Woman accused of THC-impaired driving causing death testifies at voir dire

Article content

A woman charged with THC-impaired driving causing death says she told police she had consumed cannabis and psilocybin the night before she hit and killed a nine-year-old girl in a Saskatoon crosswalk because she thought disclosing it was “the law.”

Taylor Ashley Kennedy, 30, testified as a defence witness during the continuation of her Saskatoon provincial court trial on Wednesday. Her trial, which began in October 2023, is in a blended voir dire to determine whether the statements she made before her arrest should become admissible evidence.

Article content

Article content

Defence lawyer Thomas Hynes said the evidence Kennedy gave on Wednesday is only on the voir dire — a trial within a trial.

Kennedy was driving a black pickup truck when she struck Baeleigh Maurice. The girl was entering a 33rd Street crosswalk on her scooter at the intersection of Avenue G just after 9 a.m. on Sept. 9, 2021.

Kennedy wasn’t charged until 2022. It was the first time the charge was laid in Saskatchewan.

Const. Blake Atkinson questioned Kennedy in a police cruiser about an hour after the crash. The interview was audio and video recorded. Atkinson testified in October that Kennedy went voluntarily to give a formal recorded statement.

In the video, which was played in court, Kennedy told Atkinson she has mental health issues and uses cannabis and mushrooms (psilocybin) to help with her reactions to some of her medication. She said she last had marijuana at 10 p.m. the night before, and micro-dosed mushrooms around 3 p.m. the day before.

She told Atkinson she takes mushrooms almost every day and uses cannabis for anxiety.

“I just need to get high to calm down,” she said. “I’m just going to be honest.”

Article content

Article content

The defence alleges that her charter right against self-incrimination was breached, and that the law that compels someone to make a statement after a collision, for the purposes of justifying a blood demand, is unconstitutional.

In court on Wednesday, Kennedy said she thought she had to be honest about anything she had consumed the day before because her mom had taught her “it’s the law.”

Crown prosecutor Michael Pilon asked if she recalled telling Atkinson “I didn’t do anything, I just want to go home” when he asked, “Do you want to call a lawyer now?”

After the video was replayed for her, Kennedy agreed she never responded “yes,” but said she was trying to do so. Speaking so quietly that Judge Jane Wootten had to ask her to repeat herself, Kennedy said she was in shock at the time.

She agreed that she never called a lawyer, even though she had access to her phone.

On the stand, Kennedy wore dark-rimmed glasses and a tan coat, her hair died orange-blond. She has been out of custody since she was charged.

Shaking and crying, she told Pilon that she stayed at the crash scene and called paramedics because she wanted to help Maurice. She said she believed the law required people to give police as much information as possible if they are involved in a collision.

Article content

She said she first mentioned drugs to Atkinson when they were near her truck, and then again when they were inside the police car. In both cases, she said she was answering his question about what she did the day before.

The defence also called Kennedy’s mother to testify on the voir dire. Carla Kennedy corroborated Kennedy’s testimony that she told her daughter to report a prior crash where she was hit, but left the scene.

Hynes closed the defence’s case at the end of the day. The trial is scheduled to resume Friday. Hynes said lawyers will argue a preliminary issue to see whether the court will hear the constitutional challenge on the compelled statements.

“The constitutional challenge is about a section of the Criminal Code that says compelled statements can be still be used to support a roadside screening demand. We’re saying that section of the Criminal Code is unconstitutional,” Hynes said outside court.

“We’re also saying that police separately violated her rights in a bunch of different ways that when you add everything up, you get the statement that the case gets thrown out.”

Article content

Drug screening device training for Saskatoon police scrutinized

Pilon closed the Crown’s case Wednesday morning after calling his last witness, a Saskatoon officer who was in charge of the traffic unit, on the blended voir dire.

Staff Sgt. Devon Racicot answered questions about standard field sobriety testing (SFST), approved drug screening (ADS) device testing and drug recognition expert (DRE) training for Saskatoon police officers.

Court heard out of the force’s 479 sworn officers in 2021, three officers trained in ADS use, four trained in SFST and two active DREs were on duty the day of the collision.

Generally, 50 patrol officers are on duty each day, Racicot said. Under cross-examination, he said there is no plan in place to schedule officers with SFST, ADS and DRE training on every shift.

Officers can either ask to be trained or are compelled to receive training through a bulletin, Racicot said. He told Hynes officers can cancel their training for an approved reason, or miss training if they are held up on a call. They aren’t automatically re-enrolled, as it depends on resources and workload, he testified.

Article content

Racicot told court that at the time of the crash, 29 officers were trained to use ADS devices and 21 had been trained as drug recognition experts between 2010 and 2019.

ADS training started in 2018 when cannabis was legalized, court heard. Racicot told Pilon that city police could decide how many officers they sent for training, but could not control how many actually got in. He said all courses were cancelled during the pandemic.

Hynes clarified that the legal training for THC-related offences started before legalization, and that a batch of officers was sent to Ottawa to receive ADS training shortly after. Racicot said the force is now mandated to train new recruits in-house.

Atkinson testified that he was not trained to use ADS equipment when he detained Kennedy. Const. Patrick Foster previously testified he was the only trained officer on shift that morning.

Foster testified that he administered an oral swab test, which Kennedy failed. He said he didn’t demand a blood sample from Kennedy because Atkinson was handling the investigation.

Her blood-THC reading has not yet been called as evidence.

With some online platforms blocking access to the journalism upon which you depend, our website is your destination for up-to-the-minute news, so make sure to bookmark TheStarPhoenix.com and sign up for our newsletters so we can keep you informed. Click here to subscribe.

Article content