Family seeks tougher sentence for driver

A recent provincial court case involving a drunk driver and the death of a young woman is raising some questions for those involved — mainly, why 31-year-old Mark Russel Stinson was not charged with impaired driving causing death after he hit the vehicle of 20-yearold Chantelle Olive Dieter.

Dieter was killed in the crash.

But according to Peter Sankoff, a law professor at the University of Alberta, the reasoning is fairly simple. “Because he was drunk, but he didn’t cause the death,” Sankoff said.

“The law punishes you in accordance with what you can be said to be responsible for. It’s a fundamental principle of justice.”

In the case of Dieter and Stinson, witnesses at the scene told police that Dieter ran a stop sign before being struck by Stinson.

Speaking in a general sense, Sankoff said that in cases such as these, any proof linking the death to the impairment will likely result in a higher sentence.

“If it can be shown that I was going a little over the speed limit, if it can be shown that I was a little distracted, if I was partly at fault, any of those things,” he said.

Because the Crown could not reasonably conclude that the impairment was the cause of the death, Stinson was charged with impaired driving and sentenced in accordance with drunk driving laws.

The result echoes a similar case from 2001, when a Regina jaywalker was hit and killed by a drunk driver.

The judge in that case ruled that the driver could not be found guilty of impaired driving causing death because the Crown had not established beyond a reasonable doubt that the impairment was the cause of the death.

But the questions remain for the family of Chantelle Olive Dieter.

“Who were the witnesses? Who was there to convict Olive, that she went through a stop sign?” said Connie Dieter, Chantelle’s aunt.

Since the conviction, the family has been running an “active campaign” on Facebook and holding rallies in the hopes of getting a tougher sentence for Stinson.

They’ve spoken with the Crown prosecutor and plan to make an application with the Saskatchewan Judicial Council.

The family hopes that a new witness, the first on the scene on the night of June 30 and one who wasn’t interviewed by police, will lead to a successful appeal.

Until then, they say, more lobbying and more rallies will follow.