A charge of dangerous driving causing death has been laid in connection with the fatal dump-truck collision that killed South Surrey resident Jim Neiss last January.
While police said last week that a criminal charge had yet to be approved in connection with the Jan. 18 crash, according to court records, the accused first appeared in Surrey Provincial Court on the matter Nov. 18.
Neiss, 59, died just after 5:30 a.m. Jan. 18, when his Ford Explorer was hit head-on in the 19800-block of 16 Avenue by a Sterling dump truck that had reportedly crossed a double-yellow line to pass a small white car.
Neiss – a bus driver with the Langley School District – had been on his way to work at the time.
Neiss’s wife, Brenda Michie, said Tuesday she learned of the charge 10 months to the day after her husband’s death. The news is “a relief of sorts, because it’s moving forward, and that’s what you want,” she said.
“I know there’s people waiting to hear.”
Michie said she plans to follow the court process through, but isn’t ready to forgive the person responsible for her husband’s death.
She recalled an interview she watched with her husband a year ago, of a Palestinian man whose entire family had been killed.
“He was on TV and he said, ‘we have to find a way to forgive and I forgive them’,” she said. “It was pretty powerful… We’re brought up to forgive people. I’m certainly not there yet. I figure maybe one day – you’ve got to be able to do that.”
For now, “it’s all about getting through each day.”
“I try and keep remembering it was what he’d want me to do.”
Glen Edward Theriault, 63, is due in court Dec. 12.