'Shockingly callous': Trucker who ran woman off 402 gets house arrest
A trucker is serving six months of house arrest for dangerous driving after running a woman off Highway 402 amid a road rage incident.
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A Southwestern Ontario truck driver is serving six months of house arrest for dangerous driving after running a woman off Highway 402 during a road rage incident.
The run-in involving trucker Douglas McInroy on the highway between London and Sarnia saw the woman crash in the centre median and left her with shoulder pain, whiplash and panic attacks when she gets behind the wheel.
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“The incident itself was horribly traumatic,” assistant Crown attorney Meaghan Jones said recently in a Sarnia courtroom. “Part of who she is has changed.”
McInroy, 53, who has ties to St. Thomas, Chatham-Kent and Windsor, was hauling large slabs of stone when a vehicle passed him and honked its horn about 9:30 p.m. on Dec. 14, 2022. McInroy honked back, pulled in behind the vehicle and turned on his high beams.
The woman couldn’t see anything in her mirrors due to the bright lights. McInroy pulled up right behind her and changed lanes multiple times before his trailer collided with the woman’s vehicle, sending her into the centre median.
McInroy radioed another trucker ahead of him after the crash and said, ‘See that, Dave?’ Then he swore and called the driver an inappropriate word. He didn’t report the crash, but police found McInroy’s damaged truck, which also hit a guardrail, a couple of hours later.
A video of the incident from McInroy’s cab, including what he said over the radio, was played in a Sarnia courtroom during a sentencing hearing after he pleaded guilty to dangerous driving.
Defence lawyer Michelle Farquhar admitted to the judge the video was egregious.
“It’s not the video that’s egregious,” Jones responded later. “It was Mr. McInroy’s conduct.”
But Farquhar pointed out an important aspect of the case: her client has no memory of what happened that night. Normally a quiet, mild-mannered person with an otherwise perfect driving record over a more than 30-year career, he has no recollection of that evening.
“Those were not intentional, conscious actions of him in his right mind,” she said. “He is not an aggressive person.”
He also carries guilt and remorse for what happened, she added.
Jones pointed out the woman could have been dying after the crash, for all McInroy knew, but instead of reporting it, he radioed to another trucker and called her names.
“It’s shockingly callous,” she said.
Jones added what he did had a profound impact on the woman and he posed an enormous risk to others on the road.
Given a chance to speak, McInroy apologized.
“I would just like to apologize for everything that’s been going on,” he said, before getting choked up.
Justice Mark Hornblower recently sentenced the trucker to six months of house arrest and one year of probation. But after extensive arguments from Farquhar about how losing his licence would affect McInroy, who is his family’s sole provider, the judge didn’t ban him from driving.
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