Former Ontario attorney-general Michael Bryant was charged today with criminal negligence causing death and dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death in relation to a cyclist's death last night on Bloor St. W. Here is what the Criminal Code says:


Causing death by criminal negligence

220. Every person who by criminal negligence causes death to another person is guilty of an indictable offence and liable

(a) where a firearm is used in the commission of the offence, to imprisonment for life and to a minimum punishment of imprisonment for a term of four years; and

(b) in any other case, to imprisonment for life.

R.S., 1985, c. C-46, s. 220; 1995, c. 39, s. 141.


Dangerous operation of motor vehicles, vessels and aircraft

249. (1) Every one commits an offence who operates

(a) a motor vehicle in a manner that is dangerous to the public, having regard to all the circumstances, including the nature, condition and use of the place at which the motor vehicle is being operated and the amount of traffic that at the time is or might reasonably be expected to be at that place;

Dangerous operation causing death

(4) Every one who commits an offence under subsection (1) and thereby causes the death of any other person is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years.

Negligence? Is that in like, mr Bryant did not exercise proper care for the cyclists safety when he was deliberately smashing him into obstacles on the side of the road? Feels like murder to me, but what do I know I guess.

Does criminal negligence causing death at least carry a significant jail sentence?

Minimum sentence only applies for a firearms offence? Wonder what the thinking behind that is? The scenario that has been sketched, ever so briefly, is one right out of a movie. Negligence wouldn't seem to be a part of that. I guess there were a sufficient number of expert witnesses to counter-balance the accounts of the lay witnesses.

****.. I missed the news this morning and this is definitely not what I expected when trying to catch up on bikeforums posts.

The whole thing is sickening.. I'm feeling particularly nauseated after watching the witness testimonies on ctv. I'm far from being a lawyer, but how the hell can trying to knock a person off your car by running them into roadside objects at speed be anything other than attempted (or in this case, successful) murder?

Even if I try to put myself in Bryant's shoes to come up with a plausible defence (i.e. what TJ said -- the potential for claiming "I was terrified" / self defence), he has shown a complete disregard for human life by (allegedly) speeding off after running over the cyclist + leaving him bleeding in the road to die.

Fear fleeing is classic defense, BUT being a boxer he coulda just punched him off the car sooo easily. I hope the prosecution bring that up. I still wonder what kind of driving brought Al to the drivers side for a 'chat' to begin with.

Did they mention if the lady in the passenger side was his wife? I think the criminal negligence is because he has no history with this guy, murder can't be proved. In the heat of the moment type stuff, manslaughter can easily defended re a bar fight (I didn't mean to kill him). In this regard his actions were so likely to cause terrible injury, if not death that you apply criminal negligence, otherwise dick heads like this would NEVER get life, ever, for anything. The minimum four years as applied to firearms is, I think, in the instance you kill someone showing them a loaded gun and it goes off. No intention to kill, or even harm, but damn you were EVER effin stupid. I think in other cases the minimum would not be generally applied in sentencing because, other than a loaded gun, you will have a very hard time being so stupid with anything else that you might actually kill someone... so you'd have to have been trying. Like in this case.

My barrister has advised me that I reserve the right to be utterly and completely wrong in the above legal interpretation.

I'll be at the memorial tomorrow. Unfortuntely.

How do we think White Industries hubs would hold up to cyclocross - good/bad?

Yep, I'll be there too.

My ENO bearings seized after part of one winter's worth of riding, but I believe its known the WI uses dumpy bearings. They are light, however.

I have a kid on our team who needs new mtn cranks but can ill afford any...he would be stoked to put those on his bike

So in addition to the tragedy with Al, I saw another cyclist (or atleast bicycle) down on Spadina near Dundas today...

There was a bike on the streetcar tracks, it looks like he was crossing to the other side of Spadina from one of the exits from Kensington Market when he got hit by a streetcar. I saw a mangled fender, the rear tire looked pretty chewed up too... no sign of the cyclist, but lots of police around, and all southbound streetcars were diverted. Anyone know what happened?

I won't be able to make it to the memorial, but my thoughts are with you.

So I converted my roomates bike to an IGH and got as far as setting up the actual shifter... I have no idea how the cables even attach. So I've sent him along to Urbane tomorrow with a 95% done bike. Truth be told I'm totally comfortable with setting up everything applicable to either single speeds or deraileur bikes, but this other stuff I have no bloody idea.

"My ENO bearings seized after part of one winter's worth of riding, but I believe its known the WI uses dumpy bearings. They are light, however."

Oh cr@p, are these hubs junk? I just bought 3 of them a 40 spoke front and rear, and a 32 spoke front, for various touring applications. It was an impulse purchase, normaly I would be drawn to Phil hubs (or Shimano). I also got a crank, and the BB (didn't expect much of the BB). I just thought it was kinda a kick to be able to get almost a groupo of parts for Rohloff tourer.

I miss working at urbane sometimes.

/sigh

On the other hand. BB30/Super record/Di2 for the win! We gots it all

I remember frequenting that shop back in the '90s when I lived out there. What section of town are you living in? I used to live up in Edgemont Village. My dad spent much of his youth living out near Lighthouse Point. Someday when I retire I'm gonna pack up and move back out there.

Bearings are cartridge sealed, so if they fail, you can replace them with much better ones. I can't complain about the hub otherwise, and I don't know how it's doing right now, because I gave it away to a friend some time ago. I'm sure you'll be fine.

I'm a bit confused. Is the memorial tonight still happening?

yup .. yesterdays was a more friend centric one I think ... I think loads of folks out tonight

Hey is it me or are we starting to see a smearing campaign of the deceased cyclist character? The ex-AG has hired a firm known to represent high profile public figure, including B. Mulroney...

Dude ... that started when the former AG pulled over at the Hyatt. The machine is in full motion. The Prince of Toronto will drive once more.

The articles I've read this morning (in the Metro paper) didn't mind painting Al as an alcoholic with a "substance abuse" history - it was seemingly implying he was on a mission looking for trouble - wasn't particularly nice I thought...

WTF, indeed - regardless of this, the guy was killed and it was far from an accident.

Bleh. :(

I've heard of two cyclist/streetcar accidents from yesterday and today too - anyone know anything of them? It was only on a traffic report I heard.

edit: http://www.citytv.com/toronto/cityne...ike-collisions

Yeah that's what I thought. It helps to be rich & powerful & connected with the justice system, police, media, etc. Next thing you know he'll be congratulated for having courageously defended himself from an armed and dangerous cyclist that assaulted him.

Hi all, lurker here. Just wanted to share this link - Bryant just resigned from Invest Toronto and claimed innocence. (Not surprising I guess, but how he can possibly be innocent of these charges - in lay person real life, not rich and powerful real life - is beyond me.)

http://www.citytv.com/toronto/cityne...invest-toronto


edit: another (longer) piece from the Star: http://www.thestar.ca/news/ontario/article/689950

I don't know much about criminal charges but in theory he could be innocent of one charge and be guilty of a lesser charge.

On a somewhat unrelated matter, does anyone know what happened to the driver that hit Charlie?

I hope something significant. Just about every time I go on a road ride I get that in my head at some point.