A cyclist who was pushed off his bike by a neighbour as he was cycling home took revenge by attacking the man’s car with an axe.
John Bromley Williams, 51, was riding home on the Isle of Capri in Australia’s Gold Coast, when he suffered cuts and grazes after being pushed off his bike by his neighbour.
He fetched an axe from home and smashed the windscreens of two cars outside the neighbour’s house, also denting the bodywork.
A motorist dialled the emegency services who found Williams with the axe and bloodstained gloves.
The Southport Magistrates Court heard that both men had been drinking, and Williams pleaded guilty to wilful damage and arming himself so as to cause fear, according to The Australian.
He has since stopped drinking and moved house to avoid any further confrontation, the court was told.
He was made to pay AU$4546 to Suncorp Insurance and sentenced to 150 hours of community service.
In a similar incident in the UK this year, Thames Valley Police arrested a 41-year-old man on suspicion of GBH with intent and criminal damage in connection with a road rage attack in Oxford.
The incident took place on Parks Road after a motorist exiting the University of Oxford’s site there was involved in a near miss with a cyclist.
Police say that the latter then assaulted the driver with his bike lock and also damaged the vehicle.
The 32 year old victim of the alleged assault had to be treated at the city’s John Radcliffe Hospital for facial injuries.
Add new comment
16 comments
Thank you for the illustration. I was totally bemused by the concept of an 'axe' before I saw that. Could I ask for extension of the graphic glossary of terms to be extended to 'car', 'house', 'road' and 'Australia'?
Blood stained gloves? Did I miss a paragraph?
Touche!
What's all the fuss about? He just realised it was time to bury the hatchet...
Love the titles under some of these library shots.
"An axe yesterday" sort of thing...
Almost at the level of some of the captions under pics used on the Guardian site.
'A photo of a man...'
Must be for ease of legibility for blind visitors who use talking browsers (assuming there is such a thing...)
Is anyone making a light-weight aero axe that we can take on the bike?
Titanium head on a carbon handle perhaps?
Should have waited till the middle of the night. Forget axe, screwdriver through the radiator. The bloke will drive miles before the car overheats and will be ass fodder for the bush.
I may have put too much thought into this type of thing whilst I ride around seething after the latest bit of lunacy.
Luckily for me I don't own an axe!
I have a battleaxe at home but that's a different story.
We've all been there!
There's a right way and a wrong way to do this. This was the wrong way. The right way - be elected mayor, use a tank.
Still a heavier sentence than killing a cyclist with your car in this country...
The penalties for damaging another's property are probably way more severe than for endangering (or even taking) someone's life if they happen to be on a bike, so in this instance I expect the full weight of the law to fall on the angry cyclist.
And here - at least as reported - the cyclist's actions were premeditated.
And what about pushing the guy of his bike? Was the guy on foot or in car?
oh please, this is not a story - they were both drunk as skunks. Why bother reporting this...no further comment.