A former borough mayor will face trial on charges that he threatened his girlfriend with a knife, a district judge ruled.
Eric J. Strawoet, 58, of Beech Street, Cheswick, is accused of knocking down Louise Parkhill, then holding a knife to her throat in the house they were sharing Dec. 17.
Parkhill testified at Strawoet's preliminary hearing Monday that she had received an e-mail at work from someone looking for Strawoet to talk about his military service in Vietnam.
She brought the contact home to Strawoet and he appeared to appreciate it, she said.
"He got ahold of the parents of a sergeant he was with at a fire base," she said. "It was very emotional for him."
She said Strawoet, who is a barber, may have had a customer because she didn't see him for several hours.
Parkhill testified she later found him asleep on the floor of their laundry room.
"He was drinking and I woke him up. I got very angry because he wasn't supposed to drink and I told he'd have to leave," Parkhill testified.
"He told me he had no place to go. I went upstairs to dial 911 to call the police. He pulled the phone out of my hand, and he had a big knife in his hand," a tearful Parkhill testified.
The knife was a "big Rambo-type knife serrated on one side. He kept it by his bed," she testified.
She said Strawoet pushed her into the hallway and then onto the floor where he straddled her legs and held the knife to her throat.
Testifying that Strawoet stabbed the floor near her body, Parkhill said she grabbed at the knife to knock it away "because I feared for my life."
In the process she cut herself and required 13 stitches, she testified.
District Judge David Sosovicka ruled that Strawoet will stand trial on charges of aggravated and simple assault, false imprisonment, reckless endangerment, unlawful restraint, terroristic threats and harassment.
Sosovicka continued Strawoet's bond at $10,000 cash, which he had already posted.
Strawoet was ordered to begin drug-and-alcohol and anger management treatment and to stay away from Parkhill.
Strawoet didn't comment Monday.
Strawoet, who was Cheswick's mayor from 1998 to 2005, had a previous scrape with the law.
In 2004, he was placed in the Accelerated Rehabilitative Disposition (ARD) program for flashing a badge at a Buffalo Township woman and stopping her along Route 28 in Harrison.
The court dropped charges of impersonating a public servant and disorderly conduct after he successfully completed the three-month program.
At his trial, Strawoet said he flashed a badge to get people to slow down. But he denied trying to stop any drivers.
