Driver in crash denies running stop sign

Woman on trial for dangerous driving in 2015 collision that killed Calgary man

The driver of an SUV that sideswiped a car being driven by a Calgary man, killing him, said Tuesday she didn’t run a stop sign before the deadly crash.

Cinzia Marson testified she never saw Christopher Pollitt’s Hyundai Elantra before she struck it at the intersection of Highway 791 and Highway 72.

“I get to the stop sign and I stop,” Marson told defence lawyer Alain Hepner.

“At that point I did proceed through the intersection and after that I had no idea what happened, I was in complete shock, my son woke me up crying saying ‘Mom, what happened?’” she said, choking back tears.

“I got out of the car as fast as I could to get (my son) out and I grabbed him and his blanket and I just sat down on the grass,” she said, of the June 14, 2015, collision.

Marson, charged with dangerous driving causing death, said she didn’t even know she’d struck another vehicle until she stood up after being asked by passersby to go sit in their car.

“That’s when I realized there was another vehicle farther down from me,” she said.

Under cross-examination by Crown prosecutor Ron Simenik, Marson couldn’t explain how an eyewitness said he saw her run the stop sign without slowing.

She couldn’t explain why her onboard crash data recorder had her speed at impact at 68 km/h while an accident reconstruction expert pegged it at 67 km/h.

“The expert says it’s impossible for you to have stopped at the stop sign and reached a speed of 67 km/h unless you had a rocket attached to your car,” Simenik said.

“Despite all that evidence you remember stopping?” he asked.

She said she would never have jeopardized her son’s life by driving so carelessly.

Marson also denied she may have been texting on her phone, or been distracted while talking on Bluetooth.

Justice Beth Hughes will hear final arguments in the case Wednesday.