Novice driver negligent, jury hears

Crown says 26-year-old used Bloor St. as his own ‘personal speedway’

Galeeb Abau-Jabeen was “showing off ” and treating Bloor St. like his own “personal speedway” as he weaved in and out of traffic, cutting off cars, before crashing at Parliament St., killing his best friend and seriously injuring another passenger, a jury heard Monday.

“What he did was no accident. It was a crime,” Crown attorney Andrew Max said during closing arguments that urged jurors to convict Abau-Jabeen of criminal negligence causing death and bodily harm.

After a two-week trial, the Superior Court jury is set to begin deliberations Tuesday in which they will be given the choice of three possible outcomes — guilty of criminal negligence causing death and bodily harm, guilty of dangerous driving causing death or bodily harm, or not guilty of anything.

Defence lawyer Chris Murphy agreed there was a lot to find fault with Abau-Jabeen on the night of Nov. 28, 2016. But the prosecution has not proved his actions were criminal, he said.

The 26-year-old novice driver consumed alcohol before getting behind the wheel, even though his G2 licence prohibited him from having any booze in his system. But while that’s an offence under the Highway Traffic Act, it is not a crime under the Criminal Code, Murphy noted. Abau-Jabeen also blew below the legal limit for a fully licensed driver, and an expert testified it is difficult to say to what the degree he was impaired at the time of the crash.

Max told the jury there was no requirement for the Crown to prove he was impaired.

“This is criminal negligence even if the accused was stonecold sober,” he said.

Murphy said his client’s “bad driving” was limited to Bloor St., east of Sherbourne St., after he made a “split-second” decision to try and run a yellow light after seeing the pedestrian countdown signal. He was going as fast as 85 km/h an hour when he lost control. The speed limit on Bloor is 40 km/h. Mohammad Mohammad, 25, was killed, and another passenger, Elif Gozgoz, then 20, suffered severe injuries to her head and spine. The prosecution alleged Abau-Jabeen’s erratic driving, and speeding, happened earlier in the evening and was not just isolated to Bloor.

Murphy also asked the jury to reject the evidence of another surviving passenger Neveen Moukbel who testified AbauJabeen was speeding and driving recklessly earlier in the evening and that Gozgoz urged him to slow down, saying “I don’t want to die.” Murphy said Moukbel had never told anyone that before, including at the preliminary hearing.

“Through the course of time, her memory has just changed,” he said.

And if Gozgoz was so fearful, why was she not wearing a seatbelt, he asked.

Abau-Jabeen admitted on the stand Mohammed tapped him on the shoulder and said, “The girls are with us, we should, like, slow down.”

Max told the jury this is not about a split-section decision to run a yellow light.

Rather, this case is about a series of choices, made by AbauJabeen, that was a “significant and marked” departure from what reasonable people would do in the circumstances, he said.