Dentist seeks 4-year sentence for deadly crash
Christy Natsis will spend time behind bars for her role in the head-on crash that killed 50-year-old Ottawa father of three Bryan Casey on Hwy. 17 near Arnprior on March 31, 2011.
The only question is how much time the prominent Pembroke dentist, convicted in May of impaired and dangerous driving causing death, will serve.
Natsis’s defence team of Michael Edelson and Vincent Clifford spent most of Tuesday, the first day of three-day sentencing hearing in a Pembroke courtroom, attempting to make their case for a sentence of 3½ to four years in prison.
When the hearing began, it was almost immediately adjourned to allow Justice Neil Kozloff and Natsis to read victim impact statements to be presented later in the hearing. When court resumed half an hour later, the judge told Crown attorney John Ramsay he would have to edit a few of the statements, including nine paragraphs to be read by Casey’s widow, Lee Ellen Carroll, that referenced elements outside the intended scope of a victim impact statement.
Natsis’s defence also raised the issue of her pending breach of conditions charge, requesting that she be arraigned immediately and the matter dealt with.
Natsis was arrested in Ottawa on Nov. 17, 2011, after buying two 12-ounce bottles of vodka from a Rideau Street LCBO outlet while under bail conditions to abstain and not be anywhere where alcohol is sold.
Natsis later pleaded guilty and Clifford said she would serve 40 days in jail, consecutive to whatever sentence Kozloff imposes on the criminal charges.
Edelson devoted most of the morning to meticulously dissecting the seven cases cited by Ramsay and revealed the Crown was seeking a term of six to eight years in penitentiary. Edelson, saying the cases were more different than similar to that of Natsis, focused on “moral blameworthiness” and highlighted aggravating factors that he said were not present in the Natsis case.
He said any sentence handed down to a first-time offender in such a case should be as short as possible while still acting as a deterrent and denunciation of the act. The second theme of his comments on both his own brief and the Crown’s was framing sentences of four to five years as being substantial, even in the presence of such aggravating factors as lengthy criminal records or markedly high blood-alcohol levels.
Edelson said that in many such cases, the defence had sought a conditional sentence instead of jail time, an option he admitted was unavailable to Natsis. Edelson cited two cases. In one, the driver in a crash that killed a 17-year-old girl in 2009 received a sentence of four years despite myriad aggravating factors.
He also cited the 2008 conviction of former National Hockey League player Rob Ramage, who was convicted of impaired driving causing death and dangerous driving causing death for a 2003 crash that killed former Chicago Blackhawks player Keith Magnuson. Ramage was sentenced to four years in prison, a term some at the time thought to be remarkably long considering pleas from Magnuson’s family to spare him prison time and the fact that Ramage had no prior record.
Edelson said he was seeking a jail term of three-and-a-half to four years in prison for Natsis, citing her lack of previous criminal record, the negative impact of the media scrutiny the case has garnered, and her standing as a “pillar of her community” as mitigating factors.
Clifford spent the final few hours of the day reading excerpts from 100 letters attesting to Natsis’s character, her standing in the community and fundraising and volunteer efforts in a variety of community causes.
The letters cited her work on the Pembroke Regional Hospital Foundation board, her help in raising money to refit and upgrade the hospital’s maternity department, her sponsorship of a $750-peryear scholarship at Fellowes High School, and providing dental services at a greatly reduced rate or no charge to children and adults who were either in dire financial straits or who were suffering from physical or mental complications that made finding treatment difficult.
Clifford characterized Natsis as a “pillar of society” who has been “vilified by the press” over the course of her trial.
The hearing continues on Wednesday with Ramsay presenting the Crown’s submissions, the reading of victim impact statements, and the court hearing from Natsis herself.