Iqaluit snowmobile attack suspect appears in court
Jordan Kovic, 19, charged with attempted murder, five other offences
A 19-year-old Iqaluit man accused of repeatedly running over someone with a snowmobile, in an attack that has left the victim in critical condition at an Ottawa hospital, appeared at the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit last week. (File photo)
A young Iqaluit man charged with attempted murder after allegedly running over another man repeatedly with his snowmobile appeared at the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit last week.
Jordan Kovic, 19, appeared before Justice Neil Sharkey on Feb. 4.
The police arrested Kovic on Dec. 27 and charged him with six counts in connection with an attack alleged to have occurred near Iqaluit’s downtown area. The charges include attempted murder of one man, assault causing bodily harm of another man and using a vehicle to cause bodily harm.
Police allege Kovic assaulted one man until unconscious and then ran over the victim with a snowmobile in a “gruesome” attack, according to RCMP media releases.
One victim of the alleged attack remains in critical condition at an Ottawa hospital, police said.
None of these charges have been proven in court.
Kovic appeared in court on Feb. 4 in connection with an unrelated set of convictions from incidents in 2018 and 2019.
In November, Justice Sue Cooper found Kovic guilty of assaulting a woman and threatening to damage her property in December 2018. At the same time, Cooper found Kovic guilty of attending the same victim’s home in April 2019, despite a court order that forbid him from doing so.
And Kovic faces two other criminal charges related to incidents alleged to have occurred in 2019. Kovic faces one count of sexual interference, which is sexual touching between an adult and a minor, and one count of sexual assault.
The sexual abuse allegations have not been tried in court.
On Feb. 4, Justice Sharkey adjourned Kovic’s sentencing for his three convictions until a pre-sentence report is submitted to the court. A pre-sentence report is usually written by a probation officer or social worker and outlines the background factors of an offender’s life history.
In other jurisdictions, courts follow the Supreme Court of Canada’s direction and provide a Gladue report, which is like a pre-sentence report specifically for indigenous offenders. Gladue reports take into consideration the Indigenous identity, life experience and history of an offender. But in Nunavut, a pre-sentence report usually takes the place of a Gladue report.
Kovic, who is remanded at the Baffin Correctional Centre in Iqaluit, is scheduled to appear in an Iqaluit court again on Feb. 18.
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