Brackenridge woman tells police she feared for her life in assault

Brackenridge police said officers found a woman bleeding from her mouth and nose upon responding to a domestic dispute on Cherry Street Sunday.

Police charged Nicholas Cory Skufca, 37, with a felony count of strangulation along with simple assault and harassment.

In a criminal complaint against Skufca, police said the woman had blood on her face, scratches and blood on her legs and bruising on both sides of her neck.

The woman initially declined, but later accepted medical attention. Medics suggested she should be checked at a hospital because of her neck; the woman said she’d go herself.

The incident was reported by two passersby who know Skufca and the woman, and who got out and intervened.

According to the complaint, they told police they noticed the front door to Skufca’s house was open as they drove by. They told police they heard screaming and saw the woman laying on the floor at the bottom of the steps, with Skufca standing over her.

Police said the woman told officers that Skufca came upstairs and started assaulting her. She did not know why. She said that, when she went to go downstairs, Skufca kicked her down the stairs, and kicked her in the stomach.

When asked about the bruising on her neck, police said the woman told them Skufca “was choking her to the point that she couldn’t breathe and she was afraid that Skufca was going to kill her,” the complaint states.

Police said they found the woman’s blood on the steps and in an upstairs bedroom.

Skufca denied assaulting the woman, the complaint states. Police said he became irate upon being placed under arrest, insisting there were witnesses next door who would say he had not assaulted the woman.

Police said they spoke with the neighbor, who told them she did not see anything and had not been at Skufca’s residence, but had heard a lot of screaming, yelling and banging noises coming from there.

Skufca did not have an attorney listed in court records. He was arraigned and sent to the Allegheny County Jail in lieu of $10,000 bond. His preliminary hearing is scheduled for March 10 before District Judge Carolyn Bengel.