MANDEL: Court hears alleged skipper in boat crash ‘impaired’

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The toxicology results certainly sounded devastating for the man accused of causing a deadly boat crash that killed two of his passengers.

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If indeed Filip Grkovski was the skipper on that deadly night of May 31, 2022.

Forensic scientist Cara Shepard told Grkovski’s judge-alone trial that a sample of his blood taken at the hospital more than four hours following the boat capsizing indicated prior cocaine use within “the last day or two” of the crash. She also projected that he would have had a BAC of between 85 and 154 mg of alcohol in 100 ml of blood between 11:46 p.m. and 11:53 p.m., the time when his 30 ft. pleasure craft slammed into a rock breakwall near Tommy Thompson Park and flipped over.

Shepard said there would be “significant” impairment in his ability to drive the boat at a BAC of anything more than 50 mg/100 ml. But she admitted that based on the findings, she couldn’t draw any conclusions about whether the cocaine produced any impairment.

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Defence lawyer Alan Gold tried his best to shake her opinion, suggesting that driving on the road with pedestrians and traffic is far more complex than driving a boat slowly back to a marina along a channel where all you had to do was keep to the left of the buoys.

Shepard said she couldn’t comment on which would be more complex, but her opinion remains: “I would expect an individual to be impaired in their ability to operate a conveyance within these ranges.”

Grkovksi, 41, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of criminal negligence causing death, four counts of criminal negligence causing bodily harm; two counts of impaired operation causing death; and four counts of impaired operation causing bodily harm.

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It’s a miracle only two died that night.

Forensic pathologist Dr. Maliha Khara testified Megan Wu, 24, of Newmarket, and Julio Abrantes, 34, of Richmond Hill, were victims of drowning. Wu also had a blood alcohol concentration of 156 mg/100 ml of blood.

Court has heard Grkovski took about nine passengers to party on the lake at a “tie-in” with about five other boats near Centre Island. At issue is who was behind the wheel when the craft returned about eight hours later and flipped over.

For Zaynab Altakawee, 28, this was her third time on Grkovski’s boat and she recalled him popping champagne for them and drinking – but “not aggressively” – as he drove them toward the boat get-together.

After an afternoon and evening of partying, they headed back to the marina. At that point, “Filip was driving,” Altakawee recalled.

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She said Filip and his girlfriend Vanessa had been fighting heatedly all day and she went down to the cabin with her two friends to try and calm her down. She then came up and ended up dozing on a bench beside the sleeping Abrantes and Wu.

Altakawee then remembered suddenly waking up feeling nauseous and “Eddie” now at the controls. She went down to the washroom when “everything just started shaking, tumbling, flipping.”

The boat ended up wedged upside down against the rocks, and she and her three friends were trapped below for about 45 minutes.

“Thank God we didn’t drown because the rock was able to hold the boat up at an angle that we still had air,” she said. “We were just panicking, screaming, crying, trying to kick and get out the window.”

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Her anger continues to this day.

“We could see out the windows that eventually most of them made it to the rocks and they were just sitting there, just not even caring about us sinking,” Altakawee recalled.

The only one in the water trying to help was Grkovski but she claimed he was really only interested in rescuing his girlfriend.

She ended up blacking out due to the fumes from the leaking gas. Later she learned first responders cut a hole out of the hull of the boat and pulled them all to safety.

All but Wu and Abrantes.

So who was driving when the boat crashed? Despite the defence lawyer’s charge that she was “trying to cause problems” for his client, Altakawee was keen to tell the court that it could have been Grkovski.

“I don’t know who actually was behind the wheel when I was downstairs,” Altakawee testified.

The trial continues.

mmandel@postmedia.com

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