The assault trial of a state trooper accused of beating a Russian hotel worker continued Wednesday with a disagreement over whether a translator was needed. Prosecutors wanted Ivan Cholak to speak through a translator as he described the evening when he says he was attacked by S.C. Highway Patrol Lieutenant Danny R. Webb. The defense said he knew enough English to insult Webb that night.

Defense attorney Glenn Walters asked Cholak “You testified that you don’t understand the word ’bastard.’”.

“My family not use them (words),” Cholak said.

“But you do understand the word ’n——-,’” Walters asked, but Cholak’s response was unintelligible.

Webb, a 21-year law enforcement veteran, is charged with pointing and presenting a firearm, assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature and malicious injury to property. He was suspended from the Highway Patrol after being arrested in the March 2004 incident.

Prosecutors claim Webb became angry because Cholak refused to move his truck, which straddled two parking spaces, and pulled his service weapon on Cholak. They say he hit Cholak’s face with the gun barrel and knocked a cell phone out of his hands when he tried to call police.

Cholak said he suffered back pain and a broken finger in the incident.

The defense tells a different story, saying Cholak taunted Webb and called him a racial epithet. Webb, who was in town with his children to visit friends and attend a church function, only pulled his weapon when he thought Cholak appeared to pull something silver from his pocket. The family fled when a Cholak acquaintance got into a confrontation with Webb’s 12-year-old son, the defense says.

In Wednesday’s testimony, the second day of the trial, prosecution and defense argued over whether the jury’s understanding of testimony would be benefitted by the use of an interpreter to translate Ivan Cholak’s version the alleged assault.

“Can you speak English?” 1st Circuit Assistant Solicitor Brian Jeffries asked of Cholak.

“Nemnoga (a little),” Cholak said through , an certified Russian interpreter sworn in before testimony began early Wednesday.

The need for an interpreter was brought into question after Walters had Cholak testify in English about the alleged confrontation with the trooper.

After Walters’ exchange with Cholak, Jeffries apparently foresaw defense’s direction and objected to Walters’ questioning, stating that Cholak “shouldn’t be impeached because the state asked for an interpreter.”

“The defendant has asked that the plaintiff talk only in English,” Walters said.

Circuit Court Judge Diane Goodstein then ordered a recess for jurors and time for her to consider a motion to dispense with Tobias’ services. In the jury’s absence, Goodstein said her decision to “certify” Tobias as a translator came only on prosecutor’s information that Cholak spoke or wrote only a small amount of English.

“That is simply incorrect,” she said. “Having heard this witness testify, he does have a substantial grasp of the English language.”

In the end, Goodstein decided a jury would be best served if Tobias translated only if Cholak felt comfortable speaking in his native Russian.

He did. And Tobias translated the testimony of Cholak, who remained on the witness stand all day Wednesday.

“Describe the man who hit you, the man who had the gun,” Jeffries said.

“He was black man,” Cholak said through Tobias. “He was taller than me, bigger than me.”

“Let me ask you this, why was your truck taking up two spaces?”

“Because of the job I was doing,” Cholak said. “If I had parked my truck straight, I would not have been able to open truck.”

“You testified that you had your truck parked a certain way so you could load and unload your truck, is that correct?”

“Da (yes).”

“And when he started swinging at you, did you say anything to him first?”

“Nyet (no).”

Cholak said that during the altercation, his cell phone was broken when Webb knocked it from his hands as he attempted to call 911.

But under cross-examination, Walters retrieved state’s exhibit number four, Cholak’s cell phone. Several members of the jury audibly snickered when the theme to a Harry Potter movie chimed out as Walters pushed the cell phone’s power button to on.

“Your testimony was he broke your phone,” Walter said. “You said you were unable to communicate with police because the phone wasn’t working. Can you explain to me why it works today and why it didn’t then?”

Walters offered that Cholak’s motivation for pressing the criminal charge was to enhance the potential of a civil suit.

“I am here in America,” Cholak said in broken English. “I never hold my hand out. I never ask anything of nobody.”

“Isn’t it true (the assault) never happened?” Walters asked.

“It all happened the way I told,” Cholak said.

After Cholak was dismissed from the stand, Goodstein instructed jurors to return at 9 a.m. today. She ordered that in the meantime, jurors not to discuss the case or expose themselves to any media outlet, including newspapers, TV or the Internet.

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