A 55-year-old man has been handed a suspended sentence with 18 months of probation for threatening a fellow flagger with a traffic sign at a Burnaby construction site two months ago.
Peter Kyle McGregor pleaded guilty Monday to one count of assault with a weapon for an incident at Byrnepark Drive and Marine Drive on the morning of May 30, according to agreed facts presented at a sentencing hearing in Vancouver provincial court Monday.
Police arrived at the construction site at about 7:17 a.m. to find three men holding McGregor down, Crown prosecutor Louise Gauld told the court.
The officers learned McGregor had been working at the site as a flagger, and another flagger had told him to go to the other side of the street and “do his job,” Gauld said.
McGregor told the other flagger to “go f**k herself,” according to Gauld.
After the other flagger reported the incident to her supervisor, McGregor came at her swinging his fist and a hand-held stop sign, she said.
“(The other flagger) had to back away to avoid being hit,” Gauld said.
Other workers at the site restrained McGregor until police came, but he threatened to cut off the other flagger’s head with a machete and shoot the co-workers, according to the agreed facts.
McGregor’s lawyer, Graeme Jose said it had been his client’s second day on the job, and the other flagger had made multiple comments about McGregor taking breaks when he shouldn’t be and sitting down on the job.
“That caused a little bit of obvious strife,” Jose said.
Jose said his client told him he “hugely overreacted and snapped.”
The other flagger was not struck or physically injured during the incident, according to the facts.
It’s not the first time McGregor has been convicted of assault.
Gauld outlined four previous convictions and one conviction for uttering threats, but she noted there were big gaps between those incidents.
“It appears that he has long periods where he is able to keep his anger problems in check, and then he isn’t able to do that any longer,” she said.
In a joint sentencing submission, Gauld and Jose called for a suspended sentence with 18 months of probation, including a ban on contacting the victim, a five-year weapons ban and counselling for anger management and conflict resolution as directed by his probation officer.
B.C. provincial court Judge Laura Bakan agreed to the submission and imposed the sentence.
She noted flagging can be stressful work.
“Construction sites, flagging often take place in stressful environments, with weather and motorists, and when there is conflict between workers on the job site, it can be stressful due to that environment.”
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