Courts delays have resulted in charges being stayed against a Saskatoon woman charged with impaired driving causing death.
Nine-year-old Baeleigh Maurice was riding a scooter on her way to school when she was hit by a half-ton truck in a marked crosswalk on 33rd Street on September 9, 2021.
The truck driver, Taylor Kennedy, admitted to police that she had used cannabis and microdosed psilocybin mushrooms the previous day.
Kennedy was charged on March 15, 2022 and was the first person in Saskatchewan to face a THC-related impaired driving charge. Her trial went through several delays before final arguments were heard at the end of August this year.
Kennedy’s defense lawyer argued the charge should be stayed because it exceeded the 18-month window set out in a 2016 Supreme Court decision. On Friday morning, Judge Jane Wootten agreed saying she had “no recourse but to stay the charge.”
The young girl’s family members and supporters wept in court as the decision was announced.
