Police officer horrifically struck with samurai sword

Petar Govedarica was standing outside his sister’s house in July last year when he saw Milos Radovic hit a policeman with a samurai sword and split the officer’s head down to the bone.

Giving evidence in the Supreme Court yesterday, Mr Govedarica said Mr Radovic held the sword above his head with two hands before bringing the blade down forcefully on Sen. Const. Andrew Swift’s skull.

Mr Govedarica described the incident as “probably something I have seen in a movie, not something you see every day”.

Mr Radovic denies trying to kill Sen. Const. Swift, saying he was not in control of the weapon when it hit the officer. He claimed he had been tasered by the officer and was experiencing a muscle spasm at the time of the blow.

Mr Radovic went to his former wife’s house while their two teenage sons were home alone, despite a violence restraining order prohibiting him from contacting the children.

He left briefly but returned with a samurai sword after police and Mr Govedarica arrived at the property.

Mr Govedarica gave evidence that his former brother-in-law was aggressively screaming, “I am going to kill yous (sic)”, and “I want to die”, before he started swinging the sword.

He told the court Sen. Const. Swift fired his Taser before he was struck but said only one prong hit Mr Radovic and it appeared to have no impact.

Under cross-examination, Mr Govedarica rejected suggestions that Mr Radovic did not raise the sword above his head or “whack” the weapon down on to the officer’s head.

Another witness told the court that Mr Radovic appeared “extremely angry” when he arrived at the house and said he was yelling in English and Serbian.

She said she could hear Mr Radovic shouting, “Just kill me now”, and “I hope you’re happy”, in the lead-up to the alleged attack.

The woman told the jury she could not believe what she was seeing when Mr Radovic swung the sword at Sen. Const. Swift’s head.

“He just turned around and did a full-on over the head swing across the top of the police officer’s head,” she said.

Sen. Const. Swift and his partner restrained and arrested Mr Radovic before the officer was taken to hospital with a 10cm long cut and a fracture to his skull.

Prosecutor Justin Whalley argued that anyone who forcefully struck another person to the crown of their unprotected head with a bladed sword clearly had an intention to kill.

This article originally appeared on PerthNow.