Prisoner's signed confession

Photo: Castanet staff

With a week to go before his next court appearance, the man now charged with being the driver who struck and severely injured a paper carrier last year is pleading his case to the media.

Photo: Facebook

Donald Brodie has admitted that he was driving the car that struck and injured Steve Kania in December 2013.

In a hand written letter to Castanet dated June 16, Donald Maxwell Brodie expresses remorse for the events of Dec. 6, 2013 that saw Steve Kania forced into an induced coma with head trauma and several fractures to his lower back.

Brodie admits to being the driver, and accepts fault for running an RCMP roadblock that night, which initiated a “crazy high speed chase”.

However, he does not accept all blame and instead points a finger towards how the police reacted to the incident.

“The Kelowna RCMP are as much to blame as I am. They tried to ram me head on at 50 MPH I swerved to avoid a head on with police and ended up hitting Steve Kania. That’s why the IIO (Independent Investigations Office) have gotten involved to investigation the police. They should have called the chase off. I was purposely driving on the wrong side of the highway to get that chase called off. It ended in a residential St. With people standing on the sidewalks the police saw all these people and chose to ram me and re-directed me into Kania.”

-- excerpt from letter

Brodie then apologizes for what happened, but doesn’t specify where his sorrow is directed.

He also mentions his friend Nate Fahl, the man initially believed to be the driver.

Brodie says Fahl was passed out in the passenger seat during most of the chase, and asks the public to reconsider their perceptions of the man, now found innocent of this crime.