life in prison for helping ducks on highway

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Really a sad, unfortunate story. I think the sentence extreme, bu this is a complicated one.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... crash.html

This is depressing on so many levels. My mom stops to rescue animals all the time and has been doing so for many years, and no one has ever been hurt by it. I feel bad for that lady, but also the man and his daughter, and his wife. Not to mention the ducks.

Well, first of all she was not sentenced to life imprisonment, at this stage she has been convicted, but no sentencing hearings have been held yet.

And while the maximum penalty for dangerous driving causing death and criminal negligence causing death are, indeed, life imprisonment, the facts in this case do not come anywhere close to meriting a sentence like that.

I expect the Crown to seek something in the vicinity of 6 years. Since conditional discharge is not available (as the maximum sentence exceeds fourteen years) I expect the defence to seek two years less a day (so that she serves it in a provincial jail rather than a federal penetentiary).

I suspect she will recieve a light sentence too. There was no malice in her actions. However, I think the verdict is correct. She acted in a reckless and unsafe manner and is culpable for the deaths.

she would have killed the ducklings if she captured them

did she even put her flashers on?


things like this get people killed time and time again
people dont think before they do something

I drive on rural roads here in Scotland and each and every journey I have to repeat to myself "Don't swerve to avoid wildlife." If I did I'd either end up dead, roll the car down a mountain side or hit oncoming traffic.

I stopped recently for a fox who had decided to casually walk onto the road and stop, thankfully I was driving slowly and all cars behind me stopped too.

Lets see, she stopped her car in the left lane of what was probably a controlled access highway where the speed limit is 100km/h (and average speed knowing Montreal is 120km/h). Yes, she acted reckless and without regard to the other drivers. She is guilty of the crime which caused death to a fellow human. The question is whether she will get the full sentence or a reduced sentence.

Nothing complicated about some idiot stopping in the fast lane for no apparant reason. And no, ducklings on the side of the road are not an apparant reason to the average person in the fast lane.

I mean, had she caused an accident by shooting accross the lanes to park on the side of the road and walk back tot the ducks I could understand the complicity.
It;s a story of stupidity and the only sad thing about it is that drivers like that need accidents like that to possibly make them better drivers. And even then it's no guarantee

When I lived in Illinos, I worked in the far Northwest Suburban town of McHenry. The Fox River ran right through the middle of town. It was not an unusual sight to see ducks and geese on Riverside drive. Heaven help the person who tried to run them down. It was nothin to sit for quite a while on Riverside while the parade of ducks, geese and offspring would cut across the road, and, with the geese, they would sit in the middle of the road on occasion. Sometimes the city police or the McHenry county Sherrif's police would show up, see the geese sitting or standing there, and would shoo them off the road.

She was not in trouble with the law for helping ducks. She was in trouble for illegally stopping in the traffic stream on a busy highway and people died because of her poor judgement. If she had stopped and there were no ducks and the same people died she would have ended up in the same trouble.

However, a life sentence? That does seem a bit harsh.

ruveyn

I move box turtles across the road,but I never stop in the road,I find a safe place to pull over off the road and walk back for the turtle.This is just on the state highways,I doubt I'd have the nerve or stupidity to get out on a major busy interstate to move one.

Helping animals: Good
Stopping ON the freeway to do it: Stoopid.
I think a life sentence was a bit over the top, though.

A life sentence was not over the top, because she did not receive a life sentence. The topic title is provocative, but highly misleading! I think it would be a good idea for the OP to edit it.

Not likely; provocative and misleading is kind of his style.

What if she had done the same thing and no one died? Would she also be punished the same way? It doesnt make sense to me that people get sentences for something when people die when they would not be sentenced if they did the same thing without casualties.

It would have been a traffic citation, probably an expensive one, for just needlessly leaving the vehicle blocking highway traffic with no injuries or deaths as a result. Since people died, their deaths are directly attributable to her negligence and there lies the big difference. She's apparently a dimwit, to put it bluntly. There's nothing wrong with signalling then safely pulling over to help animals but just coming to a complete stop ON the highway makes me question her competence to operate a motor vehicle.