No matter how hard they tried, Michael Fan would not make eye contact with them.
One by one, Brad Dean’s widow, his father, mother, brother and friends delivered their heart-wrenching victim impact statements to Fan, who had just plead guilty to driving without due care and attention.
The small room at Richmond Provincial Court was packed Tuesday morning and it was the first chance for those who loved 33-year-old Brad – who died in November 2016 after his group of six cyclists were hit by Fan’s vehicle on River Road in east Richmond – to look Fan in the eye.
Brad’s father, Tom, and his mother, Lianne, especially took extreme pauses to catch a glimpse of remorse from Fan as they took the stand to articulate their respective loss.
“Brad was killed. It’s three words that I play over and over again,” said Tom, while staring at Fan.
As well as Brad’s parents and his wife, Adele, his close friend and fellow cyclist, Chris Jameson - who barely survived the collision and will be in rehab the rest of the his life – tried to reach Fan with the gravity of how their lives have been turned upside down.
“You’ve killed one man, but destroyed countless lives,” said Adele, who only found out after the fatal accident that she was pregnant with Brad’s daughter.
Not once did Fan, who was 19 at the time of the crash, flicker, with his head slightly bowed for most of the two hours of statements from the victims.
Crown counsel had earlier told the court how Fan had been partying all night before the fateful collision.
The court heard how a video outside the Starlight Casino in New Westminster showed Fan driving his Lexus to the casino with friends at 5 a.m. on the morning of the crash.
He left at 7:30 a.m. before returning at 8 a.m.
At 9:45 a.m., the court heard how Fan departed the casino once more, somehow ending up about half an hour later travelling westbound on River Road in Richmond, despite living in Burnaby.
It was moments later that a cyclist, not connected to Brad’s group, recalled being overtaken by Fan, who crossed the centre line before taking out Brad’s cycling group, who had been heading east in single file and on their own side of the road.
Brad was killed, while Jameson and fellow cyclist and friend John White were severely injured.
Although admitting to drinking alcohol the previous evening, Fan passed a roadside breath test taken by police attending the scene.
The court heard how he was distraught and then threw up when learning that one of the cyclists he hit had died.
He told police at the time that he hadn’t had much sleep the night before. Indeed, while being taken away by police, he was so tired in the back of the police cruiser that he was found to be snoring loudly.
Groans of disgust and shakes of the head were prevalent in the court when Crown counsel told of how Fan changed his story several times to police of his movements the night before the crash in order to “not look so bad.”
The court was set to reconvene later on Tuesday for Fan’s sentencing, for which the Crown is asking for an $1,800 fine and a one-year driving ban.
Fan’s lawyer told the court that his client is opposing the ban.
Brad’s family had unsuccessfully previously lobbied B.C.’s Attorney General, David Eby, in a bid to get the charges upgraded to criminal, as opposed to being treated under the Motor Vehicle Act.
The maximum penalty for the charge is a $2,000 fine and six months in jail.
More to come on this story...
