Sergie Chukwak, 47, of Naknek, was arrested at the Sea Inn Bar last Friday night by Dillingham police, after the owners called to say he was highly intoxicated and refused to leave. Officer Dan Decker advised Chukwak he was under arrest for criminal trespass and remaining in licensed premises while intoxicated, but according to Decker, Chukwak said "he was not going to jail."
Decker reported that it took several efforts by he and two Sea Inn employees to subdue Chukwak and place him in handcuffs. All three men were required to get Chukwak into the backseat of the patrol car, as he was apparently kicking at the men.
Before sleeping it off, police say Chukwak ripped the paneling off of the wall in cell number five at the Dillingham Jail, causing several hundred dollars in damage.
He was arraigned on four charges the following Saturday morning, including forcibly resisting arrest and criminal mischief for damaging the jail cell. A $500 cash bail was posted Monday for his release. Police later filed another charge that Chukwak was violating the conditions of his release from an arrest for felony assault, resisting arrest, and possession of drugs in Naknek at the end of June.
Chukwak was a member of the Bristol Bay Native Corporation Board of Directors from 2010 until November 2012, when he voluntarily resigned after being charged with second-degree sexual assault in Naknek.
The victim of that alleged assault later committed suicide, and the state's case against Chukwak unraveled without her testimony. The prosecution dismissed the charge at the end of January 2013.
This story first appeared in The Bristol Bay Times/Dutch Harbor Fisherman and is republished here with permission.