By James Tinley
Register Staff
The woman Wojteck “Walter” Kanicki threatened to kill two years ago while in a drunken stupor and carrying loaded handguns is the reason he is not in prison for those crimes today.
Kanicki shared an embrace Monday with the ex-girlfriend he threatened to kill, moments after her emotional plea for leniency at Kanicki’s sentencing in Superior Court in Milford helped him avoid a prison sentence.
Kanicki, 31, whose last address was on East Main Street in Branford, was given a five-year suspended sentence Monday, after pleading guilty to the felony charges of carrying a dangerous weapon and attempt to commit second-degree burglary and the misdemeanor charges of second-degree stalking and threatening.
The charges stem from Kanicki showing up at his former girlfriend’s Milford apartment and threatening to kill her and himself in August 2006, said Assistant State’s Attorney Melanie Cradle.
The sentencing judge said the fact Kanicki was able to walk out of the courtroom a free man rather than in handcuffs was directly the result of the urging of his victim.
“If it was a situation where the victim felt traumatized and asked for a period of incarceration, I wouldn’t hesitate to send you to prison,” Judge John Cronan said to Kanicki.
“There is nothing more frightening than having someone stop at your door and be very drunk with a weapon. … Society cannot accept that.”
Kanicki was so drunk he “forgot” it had been over a decade since he broke up with the victim, and he became jealous when he found another man at her house, said his attorney, Richard Altschuler.
Kanicki was first allowed to enter the house, but was later told to leave when the now 36-year-old victim realized how drunk he was. On his way out, he stole her keys, only to return with two 9mm handguns and a .38-caliber revolver, all of which were loaded, police said.
When police arrived at her Meadowside Avenue apartment, Kanicki threw one gun to the ground and was subdued with a Taser, Cradle said.
Cradle asked that Kanicki be sentenced to “some period of incarceration,” but the judge deferred to the victim’s wishes.
The victim, whose name was not released, said, “One bad event does not erase all the good” Kanicki has done.
She told the judge that she never thought Kanicki would hurt her or himself.
“He would never hurt a fly, was never abusive and never had problems with alcohol,” she said. “What happened was a culmination of a lot of different problems, but he does not deserve to go to jail.”
Kanicki was in the midst of a divorce and financial troubles, Altschuler said. He commended Cronan for sentencing Kanicki to four years of probation rather than a prison term.
“I think it takes guts for a judge to do that,” he said. “But this was a unique situation and a prison term would have only caused more harm.”
Kanicki, a Polish immigrant, had no previous criminal record and was “living the American dream,” Altschuler said. “But in one night it became an American tragedy.”
James Tinley can be reached at jtinley@nhregister.com or 401-3530.