Two officers who let go of an impaired driver before he caused a fatal crash will not face charges, Ontario’s police watchdog has decided.
Special Investigations Unit (SIU) Director Joseph Martino said on Monday that there are no reasonable grounds to believe that any of the Halton Regional Police (HRPS) officers committed any criminal offense in connection with the March 30, 2024 collision.
The SIU, a civilian agency that investigates officer conduct that may result in the death, serious injury, sexual assault and/or shooting of a person, said it was notified of the incident on July 22 of the same year.
Around 1:30 a.m. March 30, police were called to the McDonald’s parking lot in Milton on reports of an impaired driver – later identified as an 18-year-old man – behind the wheel of a black Infiniti. A 16 year old girl was a passenger in the car.
Two officers responded to the call, one of whom was designated as the subject officer by the SIU. The officer spoke to the driver “at length” and found no reason to charge him with impaired driving. They did not perform an examination or use a respirator to determine consciousness, Martino’s report said. The driver was allowed to leave the scene.
Video footage was later obtained from McDonald’s that “potentially revealed” the driver was stumbling and/or under the influence of alcohol/drugs, according to the report.
At 2:23 a.m., two other officers, one of whom is believed to be the second subject, pulled over the driver near the intersection of Derry Road and Holly Avenue in Milton. The report shows the Infiniti weaving in and out of lanes on Derry Road.
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The traffic stop was captured on the officer’s in-car camera (ICC) footage, which showed the subject officer speaking with the driver sitting in the driver’s seat. A few moments later, the officer asked the passenger to get out and talk for a moment before deactivating his ICC microphone. The report indicated that the cause was unknown.
The officer charged the driver with two offenses under the Highway Traffic Act – careless driving and not having a front number plate – but allowed the driver to leave the scene at 2.50am. There is no examination, nor are there any tools used to determine sobriety.
“At 3:19 a.m., HRPS received multiple 911 calls from the intersection of Derry Road and Sixth Line in Milton, reporting that two vehicles were involved in a motor vehicle collision and both vehicles were on fire,” the report states.
HRPS officers arrived at the scene at 3:24 a.m. and found two cars: one Infiniti and the other a 2014 Honda CRV driven by a 26-year-old man. The Infiniti crashed into the back of a CRV stopped at a red light on Derry Road at a speed of 140 to 154 kilometers per hour.
Both vehicles were engulfed in flames, and all three occupants died at the scene.
The 18-year-old’s blood sample was eventually sent for analysis and determined to be three times over the legal limit.
Martino said the offense he deemed was criminal negligence causing death – a test that has high standards that must be met.
“The alleged conduct must reflect negligence or reckless disregard for the lives or safety of others. Errors in judgment or negligence alone are not sufficient to establish liability,” he said.
“In the final analysis, when the officers’ recklessness regarding the second stop is weighed against the mitigating considerations noted above, the available evidence is insufficient to prove that their actions constituted a clear and substantial deviation from the level of care that was reasonable under the circumstances.”
No officers participated in the investigation or provided their records, as is their legal right.
Because the incident was reported to the SIU about four months after it occurred, no physical evidence was collected, according to the report.
Martino said it appeared the incident may have contravened the SIU Act and the Police Code of Ethics, and there was evidence that the two officers committed “possible violations” in the way they investigated code-related matters.
He referred the matter to the head of HRPS for review and will notify the Law Enforcement Complaint Board, which handles public complaints about police behavior in such matters.
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