Stop sign not only clue of Hwy. 16 intersection, witnesses tell court

The first responder on the scene of a deadly collision near Langham says he would have noticed the Highway 16 intersection from Range Road 3083 — even without a stop sign.

In a video played in Saskatoon Court of Queen’s Bench, Warman RCMP Const. Gary Pepin re-enacted Robert Major’s 1.6-kilometre drive north along the range road. He took the video in January 2017 — almost a year after the Feb. 22, 2016 crash that killed three people.

Pepin testified he would have been taking in many other clues as he approached Highway 16, like the caragana bushes and the sprawling Ag in Motion site in the southeast corner of the intersection.

The stop sign at the intersection was down when Major entered the highway, striking a westbound semi hauling vehicles from Saskatoon to Edmonton.

Three of Major’s six passengers died in the crash — his sons Brenden Major, four, and Theodore Cardinal, nine, and his girlfriend, 26-year-old Kimberly Oliverio. Major, his other son, his nephew and his co-worker were injured.

Major was charged with three counts each of dangerous driving and criminal negligence causing death and bodily harm. His trial began Monday after he pleaded not guilty to the 12 charges and elected to be tried by judge and jury.

On Thursday, jurors heard the stop sign at the south intersection of Highway 16 and Range Road 3083 had been knocked down weeks before the accident, and remained frozen to the ground.

However, there is a stop sign in Pepin’s video, taken almost a year later.

Under cross-examination, Pepin told the defence that while the stop sign is what actually directs a driver to stop, the most visible object denoting the upcoming highway is the Ag in Motion site.

Paul James, a manager with the semi company, testified he drove to Saskatoon after hearing that one of the company’s vehicles was involved in a collision. He said data collected from the semi’s “black box” revealed the driver went from approximately 94 to zero kilometres an hour in eight seconds, with a nearly 20 km/h speed drop at the time of impact.

This “massive deceleration” suggests something caused the semi to stop suddenly, James told the jury. He said the impact is visible in a photo he took of the crushed passenger truck.

At the beginning of his testimony, Pepin choked up as he described being alone at the crash site when the sounds of crying children punctuated the silence.

He said he was told an extrication was needed and that there was nothing he could do, so he turned his focus to controlling traffic.

Nearly every Crown witness thus far has said the crash deeply affected them and those around them.