The driver of a heavy goods vehicle who decimated a family from Laval in 2022 in Ontario was a real time bomb: not only was he not allowed to drive, but he had his eyes glued to his cell phone a second before the tragedy, reveals a disturbing video obtained by The newspaper.
On April 18, 2022, Mehakdeep Singh, driving a Volvo trailer truck, never saw the line of vehicles slowing down and stopping in front of him. He was too absorbed in the screen of the phone he held in one hand. It then caused a violent collision which cost the lives of two children and their grandmother, on Highway 401, near Belleville, Ontario.
The driver was subsequently criminally charged and recently pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing death and injury. He received five years of detention.
To convict him, authorities had a damning piece of evidence: a video of him staring at his phone up to a second before the collision.
Vehicle of Anik Legault and his family. Her children, Émérik and Maélie, as well as her mother, Chantal Dendooven-Legault, perished. COURTESY of the Ontario Court
COURTESY of the Ontario Court
Cameras installed in the cabin of his truck filmed Mehakdeep Singh as well as the road ahead.
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Absorbed by his cell phone
For several minutes before the fatal collision, Mehakdeep Singh looked at his phone for a long time. He was mechanically and half-heartedly monitoring the road, but his attention was mostly diverted to his screen. He even momentarily took his hands off the steering wheel to operate on his cell phone, before changing his mind.
He then put the device down for a few minutes, only to pick it up again barely 20 seconds before impact. Already, on the camera images which show the path in front of its heavyweight, the slowdown is visible in the distance.
He looks up for less than a second before hitting the Hyundai Elantra, which was slowing in front of him, at full speed. The truck driver didn’t even have time to apply the brakes.
Its speed at the time of impact was 105 km/h.
The three passengers in the back seat of the Hyundai had no chance: Émérik Giroux, 7 years old, Maélie Giroux, 3 years old, and their grandmother Chantal Dendooven-Legault, 68 years old, perished.
Anik Legault (with headband), with her twin brother, Érik, at a restaurant in Toronto shortly before the death of her mother, Chantal Dendooven-Legault, and her children, Maélie, 3, and Émerik, 7 , in a violent collision in Ontario in April 2022.
Courtesy photo
The children’s mother, Anik Legault, and her twin brother, Érik, seated in the front seat, were barely injured. The group was returning from a weekend in Toronto. The Laval family should never have crossed paths with the careless trucker.
Indeed, the man, now 26 years old, was not authorized to be behind a wheel at the time of the collision.
Mehkadeep Singh, at the time of the fatal collision. COURTESY COURT OF ONTARIO
COURTESY COURT OF ONTARIO
The police investigation revealed that he falsified his logbook and thus violated the limit of hours of service permitted for truck drivers.
The company he worked for, Snowflake Express Inc., still used electronic statements, as well as paper ones. Electronic statements have since become mandatory in Canada.
- Listen to Alexandre Dubé’s editorial on Benoit Dutrizac’s show about the fatal accident via QUB radio :
Difficult forgiveness
Thus, Singh’s paper statements differed from the electronic statements.
The mileage on the Volvo truck recorded in the logbook was also different from the movements observed in the videos. And the GPS data did not match the logbook entries seized at the crime scene.
The Volvo truck driven by Mehkadeep Singh. COURTESY of the Ontario Court
COURTESY of the Ontario Court
The driver should have been taken off the road for 72 hours for these false entries in the system, we can read in court documents.
In addition to the five-year prison sentence, he will be banned from driving for a period of seven years. He will then face deportation, we learned.
“Of course I would have liked him to get a more severe sentence, but no sentence will be sufficient in my eyes for three lives taken,” commented Anik Legault, who traveled to Ontario to attend the plea of guilt.
COURTESY of the Ontario Court
The driver filed a letter of apology in court, but Mme Legault said she doesn’t feel ready to hear what he has to say.
“I would have found it easier to forgive if it had been an accident, and not repeated dangerous behavior,” she said.