A Surrey provincial court judge shouldn't have found Amardeep Singh Lally Narwal guilty of threatening a businessman in a Surrey parking lot because she hadn't determined if he knew his accomplice had been pointing a replica gun at the time.

That what Amardeep Singh Lally Narwal's lawyer argued, though unsuccessfully, before Justice Gordon Weatherill at B.C. Supreme Court in New Westminster.

Weatherill dismissed Narwal's appeal and upheld Narwal's conviction on Monday. "In my view, there is no possible interpretation of the appellant's conduct other than that he knowingly uttered and conveyed to the complainant a threat of bodily harm," Weatherill said.

Narwal was convicted on June 3, 2011 of uttering threats to cause death or bodily harm in connection with an incident in Surrey on Sept. 22, 2010.

The court heard he drove his black Cadillac Escalade, with tinted windows, into the parking lot of Bisla Martial Arts that evening. He then rolled down his window and called out to Inderjit Bisla, owner of the club, who'd been standing nearby. "I want to talk," he said.

The court heard that Bisla ran and hid behind another car after seeing Nachatar Singh Bagri, who had been sitting in the back seat of the Escalade, point a replica gun at him. The court heard that Narwal said, "Come here, come here," and then he and Bagri said something to the effect of "Why don't you come in front of us now. We'll see you, we'll take care of you."

Bagri was also convicted of uttering threats.

Weatherill noted that the trial judge considered the context in which the words were uttered and found "any reasonable person" in Bisla's shoes that night "would have considered his life in danger as a result of the words and conduct of Mr. Narwal and Mr. Bagri."

"Theirs was not an innocent visit," he noted.

Narwal's lawyer argued that the words alone should not have been interpreted as threatening without the imitation gun in the mix. Because the trial judge didn't find Narwal was aware Bagri had pointed the gun, the lawyer argued, the judge was wrong to find Narwal guilty on the basis of a circumstance she hadn't determined he even knew about.

Weatherill disagreed.

tzytaruk@thenownewspaper.com