Driver faces charges after motorhome hits pedestrian
Accused has earlier conviction in case of ‘motor manslaughter’ from 1991
A man charged after a pedestrian was struck by a motorhome in Regina was previously convicted over a 1991 vehicle-related manslaughter, court records show.
Monday’s incident, which left a 34-year-old man in hospital, happened on the 1700 block of Prince of Wales Drive at around 3:12 p.m.
Christopher Alan Martyn, 46, has been charged with failing to stop at the scene of an accident involving bodily harm. Martyn was sent to prison more than two decades ago for what an appeal court decision called “motor manslaughter” after an Oxbow garage owner was run over in an altercation.
Soon after 3:30 p.m. on Monday, Regina police detained the driver of a motorhome in the Husky House parking lot on Prince of Wales Drive, as emergency vehicles and police cruisers surrounded the scene.
Police said in a release Tuesday that the collision victim was driving on Prince of Wales Drive when he was forced to hit a curb in order to avoid the motorhome.
With the impact with the curb damaging his vehicle and the motorhome subsequently stopping, the victim approached it on foot, according to police.
However, when the motorhome went to pull away, the victim held onto its exterior, police said. He was then thrown off the motorhome, and suffered injuries, when its driver braked.
A witness to the incident, who gave his name only as Daniel, said he was sitting in the Husky House parking lot when he saw a white motorhome back up from behind a car stopped on Prince of Wales Drive.
“I was wondering what he (the motorhome driver) was doing backing up on the street,” he said.
“And then he swerved over in the centre lane,” Daniel said, adding he saw the pedestrian get hit and thrown.
“You watch TV, you see this stuff, but you never see it in real life,” he said. “I jumped out of my truck with my cellphone in my hand, and I ran over just in case somebody else didn’t have a cellphone.”
Daniel said the motorhome involved left the scene but that other witnesses grabbed a licence plate number and followed it. It was unclear initially whether the motorhome that police were holding at the scene Monday was the one involved, although Daniel believed it wasn’t the same one.
He said the victim appeared to be having trouble breathing and was bleeding from the head but woke up while bystanders were waiting for the ambulance. The victim was taken to hospital with undetermined injuries.
Police confirmed that although the motorhome initially fled, it later returned and a man was arrested. Martyn is to appear at Regina provincial court on Oct. 11.
He was previously convicted of manslaughter for a collision in Oxbow in November 1991. Initially sentenced to two years less a day in jail, the term was later lengthened to four-and-a-half years in prison on appeal.
An Oxbow garage owner, who confronted Martyn over an unpaid repair debt, was killed. He was struck when Martyn sped away from a 2 a.m. row between the pair — over the debt — outside a hotel in Oxbow. It emerged that Martyn had fled briefly to the U.S. after the incident before returning.
“After impact with the victim, he accelerated to get over the body even though he thought he had hit either his friend ... or (the deceased),” states a 1993 Saskatchewan Court of Appeal decision upping his sentence. “His failure to stop or return, as well as his subsequent conduct, indicate a callous disregard for the lives and safety of others.”
Martyn also made news headlines nationally in July 2010 for an Amber Alert that was issued by Regina police after the disappearance of his then 34-year-old estranged partner and their fouryear-old daughter. They returned home to Regina the next day.
The woman had suffered minor injuries, but the child was unharmed. Martyn subsequently pleaded guilty to assault causing bodily harm, while other charges were dropped.