MONTREAL - A young man is in hospital and a taxi driver is expected to appear in court Monday after an altercation on St. Laurent Blvd. early Sunday morning.

The incident took place around 4 a.m. at the corner of Rachel St. in Plateau-Mont-Royal. The man entered into a conflict with a group of people.

According to witnesses, the group was arguing with the man and attacked his vehicle. The driver attempted to leave and a 23-year-old man was struck down.

Jonathan Himsworth, who captured the scene on video, described it as "a horrific incident to witness."

"I just wanted there to be a witness for that. I didn't expect him to retaliate quite so extraordinarily," he said.

"That suspect was rushed to the hospital. He was in a critical state, but this morning was in stable condition," said Raphael Bergeron of the Montreal police said on Sunday. The man's situation had not changed on Monday morning.



The driver sped off from the scene and a 47-year-old taxi driver was later arrested.

"The cab driver was arrested shortly after the event for assault with a weapon, obviously due to the fact that he ran over one of the suspects," said Bergeron. The driver is expected to appear in court on Monday to face criminal charges.



A 42-year-old passenger was also arrested for mischief committed to the taxi, and was later released with a promise to appear in court.



Disturbing incident: witness

The altercation is said to have begun inside the taxi over a fare. Himsworth said he saw an angry customer exit the vehicle.

"He slammed the door extraordinarily loudly to the point where I was quite taken aback," he said, adding that the taxi driver jumped out of his car and confronted the passenger.

Himsworth said he left the scene soon after, because he was uncomfortable with how far the verbal argument had escalated.

"The cab driver's face was so vehement. I've never seen someone be so angry," he said.

Himsworth entered his home and shortly after, heard a commotion on the street.

The witness opened his window and said he saw the taxi driver aiming for his passengers.

"The same passengers that were in the cab are being chased by the cabbie reversed, back-and-forth in the intersection essentially just trying to hit them," he said.

That's when Himsworth pressed record on his camera.

"We saw the cab driver ram his cab into the lamppost. At that point I started running footage," he said.

Himsworth sent the video to CTV.

WARNING: The video is extremely graphic, and shows the man being run over.



