MANDEL: Unlicenced speeding driver with almost triple the legal limit pleads guilty in fatal crash

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It was a triple header of selfishness and stupidity: Tara MacMunn was unlicensed, drunk and speeding when she slammed into Hazela Baksh’s car on Albion Rd. in a fatal crash that should never have happened.

Except that MacMunn, 38 at the time, was driving with almost triple the legal amount of alcohol in her system and speeding at more than double the posted limit.

In a downtown courtroom Thursday, MacMunn pleaded guilty in a quiet voice to one count of impaired driving causing death before Superior Court Justice Katherine Corrick as many relatives of the beloved victim filled the seats and wiped tears while listening to the grim agreed statement of facts.

Crown attorney Simon King said it was 11: 05 p.m. on April 18, 2023 and MacMunn was driving east on Albion Rd. toward Finch Ave. W. in her Nissan Altima at 110 km/h in a 50 km/zone. The road was under heavy construction and reduced to two lanes.

Baksh, 64, was on her way home from the nearby mosque where she had gone for Ramadan prayers and to deliver food, as she always did. Because of the slowed traffic, she was travelling at just 11 km/h in her Toyota Rav 4.

MacMunn was going so fast, King said, that she slammed into the rear of Baksh’s vehicle, struck two more and then continued into the intersection, crashing into a concrete barrier. Baksh suffered catastrophic injuries and was pronounced dead at the scene.

MacMunn was taken to Sunnybrook hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. A warrant for her medical records revealed a reading of 214 mg of alcohol in 100 ml of blood, King said, and a warrant for a blood sample showed she had a BAC of 210 mg/100 ml when it was collected.

Police also discovered her driver’s licence wasn’t valid at the time of the collision.

Baksh’s family had hoped to be able to present their 15 victim impact statements but the apologetic judge explained that due to time constraints, she’d have to postpone the sentencing hearing until next month.

“It was just raw emotions, everything coming back to the night of April 18,” said Baksh’s diappointed sister, Hasheda McCade. “It’s very hard for us to go through it again. It’s been two years, but it seemed like yesterday, just listening to everything in the courtroom.”

Baksh was the eldest in their family and she was there for them all.

“She was amazing, she was everything you would want in a big sister,” McCade explained, as she stood in the sunshine with her family outside the courthouse. “I went through breast cancer during the pandemic. She was there for me, every step of the way, with food, with support, everything,” she said.

“It’s been hard for everyone, not only myself, but my entire family.”

To lose her in such a senseless way only adds to their grief, she said.

“It’s devastating to know that somebody would be so careless,” McCade said fiercely. “To me, it’s murder. It should be a life sentence. She killed someone. She killed my sister.”

Yasier Jason Baksh still can’t believe someone could be driving without a licence and with so much alcohol in their system. But he saw the results firsthand: he was there to bury his beloved aunt on Eid and was the one who later went to the police lot to get her vehicle.

“Just the damage that I saw on her car – I still can’t get that image out of my head,” he said softly.

His aunt lived just down the street and was always calling him over to learn how to make her special dishes – or to get some help with technology. Just a few weeks before she was killed, he went to help her prepare a meal for the mosque.

“And I’m really glad I made that time because its moments like those that we take for granted sometimes and we don’t know when it will become a memory,” he said.

So he has this simple message: don’t drink and drive.

“This doesn’t have to happen,” Yasier Jason Baksh said. “This doesn’t have to happen to another family.”

mmandel@postmedia.com