Humboldt truck driver gets 8 years in prison

[FONT=&quot]Sidhu received a sentence of eight years for each fatality and five years for each person injured, to be served concurrently (at the same time).[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]It's likely Sidhu will be deported. He grew up on a farm in India and followed his girlfriend to Canada in 2013 and is a permanent resident, not a citizen of Canada.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Under federal law, a permanent resident convicted of a crime that holds a maximum sentence of at least 10 years will be deported.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sask...entenced-court-jaskirat-singh-sidhu-1.5066842


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The LoLRus said:

But that is IMO more the fault of the trucking company

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i believe the owner of trucking company is yet to be charged

Should be 8 yrs for each victim.

As far as I know a murderer of several people don't
necessarily get a proportionately longer jail term
than a murderer of one single person.

thumper18474 said:

Yup and my additional comment
Its all these small companies...(and some large).. who want asses in the seats...and behind the wheel ASAP

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the trucking business is suffering. I deal with a lot of them and most agents have the same complains...most drivers are unreliable and don't even show up to work. they are scrambling to have as much drivers to fulfill their orders. I've seen a lot of times that big rigs swerve on the 401...I'd rather be behind those wheelers than in front of them.

The LoLRus said:

Isnt this a little harsh?? 8 years for what was essentially an accident

https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=...-sentencing/&usg=AOvVaw0PeLZAFjw-EXBtZB7jXpcD

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It's certainly severe for a guy who promptly and sincerely admitted fault and remorse; clearly this sentence will do nothing constructive for anyone, including him. Like the victims and the survivors; life as he knew it already ended forever that day.

But it is going much too far to say this was an accident. From all accounts this troublesome intersection was well marked by five large warning signs and by an oversized red STOP sign, all of which he ignored — supposedly because he'd picked those seconds to examine how the tarpaulins securing his load were doing, and his eyes were on his side mirrors looking back, not on the road ahead, not registering any of those signs. That was his tragic driver error due to lack of practised skill at switching his focus between the two potential dangers he was responsible for avoiding: the economic one of a spilled load, or the deadly one of an unseen vehicle.

Don't know if true or not but I heard on the radio, the judge gave him 8 yrs so there wont have a chance for any appeal. Any more, could leave the door open for an appeal. I don't think he would have appealed anyhow.

oldjones said:

From all accounts this troublesome intersection was well marked by five large warning signs and by an oversized red STOP sign, all of which he ignored

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Apparently, he also ignored stop signs at 4 earlier intersections. It would really help if they take down those trees (sorry tree huggers).

Darts said:

Apparently, he also ignored stop signs at 4 earlier intersections. It would really help if they take down those trees (sorry tree huggers).

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Taking the tree's down probably wouldn't make much of a difference, coming from the south, by the time you realize the cross traffic isn't going to stop I doubt there would be enough time to stop a Semi or a bus traveling at 100+ kmh, turning the intersection in to a four way stop would be a lot safer. There is also a rail crossing very close.

I have driven through that intersection over 100 times, did so just last week. Both roads have a lot of truck traffic and Hwy 35 is not really busy so the truckers tend to be up over the speed limit especially if empty. It's not uncommon for me to get passed by a trucker on that road and I usually drive it at 110 to 115. There are two large grain terminals, a seed plant and a bulk fuel depot all with in a KM of the intersection so a large number of trucks use both roads. Turning it in to a four way wouldn't be a real issue for the trucks as it would be the only stop sign on Hwy 35 between Tisdale and Nipawin which is almost 40 miles. That would have all traffic come to a stop and the chance of two vehicles running the stop at the exact same time are fairly high.

With the amount of people stopping at the sight of the crash the Hwy dept has dropped the speed to 60 kmh but the guy in front of me last week blew through at close to double that so not every one has gotten the message.

Actually, his sentence is 6 months for each death. There were 16 deaths so his sentence is 16 deaths x 6 months = 8 years. There were also another 13 injured and some are still trying to learn to walk again while some injured cannot walk for the rest of their lives.

This will teach lots of reckless drivers in the country of the severe punishment once convicted and proved guilty. He is a young man at 30 years of age. So when he will be out from the prison, he will be 38 years old assuming he is serving the full 8 years. So he should be fine to start his new life again back in his homeland of India at the age of 38 years old. You still can do so much in your life if you are willing to do for your life at 38 years old. While he is in the prison, he may be eligible for vocational trainings that he can do after he will be a freeman. It's not the best outcome for everyone. However, the justice system has been served and honoured in this country and everyone must obey the laws.

Darts said:

Apparently, he also ignored stop signs at 4 earlier intersections......

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Exactly!
If you believe that this was the first time he blew through a stop sign...wake up.
You do not drive down a road for the first time , blindly running stop signs.
He had been doing this for a while.
It was only a matter of time before he killed someone.
He should have received a much more severe sentence.

