Drunk driver gets five years for killing N.B. woman
Erin Wright captured on video drinking seven shots of tequila and then stumbling to her car
A Toronto hairstylist who drove her car onto a sidewalk and struck and killed New Brunswick visitor Debra Graves was sentenced to five years in prison Thursday after pleading guilty to impaired driving causing death.
“Good luck,” Ontario Court Justice Timothy Breen told Erin Wright, 29, as she was led out of court in handcuffs. “You can’t fix what you have done, but you can hopefully gain something from the experience.”
Breen accepted a joint position on sentence that included a four-year driving prohibition once she is released.
Members of Graves’ family were in the courtroom and filed victim impact statements. In addition to pouring out their anguish over losing a beautiful, caring and compassionate mother, Graves’ daughters, Caitlin and Sarah Crawford, delivered a blistering message.
When someone drinks and drives, he or she has already decided it’s OK to kill someone’s loved one, they wrote. “Your selfish and reckless convenience and entertainment” was more valuable than their mother’s life, they wrote.
Wright submitted a letter expressing remorse to the family but declined the judge’s offer to say anything in court.
On Oct. 4, 2017, Wright went to the St. Louis Bar and Grill at Fairview Mall at Don Mills Rd. and Sheppard Ave. E., where video footage captured her consuming at least seven shots of tequila between 8:44 p.m. and 10:45 p.m. Beer was served at the table, but it isn’t clear whether she consumed any. Just after 11 p.m., video surveillance shows her stumbling and having trouble opening the door to leave, according to an agreed statement of facts read out in court.
A man who ambushed and stabbed his ex-girlfriend — an attack witnessed by the woman’s young daughter — will be sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to second-degree murder.
The brutal killing of 31-yearold Cotie Weekley, a single mom who worked two jobs to support her daughter Jasmine, has devastated a family and deeply affected the little girl, who is now 8, prosecutor Greg O’Driscoll said during a hearing Wednesday, May 9, in Oshawa.
“She was just 7 when she witnessed her mother murdered,” O’Driscoll told Superior Court Justice Michelle Fuerst. “Multiple lives have been ruined here. It’s profound, it’s devastating. It’s permanent.”
Weekley had ended her tumultuous relationship with Wesley Guzylak shortly before she was stabbed to death outside her home on Simcoe St. N. in Oshawa on the night of Jan. 22, 2017, court heard.
Crown and defence counsel have submitted a joint proposal of life in prison with no possibility of parole for 14 years and nine months for Guzylak, who has admitted he killed Weekley in a rage fuelled by alcohol and jealousy. The hearing continues in June.
Guzylak sat in the prisoner’s dock throughout a daylong hearing, hunched forward with his gaze cast down as the judge listened to victim impact statements by members of Weekley’s family.
The most heart-wrenching of those was a video in which Jasmine described how her mother’s death had impacted her.
“My mom, she meant a lot to me,” the little girl said as she sat perched on a chair in an interview room. “Now she’s not here and I can’t tell her that I love her.”
Cotie Weekley’s mother, Lillian Bucosky, delivered a searing description of her enduring grief.
“I personally saw the bloodstained snow where my child bled to death,” she said. “I can’t fathom the unimaginable pain and suffering my daughter went through in her final moments. It leaves me numb inside.”
O’Driscoll also noted that by pleading guilty, Guzylak spared the child the trauma of having to testify in court about her mother’s killing.
Nevertheless the little girl is profoundly affected by the murder, O’Driscoll said. He entered as an exhibit a drawing Jasmine had done — she depicted herself with tears flowing from her eyes as a figure labelled Mommy lay on the ground, a splash of red crayon on her chest.
Over that figure stood one labelled Wesley with a pointed object in his hand.
“There’s such a sadness to her,” O’Driscoll said. “She’s like an old soul in a child’s body.”