224044
235064

Kelowna  

Confessions don't count

Two confessions given by the man accused of running down a paper carrier during a police chase in 2013 are not admissible in court, a Supreme Court judge ruled Thursday.

Donald Brodie was inside a car in the early hours of Dec. 6, 2013 that drove through a police check stop, prompting a chase. During the chase, the Eagle Talon Brodie was in struck Steve Kania near Dundas Road and Highway 33 in Rutland, putting Kania in a coma and leaving him with a serious brain injury.

While Nathan Fahl was originally charged with being behind the wheel, Brodie admitted to police two weeks later, when he was arrested on Dec. 20 on unrelated charges, that he was behind the wheel on Dec. 6.

Because Brodie had been drinking on Dec. 20, police took another statement from him the following day and he again admitted to being the driver.

Justice Martha Devlin ruled Thursday afternoon that while she determined Brodie gave his confessions voluntarily, police violated Brodie's Charter right's by not reading his full rights to him prior to the confessions, including failing to inform Brodie of his right to counsel prior to his Dec. 21 confession.

“He's had no warning,” said Brodie's defence lawyer John Gustafson. “You have the right to speak to a lawyer before you decide whether or not you want to speak to the police, so he ends up sort of blurting out that, so that's excluded. The next day they bring him in but he never really gets a full opportunity to speak to a lawyer.”

While these confessions cannot be used as evidence in the trial, the admissibility of a subsequent confession made by Brodie in a phone call in February 2014 was not challenged.

Brodie sent a letter to the RCMP in February, outlining his involvement in the Dec. 6, 2013 police chase. After receiving the letter, Sgt. Michael Cooke of the Kelowna RCMP phoned Brodie at the Kamloops Regional Correctional Centre on Feb. 13, the audio of which was played in court Monday.

“Mr. Brodie admits to being the driver of the vehicle involved in the police chase,” Crown prosecutor David Grabavac said Tuesday.

This statement and the letter he wrote to police are admissible in the trial.

Evidence submissions are expected to begin in the judge-only trial Friday, carrying through next week and concluding in September.



More Kelowna News