CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. — A P.E.I. man who was accused of throwing a woman to the floor and hitting her in the head while she was down was recently found guilty of assault causing bodily harm.
Mark Anthony Tippett, 33, appeared before Judge John Douglas in provincial court in Charlottetown for a trial over several days after he pleaded not guilty to the charge.
Tippett pleaded guilty to a charge of mischief.
During the trial, the victim testified Tippett was in her apartment when she asked him for a quarter of a sleeping pill he was taking.
At the time, Tippett was under several probation orders with the condition he not have any contact with the victim.
The victim testified she didn’t get to the pharmacy in time and wanted the pill to help her to sleep.
Tippett wouldn’t give her the pill and the victim testified she told him if he wasn’t going to help her, he could leave.
She said Tippett started smashing things in her apartment, threw her to the floor and hit her in the head.
He later punched her in the face after she was back on her feet, the victim said.
Pictures the Charlottetown police took were entered into evidence and showed bruising and swelling on the victim’s face.
Tippett denied assaulting the woman, saying he tried to leave the apartment after she demanded some of his sleeping pill, but she jumped on his back before he could get out.
He testified he threw the victim on her bed and darted for the door.
Tippett said he heard the woman fall off her bed and saw her on the floor before he left.
He denied throwing the woman to the floor or hitting her.
“That did not happen,” he said.
During his testimony, Tippett said the victim knocked a TV over in the apartment and he broke her lamp over his knee.
Some of the victim’s testimony was corroborated by a neighbour who testified she was in her own apartment on a different floor when she felt the wall and floor shake.
She described it as seeming like something slammed into the house.
“It was unsettling,” the neighbour said.
The court heard that when the neighbour went downstairs she heard crying from the victim’s apartment where Tippett called the woman a slob and made disparaging comments about her.
“It was mean,” the witness said.
She also testified Tippett and the victim told her they were OK from inside the apartment.
Tippett denied yelling the things the neighbour said she heard him say.
In finding Tippett guilty, Douglas said the police photos made his version of events less credible and his activities weren’t consistent with someone hurrying to get out of the apartment.
Douglas said he didn’t believe Tippett’s version of what happened.
Tippett, who has been in custody since his arrest, will be back in court May 21 for sentencing.
