Man follows woman and hits her with crowbar

A woman had two arms broken after she was beaten with a crowbar in a road rage attack in south Edmonton early Tuesday.

Police were searching for a man and a silver Chevrolet Aveo.

They believe the vehicle, shown in images taken from a dashboard camera, was involved in what they describe as a “vicious” beating.

“We want this individual found,” Edmonton police spokesman Scott Pattison said Tuesday.

Southwest division officers were called to the area of 76 Avenue and 87 Street NW around 6:30 a.m. Tuesday after a 34-year-old woman said she was attacked by a man with a crowbar.

It started when she was driving north on 87 Street, having just dropped off her husband at work, when she pulled up behind a Chevrolet Aveo that was stopped in her lane.

The woman honked her horn as she turned onto 77 Avenue and passed the vehicle before driving to a nearby residence.

When she got out of her vehicle, a man ran up to her and hit her repeatedly on both arms with a crowbar, police said.

“We believe that the suspect was swinging for the complainant’s head and she blocked it; otherwise, those injuries could have been even more significant,” Pattison said.

Paramedics took her to hospital, where she had surgery for two broken arms.

While her injuries were nonlife-threatening, Pattison said the assault has left the young mother and her family traumatized.

Police were searching for a white man in his 30s, described as sixfoot-one, medium build with brown hair and blue eyes.

He was wearing a grey tuque, blue jeans and a dark jacket.

He was driving a mid-2000s silver four-door Aveo with a sevendigit Alberta licence plate that starts with the letter B.

It also has a small fin or spoiler on the rear hatch and steel rims on the tires, police said.