The mother of a Langley man run over and killed by a Surrey RCMP-hired consultant in 2013 has filed a complaint with the Police Complaint Commissioner.
Dianne Murrell, mother of Andrew Leduc, has written to complaints commissioner Stan Lowe asking for him to review the case again after the driver was cleared of any wrongdoing both by Lowe and by Surrey RCMP major crimes.
“We need and deserve closure so we can mourn Andrew in the proper way and so we can get rid of our anger of that horrible day,” writes Murrell in her letter to Lowe.
She tells Lowe that she would have written sooner but no one in her family has been sleeping well and the year has been a very hard one for the whole family.
The family of Andrew Leduc had spent almost an entire year waiting for justice, after the father of three was run over and killed by a semi bobtail truck driven by a Surrey RCMP consultant at 3 a.m., Aug. 7, 2013 in the 19500 block of the Langley Bypass.
But justice did not come for Andrew, said his brother Adam at the time, after hearing police weren’t recommending charges.
Surrey RCMP Major Crimes said after a “comprehensive and thorough eight-month investigation, Surrey RCMP tentatively found that no criminality existed on the part of the driver involved in this collision.”
Police said the RCMP consultant driving the semi didn’t know he had hit and killed anyone until later, when he saw some troubling evidence on the truck.
At the time of the decision, Surrey RCMP Sgt. Dale Carr said the consultant’s cellphone battery had died so he went home and within a few hours after the crash, he called police about what happened.
“He didn’t alter evidence, he was co-operative. There was no criminal intent,” said Carr.
But the report showed that the consultant, who is a traffic safety expert, knew he had hit something but thought it may have been a rolled-up sleeping bag.
Murrell writes “if he was considered such an expert in the transportation industry by law enforcement and other government agencies, why in God’s name, when he knew better, did he not stop to make sure he didn‘t hit a person?”
She then goes on to question Carr’s statement that if he didn’t “alter evidence,” why did he drive to Mission to the truck company, and right away clean the blood off the truck?
“Which was at the least obstruction [of justice],” she adds.
“Then he goes and gets a coffee, gets home and phones the RCMP at 6:05 a.m.,” she writes about the hours the accused took to call police.
Leduc’s family don’t know why Andrew was walking along the Bypass so late at night. They recognize he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but they don’t think that should have cost him his life, said his mother.
The family has been grieving and in anguish since Andrew’s death. He leaves behind three children, twin sisters, a brother, many other family and friends.
Murrell tells Lowe that they have suffered greatly since the loss of Andrew but to see no charges against the driver who hit him, “it was like Andrew died all over again.”
“The system that I told my children to believe in, let this family down big time,” she said.
The Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner provides “impartial civilian oversight of complaints by the public involving municipal police.”
The deputy complaints commissioner said they have notified Murrell that they received her letter of complaint and plan to provide a written response.
“We want to address her concerns,” said Rollie Woods, deputy complaints commissioner.
He couldn’t provide a timeline when that letter will be sent back to her, but said it is a priority.