Impaired driver who killed best friend won’t serve more jail time after appeal

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This article was published 15/03/2024 (575 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Manitoba man convicted of an impaired driving collision that killed his best friend has had his six-month jail sentence tripled by the province’s highest court, but will serve no more jail time.

Kyle Nolan Devos, 23, was convicted after trial of one count each of impaired driving causing death and dangerous driving causing death following the April 7, 2018, crash on a field in Bruxelles, about 100 kilometres southwest of Portage la Prairie.

In a decision last fall, the Manitoba Court of Appeal increased Devos’s sentence to 18 months, but stayed the additional period of custody. The court’s written reasons for its decision were not released until earlier this month.

In a 29-page ruling, Justice Diane Cameron, writing for the court, said King’s Bench Justice Elliot Leven, when sentencing Devos in September 2022, placed too much emphasis on the massive community support behind him and not enough on denunciation and deterrence, resulting in an unfit sentence.

In staying the increased period of custody, the high court noted Devos had long since completed his period of imprisonment at the time the appeal was heard last October, was in the midst of completing three years probation and had not reoffended criminally. Factors a court considers when staying increased custody include how much time has passed since an offender has been freed from custody and what impact re-incarceration would have on them.

“In these circumstances and given the other personal circumstances of the accused, we determined that the sentence of imprisonment should be stayed,” Cameron wrote.

Court heard at trial Devos had been drinking at a party when he got into his truck with a 15-year-old friend and did “doughnuts” on a frozen farm field. Devos’s friend was in the back seat and not wearing a seat belt when the truck fishtailed and flipped over, killing him.

Devos took two breathalyzer tests two hours after the collision, providing blood-alcohol level readings of .08 for both.

He was acquitted after trial of one count of driving over .08 because there was evidence he had been drinking just before getting behind the wheel and his blood-alcohol level may not have exceeded the legal limit at the time of the rollover.

At a sentencing hearing in June 2022, court was provided with 129 support letters from family members, friends and community residents attesting to Devos’s remorse, history of volunteerism and sports leadership.

“The letters make it clear that Mr. Devos is, in his very essence, a young man of kindness, empathy, integrity and generosity,” Leven said when sentencing Devos the following September. “It would be unfair to simply ignore these essential facts in crafting a just and proportional sentence.”

Prosecutor Jay Funke argued at the time those same letters, as well as a pre-sentence report prepared for court, provided clear evidence of a community not willing to concede a crime had been committed.

One writer, who described himself as a friend to the families of both Devos and the victim, said: “For reasons unknown to us, God decided he wanted (the victim) back.”

“I know very few teenage boys who have not spun their tires or cut power turns to some extent and this group was no different,” the man said.

Funke argued the probation officer who wrote the pre-sentence report minimized Devos’s actions as well, describing the incident as an “accident” and adopting the family’s position that the community and victim’s family had forgiven him.

“Accidents are not intentional,” the probation officer wrote. “Mr. Devos did not anticipate or plan this tragic outcome.”

No one sets out to kill someone when they drive impaired, Funke said.

“That’s not required for conviction… that does not make what occurred an accident,” he said.

Funke recommended Devos be sentenced to four years in prison, pointing to the benchmark Manitoba case of Hugo Sergio Ruizfuentes, who was sentenced to 41/2 years in prison for a 2009 drunk-driving crash that claimed the life of a 63-year-old grandmother.

Devos was barely 18 at the time of the crime and should not be treated the same as an offender such as Ruizfuentes, who was 41 when he was arrested and had a long history of driving offences, defence lawyer Ryan Amy countered, telling court Devos did not need jail time to deter him.

“He is working every day that he can to make things as right as he can,” Amy said.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca