It started with a peace sign and ended with 19-year-old Damien Seguin lying on a Burnaby street with a traumatic brain injury that ended his life.
On March 25, 2021, the Burnaby South Secondary grad and some friends were hanging out and drinking in a gazebo by the Fraser River near Boundary Road, according to information presented in court Thursday.
After they left, they encountered Vancouver resident Brandon Lowe and his friends at the intersection of Marine Way and Glenlyon Parkway shortly before midnight.
Seguin and his friends were packed into two Toyota Corollas, and Lowe and his friends were in a Nissan Altima.
Accounts of their first interaction varied, according to the admitted facts presented in court, but it ended in one of Seguin's friends flashing a peace sign at the Altima.
That prompted Lowe to honk his horn and his friends to brandish a baton and bear spray at Seguin and his friends.
The animosity mounted as the two groups crossed paths several times that night in the area around Market Crossing, with one of Seguin's friends kicking the Altima at one point and one of Lowe's friends bear-spraying one of the Corollas.
"Seguin was enraged by the interaction between the three vehicles," Crown prosecutor Jacqueline Madden said in court.
The Altima finally ended up travelling up Macpherson Avenue, a dead-end street, north of Marine Drive, and Seguin got out of one of the Corollas and followed it on foot.
Some of his friends followed behind with golf clubs they'd gotten from the trunk of one of the cars.
Lowe, meanwhile, had made a U-turn and came back down the street, hitting Seguin with the front passenger side of the Altima.
"Seguin's body went up onto the Altima, making contact with the windshield, and then rolled off the vehicle past the passenger window, striking the ground, likely head first," Madden said.
Lowe, however, kept driving, and one of his friends shot bear spray out of the back window at one of Seguin's friends.
Burnaby RCMP used "extensive police resources" to locate Lowe, who, on the night of the crash, returned to Vancouver and asked a friend to help him wrap the Altima to change the colour or look of the car, according to the agreed facts.
Police arrested him on May 21, 2021, and he was charged with failing to stop at the scene of an accident causing death and attempting to obstruct justice.
He was in Vancouver provincial court Thursday for sentencing after pleading guilty in July to failing to stop at the scene.
The obstruction charge was dropped at the end of the hearing.
'He had so many dreams and goals'
Seguin's aunt and co-guardian Michelle Koo told the court she still relives the night when a police officer came to her door shortly after midnight and told her her nephew had been in an accident and she needed to get to Royal Columbian Hospital right away.
"Our lives have never been the same since that night," Koo said.
"Holidays, birthdays and even the simplest moments that used to bring us joy are now overshadowed by a deep unfillable void."
Koo said Seguin had just graduated from high school and planned to study computer science.
"He had so many dreams and goals he was eager to pursue," Koo said.
Sofia Santana, Seguin's cousin, said he was really a big brother to her "in every way that mattered."
"Losing him feels like a part of me is missing," she said.
"Sometimes I still expect to see him at his desk playing his games, turning around to greet me with his usual, 'What's up, man?' I miss that more than I can say."
Debbie Koo, Seguin's guardian since he was three years old, said she lights a candle for him every day.
"It sits below his picture and beside his ashes. That candle and those ashes are all I have left of my beautiful boy," she said.
Koo said what haunts her the most is how Seguin died.
"The thought that someone could hit him and leave him there without a moment of compassion or remorse … It feels as though Damien's life was discarded without a second thought, and that's something no parent should ever have to face," she said.
'Everlasting impact'
Both the Crown and defence lawyer Joel Whysall called for Howe to get a two-year conditional sentence (a jail sentence served in the community) with a period of house arrest, a period under a curfew and 40 hours of community work, as well as a three-year driving ban.
As aggravating factors Crown prosecutor Daniel Pruim noted the "significant and everlasting impact" the offence will have on Seguin's family as well as Howe's failure to come forward to police and his attempts to hide his crime.
Pruim also noted Howe was a new driver at the time of the hit-and-run with two passengers in his car contrary to regulations.
As mitigating factors he pointed out Howe's youth (he is 22), his lack of a criminal record, his guilty plea and his family support.
Pruim said the "circumstances before the incident" were also mitigating.
Whysall noted Howe has abided by release orders he's been under since the crash and said Howe "is not going to be a public safety risk" serving his sentence in the community.
B.C. provincial court Judge Ellen Gordon accepted the joint submission.
She pointed out first that she was sentencing Howe for leaving the scene of the accident, not for causing Seguin's death, but she acknowledged that legal distinction would make little difference to Seguin's family.
"To the family of Damien, all that matters is that he passed away and that's something they're going to have to live with every day," Gordon said.
As for Howe, Gordon, she said he will have to live with the fact he left the scene that day.
Before the end of the hearing, Gordon warned Howe he could end up in jail if he violated the conditions of his sentence.
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