A B.C. man has been found not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder following a June 2022 attack at a Vancouver gas station where he threatened to kill people.
“He believed all the people he attacked were part of the Hells Angels,” Vancouver Provincial Court Judge Andrea Brownstone said in her decision June 4.
She said Leslie Dale Chudek, found guilty of aggravated assault, assault, uttering threats and dangerous vehicle operation, was capable of understanding the nature of his actions but not that they were wrong.
She found he had a chronic psychiatric disorder of a persecutory type.
The events horrified Vancouver as part of a series of stranger attacks in the city.
His trial before Brownstone began Feb. 14 with Crown prosecutor Phillip Sebellin and defence lawyer Kristy Neurauter presenting an agreed statement of facts.
Neurauter then asked Brownstone to find Chudek guilty but not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder. That led to testimony from two psychiatrists Feb. 14-15.
Brownstone ruled Chudek did not understand his actions that day were morally wrong. As such, she ruled him criminally responsible due to a mental disorder (NCRMD), and remanded him into custody at B.C.’s Forensic Psychiatric Hospital.
The events
An agreed statement of facts said Chudek’s involvement with police had begun the previous evening when he was found holding a sign saying, “goodbye Les Chudek” and something about the Hells Angels.
When police arrived, Chudek told them the Hells Angels were after him, preventing him from buying gas at service stations.
About three hours later, early on the morning of June 1, police received reports of the vehicle running red lights in Port Coquitlam.
Half an hour later, Burnaby RCMP attempted to stop the vehicle near Canada Way.
Soon, it was reported that the vehicle was on Vancouver’s East Hastings driving with no tire on one wheel, leaving a trail of debris as the vehicle ran on the rim.
As those events were unfolding, a man went into a 7-Eleven at the Esso station at Hastings and Skeena. Almost immediately, he was struck by a red minivan. Videos played for the court showed the man being thrown in the air and crumpling to the ground.
Chudek got out of his vehicle carrying two weapons: a knife and a tree-pruning saw. Police initially reported that the saw was a machete.
Sebellin said a number of witnesses described Chudek as dazed, distressed and agitated.
That man was stabbed at one point, the court heard. In hospital, the man was treated for a stab wound to his back and a couple of fractures, one which required surgery.
Pruning saw
The court heard Chudek moved toward one bystander and struck him on the head with the pruning saw.
"'I'm going to kill you because that gang is going to kill me anyway,'" Sebellin quoted Chudek as saying.
A chase captured on video soon took place around the gas station, with people scattering in all directions.
Sirens could be heard as Chudek wandered around the gas station before he got onto a motorcycle and tried to start it.
Police approached him with firearms drawn. Chudek dropped to the ground and was cuffed. He told officers his wife and daughter had been killed by Hells Angels.
The verdict
What an NCRMD verdict means is that a criminal act was proven, but there was no criminal intent on the accused’s part.
The court heard repeatedly Chudek believed he was being pursued by the Hells Angles and believed the man he hit with his vehicle was a member of the motorcycle club.
Brownstone also transferred Chudek’s file to the B.C. Review Board, the agency responsible for supervising people found not criminally responsible.
Brownstone also made an order for Chudek’s DNA to be taken on an application from Crown prosecutor Sebellin, who said Chudek poses a risk to the public.
Defence lawyer Neurauter opposed the application saying such a move would only exacerbate her client’s fear of police.
The psychiatrists
Psychiatrist Dr. Robert Lacroix told Brownstone during the trial he had diagnosed Chudek as having been in a psychotic state marked by persecutory delusions that took over his thinking.
Lacroix said the disorder is marked by fixed ideas that are not susceptible to reason or logic.
The doctor testified Chudek had been exhibiting such symptoms for some time.
“He retained the capacity to appreciate the nature and quality of what he did,” Lacroix said. “He did not know his actions were wrong.”
Lacroix said Chudek lacked the capacity to make rational decisions when it came to dealing with perceived threats.
“There was no reality-based threat to him,” Lacroix said. “He was acting simply to preserve his life.”
In June 2022, Crown prosecutor Karen Haughton said reports from doctors indicated Chudek was mentally fit to stand trial.
The incident was one of multiple stranger attacks that happened in Vancouver.
