Sept. 17 (UPI) — A police officer in Ontario, Canada, has been sentenced to eight months in prison for killing a pedestrian while going twice the legal speed limit.
Remo Romano, of the York Regional Police Department, caused the death of 18-year-old Natasha “Carla” Abogado in 2014 when she walked across a road and he hit her in an unmarked police truck while driving 115 km per hour in a 60 km per hour zone.
Romano, 47, said he was trying to catch up with a police surveillance team at the time, although the call wasn’t urgent, the CBC reported.
Prosecutors sought a 12-month sentence, but Superior Court Judge Brian O’Marra called that “excessive,” and said an eight-month sentence was just “in light of all the mitigating and aggravating factors in this tragic case.”
This is the third time Romano has been tried for Abogado’s death.
The first trial ended with a hung jury, and he was acquitted after the second trial. But prosecutors appealed that decision and won a conviction after the third trial.
Romano’s attorney, William MacKenzie, said his client plans on appealing.
“We are extremely disappointed in the jail sentence,” MacKenzie said. “It’s been our position all along that PC Romano was in the attempted-good-faith performance of his duties at the time of this tragic accident.”
