A 32-year-old Barrie father took the stand on Tuesday and said he was only acting in self-defence during a drunken altercation where another man ended up with stab wounds to his back, face and leg at a downtown hotel room more than three years ago.
Rehano Harold, 32, has pleaded not guilty to a charge of assault causing bodily harm in a judge-alone trial in Ontario Superior Court before Justice Robert Gattrell at the Barrie Courthouse.
During his testimony in his own defence on Tuesday, Harold also made the stark claim that the alleged victim’s girlfriend was the instigator who goaded her boyfriend, Aaron Lewis, into attacking him, handing Lewis the knife that he managed to wrest away from Lewis while both men fought.
According to Harold, things became violent after he refused a drink from Abby, Lewis’s girlfriend, who was also called to testify by the Crown last week. Shortly thereafter, she encouraged her boyfriend to attack him, Harold testified from the stand through questioning by his defence lawyer, Robert Chartier.
“She said (to Lewis), ‘I’m not going to hold you back anymore, you got to do what you got to do,’” Harold said in court. “I saw Aaron tuck in his necklace and start coming toward me.
“He grabbed me with one hand and punched me with the other."
The initial confrontation led to his head being violently smashed into the hotel room wall and was followed by both men tussling on the ground, Harold testified.
It was the lone piece of his evidence that confirmed parts of Lewis's testimony from last week – that Harold's head had caused a hole in the wall.
But, critically, the accused directly contradicted Lewis’s evidence, especially regarding the knife and how it appeared by Abby handing it to Lewis.
“I heard Abby say, ‘here baby,'” testified Harold, to describe her handing the weapon to her boyfriend.
Harold, who also claimed the knife did not belong to him, said the two men were on the ground for between 15 and 30 seconds and that the weapon became dislodged from Lewis’s hand during that time.
“I was just trying to get away and defend myself,” Harold testified, adding it was likely kicked out of Lewis’s hand by one of the women who were present and trying to break up the fight.
Lewis, in his testimony last week, identified the knife as the one that cut him in three distinct places on his body, including a slash mark on the left side of his face extending up to just below his left eye.
Video evidence from the hotel room's bathroom, which was presented before Harold testified, clearly showed two holes on the back of Lewis’s shirt.
Both couples had gathered at the hotel on the afternoon of April 9, 2021 to celebrate the birthday of Harold’s girlfriend. A frantic search for his glasses followed later and led to him dumping the contents of Abby’s handbag out on to a bed in an attempt to find them, believing the bag was instead his own girlfriend’s.
It was another key point that differed significantly from what the court heard last week from Lewis, who testified that Harold became agitated when his keys were hidden to prevent him from driving home after having too much to drink.
Harold said that he was aware of the location of his keys and that it was irrelevant in any case, because he had no intention of driving home. And even if he did, he said he hadn’t drank nearly as much as the others and was OK to drive. In fact, Harold claimed, it was Lewis and his girlfriend who were out-of-control drunk.
The case, which has been delayed by other cases needing court time and technology issues, ended with Crown attorney Susie Safar cross-examining the accused, attempting to cast doubt on Harold’s version of what happened that night.
With only closing submissions remaining, the case is soon expected to be in the hands of Gattrell to render his decision.
