An Edmonton man who broke a woman’s arms with a crowbar during a road-rage attack was briefly led off to jail Thursday after he was sentenced for aggravated assault.
Moments later, the Court of Appeal of Alberta issued an order releasing Jared Eliasson from custody.
At his sentencing hearing, Eliasson was handed a three-and-a-half-year term by Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Adam Germain.
With credit for nine months spent in the Edmonton Remand Centre and two years spent under house arrest, Eliasson was set to spend the next two years less a day in a provincial jail.
“You will leave the court today through the back door and start your sentence,” the judge told Eliasson, who appeared surprised.
Before Germain left the courtroom, Eliasson, 31, asked if he could put something on the record. The judge refused his request.
Not long after Eliasson was led away to cells by a sheriff, another lawyer appeared on his behalf in the Court of Appeal.
Deborah Hatch said she will seek to have the conviction overturned and a new trial ordered. She asked that Eliasson be granted bail pending appeal.
In passing his sentence, Germain said he could find no explanation for what he characterized as over-the-top road rage.
“He needs help,” Germain said, “or at the end of his prison sentence he will continue to be the same, if not worse.”
The judge also ordered that Eliasson spent three years on probation after his release from jail.
Germain noted Eliasson’s lack of remorse over the unprovoked attack in March 2017 on Chelsey Schendzielorz.
“Mr. Eliasson should know better,” Germain said. “He is an intelligent individual … and obviously articulate. On some level, a deep thinker. He’s had all the advantages society has to offer him.
“Despite this, he commits a crime that shocks the community. Because anybody in the community could be a victim. It is difficult to defend against an enraged individual who has an iron bar in his hand.”
Outside court, Schendzielorz said she continues to have nightmares about the attack.
“I still say that I saved someone’s life, because I was strong enough to withstand the blows,” she said. “If it was someone like a little old lady who honked her horn, or someone smaller than me, I don’t think they’d be here.”
She said she had hoped Eliasson would be given a longer sentence.
“I still think he should have got more, because I’m stuck like this for the rest of my life,” Schendzielorz said. “Once he’s done serving, he might have some trouble getting a job or whatever, but he can proceed doing everything that he used to.”
Schendzielorz said she is getting counselling and hopes her attacker will also seek help.
“I’ve always stated he needs to go to jail and get the help,” she said. “That is what I do wish for him. To become a productive member of society.”