Source: Hamilton Spectator
ONTARIO - A prohibited driver who ran a red light while being pursued by police told a Hamilton judge he does not remember the crash that killed his 18-year-old daughter.
Terry J. Ritchie, 46, was sentenced yesterday by Ontario Court Justice John Takach to a further 29 months in a federal penitentiary on top of eight months of pretrial custody and was prohibited from driving anywhere in Canada for life.
The Hamilton man pleaded guilty in October to criminal negligence causing the death of his daughter, Natasha Ritchie, and driving while disqualified.
"There's not much that I can say, your Honour, except that I don't remember that day right from the start," said Ritchie. "I do miss my daughter very much."
Defence lawyer Jaime Stephenson said her client was badly injured in the March 28 collision and since his release from hospital, has been held without bail while recovering from a brain injury and fractures of his collarbone, pelvis and leg.
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Linda Ritchie said their fervent wish was that police, who had stopped her brother 10 days before the fatal crash, had done more than issue him a provincial offences notice for having an invalid licence plate sticker. She said her brother was carrying a driver's licence that had expired two decades earlier.
"If they would have impounded his car 10 days before, then Natasha might still be alive today," she said.
Linda Ritchie said the family continues to support Terry -- not because his reprehensible driving is forgiven but because they know how much he loved Natasha and grieves for her.
"This time it's different, because he has lost his baby," she said.
Ritchie had been a suspended driver under the Highway Traffic Act for 20 years and a prohibited driver under the Criminal Code for more than a year when he fled police and caused the crash, with his daughter a front-seat passenger.
His black Saturn was speeding west on Wilson Street being chased by a police cruiser that had its lights flashing and siren activated when Ritchie drove through the red light at Wellington Street shortly after 8 p.m. The car struck a van in the intersection, spun out of control and slammed into a utility pole.
Assistant Crown attorney Todd Norman said Ritchie's flagrant disregard for driving prohibitions and suspensions and his deliberate endangerment of other people on the roads demanded a penitentiary term. He recommended four years less double credit for pretrial custody, leaving 32 months in prison.
Takach said his primary concern was public safety and to send a message that drivers who flee police will be sent to prison. He said Natasha Ritchie was also a member of the public and "entitled to her life as much as any stranger would have been."
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