Shane Gallup has been found guilty of impaired driving, among other charges, and a warrant was issued for his arrest because he didn’t show up for his trial.
The trial was set for Feb. 20 in Kindersley provincial court. The three Crown witnesses were in attendance and Dorinda Stahl, the Crown prosecutor, said she was prepared to proceed with the trial ex-party, without the accused there. She said Gallup chose to represent himself for the trial.
Judge Robert Jackson said he was satisfied the accused had no reason not to be in attendance, so he was prepared to grant the ex-party trial. He told the prosecutor that he would not sentence Gallup, but he would issue a warrant for him if he was found guilty.
Stahl said she agreed with Jackson’s position to wait for Gallup to be brought to court for sentencing.
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During questioning, witness Mitchell Parton said he was with two other people in the lounge of a local establishment along Highway 7 on the evening of the incident, March 23, 2017. He said he noticed a man drinking at the bar at about 7:30 p.m., and the man showed clear signs of intoxication.
Court heard that the man at the bar was loud and obnoxious, and he stumbled in and out of the establishment as he went to smoke cigarettes. Parton said the man was slurring his words and he was rude. The waitress told him the man had been at the establishment all day.
Parton said he and his friends left the establishment in his truck and they drove eastbound on Highway 7. The friends stopped for a red light on the highway at Main Street, and Parton said another vehicle slammed into the back of his truck.
One of the passengers complained about a sore neck but no one was seriously injured, he said. Parton got out of his truck to find the man from the bar alone in the driver seat of the other truck. Court heard the man could not open the truck’s door due to the damage.
Stahl asked the witness what happened when he approached the driver. He told her the man lit a cigarette, sat back in his seat, looked at him and asked, “What?” Parton said he got the licence plate number and called the police.
The testimony of the other two witnesses, civilian Marlon Thompson and Const. Conroy Fillion of the Kindersley RCMP, corroborated Parton’s testimony. Gallup did not have a driver’s licence, so Fillion had to ask him to spell his name. The officer ran Gallup, who he was convinced gave him a correct name, through the RCMP computer system and he discovered that the man’s licence was suspended.
Gallup provided two suitable breath samples at the detachment and Stahl said the readings were 220 mg and 210 mg of alcohol in 100 ml of blood, well above the legal limit of 80 mg. She asked for convictions to both driving impaired and driving with a blood-alcohol content higher than .08 per cent.
Jackson said he believed the Crown had proven its case, so he issued a guilty verdict to both impaired driving charges and issued a warrant for Gallup’s arrest. The judge added that the accused is also guilty of driving without a valid driver’s licence.
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