The LoLRus said:

If anything good can be taken out of all this misery as that now apparently Canadian-wide regulations will be implemented that will see much stricter rules for truckers and their trucking companies

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unfortunately, sometimes something bad need to happen, for change

NiceToMeetYou said:

Actually, his sentence is 6 months for each death. There were 16 deaths so his sentence is 16 deaths x 6 months = 8 years. There were also another 13 injured and some are still trying to learn to walk again while some injured cannot walk for the rest of their lives.
…

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Your calculation of the time he will serve for the deaths is accurate as far as that goes. But you misstated by calling it "his sentence", and the arithmetic sadly ignored the injured. The actual sentence was 8 years for each of the 16 deaths. There was also a sentence of 5 years for each of the 13 injured. All of those 29 sentences will begin on the same day, so if all goes well for him he will complete his punishment for the injuries in five years and for the deaths 3 years after that. You've viewed the sentences as if they were consecutive (which would make the term for the deaths alone 158 years, plus 65 for the injured) but which of those 29 sentence would he be serving first?. Or last? As far as I know, no one in authority did a calculation such as yours, and I cannot see its usefulness or purpose. You're just as bad a driver if you kill one person alone in their car, and the concurrent sentences he received seem appropriate, even for this awful circumstance.

Whatever bad, or unlikely good comes from his time in prison, the reality is that the driver will be deported back to India when he's released. As for other drivers learning from his hard time, I think that's unlikely. If stiff sentences made people choose the straight and narrow, then we'd still be crucifying criminals like the Romans we get our laws from. Except there wouldn't be anyone to crucify, because 'severe sentences work'.

Personally, I think it would have served everyone better if he'd been sentenced to doing a significant part of that time telling other drivers what it was like to crawl out of that smashed tractor cab, smelling the gas and smoke, hearing the screaming, seeing the blood. Beginning to realize what he had done.

I certainly agree racism played a significant role in the sentencing. However, in this accident public policy was clearly at fault as well. Provincially the lack of regulations on the industry and federally if you review his background he had a university business degree. From a immigration policy perspective if you have shortage of truck drivers you bring in experienced foreign truck drivers this was certainly not the case here.

Bobert198 said:

I certainly agree racism played a significant role in the sentencing. However, in this accident public policy was clearly at fault as well. Provincially the lack of regulations on the industry and federally if you review his background he had a university business degree. From a immigration policy perspective if you have shortage of truck drivers you bring in experienced foreign truck drivers this was certainly not the case here.

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You are correct in bringing in an immigrant to do a job which s/he has experience in from his / her country of origin. The truth is that there is not enough 'business analyst" jobs in Canada for all of the university business degree holders. So that is why a bunch of immigrants who have the university degrees in various fields such as business administration and even engineering degrees are doing other type of jobs such as truck drivers, taxi drivers and bus drivers in Canada.

So Canada should stop bringing in more people from other countries who have university degrees because there are not enough jobs for them here that require university degrees. However, there are jobs in other non-university degrees such as medical technicians, construction workers, heavy industry mechanics, electricians, plumbers, escorts, sugar babies, pole dancers, blow job providers and etc.

Bigdaug said:

I see terrible drivers out there aggressive and driving dangerously !

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Have they each killed 16 people?

The only way to understand the length of the sentence is to accept that its primary purpose is to deter (scare) other drivers into paying more attention on the road. That's what this case was about - someone who wasn't paying enough attention. If you've ever driven out in rural Alberta you'll understand how this can happen. Very little traffic. Very little change in the scenery. Many intersections governed by nothing more than stop signs on high speed roads. Most of the time, no other traffic at these intersections. Not much to demand your constant alertness. I think it would challenge most people's attention span to drive a truck on those roads for any length of time. However, the consequences of being unlucky are far too horrible. Sentencing is the only tool the justice system has to try to make more people pay more attention.

But there WILL be other accidents like this one, no matter what changes are made to driver licensing standards. It's in the nature of roads to be traveled and the job to be done. Let's hope that they are few and far between.

As bad as he is, the trucking company got away with minimal training. Apparently he had only like 2 weeks experience on his own up to this. Now I don't know how truthful this is, but said something was flapping in the wind so it distracted him. It's well known that wages are lowered, and the qualified truckers that you used to get are no longer. Many get south asian cheap labour with minimal standards and training (many cases where these lower qualified drivers just plow into something often killing people).

The general population of course wants cheap delivery, and things delivered to our door. Don't know what type of stuff he was delivering but let's face it. This consumer driven society has made us far more dependent on cheap goods as a whole which has lead to this race to the bottom in the trucking industry has been going on for some time now.