Court views graphic video of assault

“This is not the creation of some film. This is real.

“It will involve a great deal of blood and it will involve someone close to death.”

That was the warning Judge Tory Colvin gave in court Wednesday before the broadcast of a graphic video depicting what were almost the last moments of a Niagara Falls man’s life.

The judge gave the public warning in Ontario Court of Justice in Welland at the sentencing hearing of Carl Cosby, of Niagara Falls, on a charge of aggravated assault.

In the video taken in September 2015, an intoxicated Cosby attempts to purchase items at Falls Convenience Store located at the corner of Walnut Street and Victoria Avenue in Niagara Falls.

He is unable to complete the transaction and stumbles from the store.

A short while later a man runs up to the counter, clutching his neck. Blood seeps from between his fingers and drips onto the counter and floor.

The alarmed clerk gets a chair for the man to sit on and a man in the store grabs paper towels and presses them to the man’s neck.

The 45-year-old man, bleeding profusely, then tumbles from the chair and the pool of blood around him grows.

Cosby’s lawyer, Bobby Walker had asked the judge not to play the video in court as it is “very graphic and not for public consumption.”

Crown attorney Tyler Shuster told court Cosby slashed the victim with an “edged weapon” in what he described as a random attack outside the store. He said there was no evidence the two men knew each other.

“Without the intervention of the civilian, he would have expired due to blood loss,” Shuster said.

“The blood loss was very rapid. Death was right around the corner.”

Shuster asked the judge to impose a jail term of between six and eight years, considering the life-altering injuries the victim sustained.

Walker concedes the incident was “horrific” but said a jail sentence of four years would be a more appropriate disposition.

The judge will deliver his decision May 4.