Woman gets two years for drunk driving crash that killed Grand Marais man ‘loved by many’

After five or six drinks at a rural bar, Margaret Anne Godin got behind the wheel of her SUV, with her ex-husband in the passenger seat, and headed north down Highway 59 to her home.

Near the intersection with Fey Road in the Rural Municipality of Alexander, her vehicle crossed the highway’s centre line and collided with 86-year-old Leonard Klatt’s southbound pickup truck.

The vehicles spun and flipped, before a passerby came across the scene and called for RCMP at around 12:50 a.m. on Aug. 29, 2021.

Mounties rushed to the scene and found Klatt, a father of six who lived in Grand Marais on Lake Winnipeg all his life, had already died at the scene.

Godin and her ex-husband were taken to hospital by paramedics, but RCMP suspected she was impaired given her slurred speech.

Mounties later confirmed with blood tests she would have been above the legal blood alcohol limit at the time of the collision.

After pleading guilty to one count of impaired driving causing death last year, Godin, now 61, was sentenced to two years less a day in jail on Tuesday by provincial court Judge David Ireland.

“There can be no doubt that the loss of Mr. Klatt has had a profound and deep impact on his adult children, his grandchildren and of course, his community,” said Ireland.

“Victim impact statements spoke of a kind and gregarious and community-minded individual; a man who was loved by many and whose death in such a violent… way has caused great pain.”

Sandra Knott, whose father had been best friends with Klatt, said she was devastated.

“I’m going to miss him so much,” she said, her eyes beginning to tear up outside court. “They’ll never replace him… I’ll just cherish my good memories of him.”

Loved ones described Klatt as spry, well known and widely liked in the small community of Grand Marais.

Klatt’s eldest son, 67-year-old Dwight Klatt, said outside court that family and friends weren’t pleased with the length of Godin’s sentence and hoped for federal prison time.

Crown prosecutor Sarah Thiessen asked for a federal prison sentence of four years.

Godin’s lawyer, Danny Gunn, argued for a conditional sentence order of two years less a day, which would amount to house arrest.

Godin had no prior criminal or driving record.

She told a psychiatrist who prepared a report for the court that she felt guilty about Klatt’s death and has become socially isolated since the collision, Ireland said.

The judge said he accepted she feels a deep sense of shame and remorse.

Ireland said he didn’t think she would be a danger to the public if she were to serve her sentence as house arrest, given her lack of record and strong ties to the community.

But members of the public would “struggle to see justice” if Godin was given a sentence of house arrest, he said.

“Ms. Godin made the… decision to drive home while her ability to drive was impaired,” said Ireland.

“Mr. Klatt was killed by Ms. Godin’s voluntary action to drink to the point of impairment and drive her and a passenger home.”

House arrest would not sufficiently denounce her behaviour, Ireland ruled.

Ireland also gave Godin two years of supervised probation and barred her from driving for five years.

Godin, who had been out of custody ahead of Tuesday’s sentencing decision, was taken in by court sheriffs after she hugged her loved ones goodbye who attended the hearing.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca