A COURT has heard how a wagon driver “thought he was going to die” as he was stabbed repeatedly and chased through a warehouse at a depot on Carlisle’s Pirelli site.
Czech national Michael Kadlcik was waiting for tyres to be loaded on to a trailer of his vehicle at the Dalston Road complex during the early hours of April 19.
Mr Kadlcik got out of his cab when a male he didn’t know knocked on his door, but was then attacked without warning, a Carlisle Crown Court jury was told today (TUES).
As the driver fled through a warehouse, witnesses saw him running and heard him “screaming” while being pursued by a knife-wielding man making “repeated stabbing motions”. Mr Kadlcik managed to barricade himself into an office, and was treated by paramedics before being transported to a Newcastle hospital major trauma unit with stab wounds to his head, upper body and leg. He also suffered a puncture injury to his lung. When interviewed three days later, an interpreter told police Mr Kadlcik had yelled “help, help” during the incident, and stated: “He literally thought he was going to die.”
His attacker was restrained in the warehouse and arrested. Twenty-year-old Bulgarian, Martin Bozhkov, latterly of Warwick Road, is charged with attempting to murder Mr Kadlcik at a time when he was an agency worker at the site.
A jury heard today that Bozhkov was “mentally unwell” at the time of the incident and, because that remains the position, he was deemed unfit to stand trial.
Bozhkov was present in the dock as jurors were told he is “under a disability” and that their task is to say – having heard all evidence during the hearing – whether he did the act charged.
Judge James Adkin told the jury: “The critical issue you are going to have to decide at the end of the case is: are you sure it was this defendant who attacked Michael Kadlcik? Just whether it was the man in the dock who attacked him.
“It is a simple case with a simple issue.”
The hearing continues.
