Jail drunk driver for 25 years, urge victim’s family

THE family of a Scottish mother killed by a drunk driver on a rural Canadian road have told a court of their anguish and demanded a 25-year jail term for her killer.

Canadian Cory Sater will be sentenced later this week

Cory Sater, 40, crashed into Dundee-born Charlene Reaveley and her friend Lorraine Cruz in British Columbia in 2011.

Ms Reaveley, a mother-of-four, was 30 when she died.

After a 13-day trial, a judge at New Westminster Supreme Court in the Canadian province found Sater guilty of six charges, including impaired driving, causing death and dangerous driving causing death.

Sater had consumed six double rye whiskey and cokes and two Jaegerbomb shots in a bar on the night of the crash before driving.

Miss Cruz was driving with her boyfriend in a Nissan Pathfinder just before 12:30am when their vehicle crashed.

The couple got out of the car, while Ms Reaveley, her husband Dan and two friends stopped to help. As the group stood beside the Nissan, a white Jeep Cherokee ran down both women.

Ms Reaveley and Miss Cruz were killed instantly, while Miss Cruz’s boyfriend Paulo Calimbahin was seriously injured.

Ms Reaveley’s mother, Mary Ogilvie, told a packed courtroom at Sater’s sentencing hearing that she was “haunted by the memories of her being buried”.

Reading her victim impact statement, she said: “What is it like for a mother to have her only child killed?

“She was my only child and my entire world. She’s on my mind 24/7. As a family, we are in pain.

“On 19 February 2011, I feel like I received a life sentence.

“I now live with a hole in my heart that cannot be filled. I will never have a day where I’m not in extreme pain. Everything that was near and dear to me was taken away that night.”

Ms Reaveley’s husband, in a statement read to the court by his sister, said the couple were high school sweethearts and that a “loss like this was like losing your sight after 30 years”.

He said he had “contemplated taking my own life but our children need me”. He also said he had suffered several symptoms of post-traumatic stress since his wife’s death.

Speaking outside the court after the hearing, Mrs Ogilvie said she wanted Sater jailed for 25 years.

Sater was on probation for assault at the time of the crash and, after the hearing, he said: “I’ll live this every day. But at the same time, there’s got to be a positive way to come out of this and become a better person.”

Crown counsel Chris McPherson called Sater’s crime an “act of remarkable selfishness”.