Wayne Camille
A Kamloops man who was busted driving drunk twice in one month last year — his eighth and ninth convictions for impaired driving — has avoided a jail sentence.
Instead, Wayne Camille will have to pay a fine that prompted questions from a provincial court judge when initially presented.
Camille, 58, was caught driving drunk twice in November — once when an officer pulled him over in the parking lot of a Sahali liquor store and again when he blew through a four-way stop at between 40 and 50 km/h.
Lawyers pitched a joint submission that would see Camille pay $2,000 in fines and be banned from driving for two years in exchange for guilty pleas to two counts of impaired driving and one count of driving while prohibited.
“The primary sentencing goals here are denunciation and deterrence,” Crown prosecutor Laura Drake said.
But, Kamloops provincial court judge Chris Cleaveley pointed out the joint submission was actually less than the mandatory minimum fine of $2,500 for the three guilty pleas.
Drake then upped the joint submission to $2,500.
Cleaveley also questioned how such a sentence would deter drivers from repeatedly driving while drunk.
“If the Crown is seeking the minimum fine, there’s not much denunciation and deterrence, is there?” he asked.
“For a fine to denounce the second offence, the fine would have to be more than the one for the first offence. It seems odd that denunciation and deterrence for the second offence is the same penalty for the first offence,” Cleavely said.
“I’m not calling the sentence into question but, effectively, there isn’t an awful lot to denounce or deter others.”
Cleaveley eventually agreed to the plea bargain after hearing the circumstances of Camille’s life, which include a stay at residential school as a youth and a series of severe bull-riding injuries that left him on permanent disability.
Camille’s seven previous convictions for impaired driving occurred in the 1980s.
Court heard Camille plans to pay part of his fine with settlement money he received for having attended residential school.
With all of the surcharges factored in, Camille owes $3,175 in fines.
Cleaveley also imposed a two-year driving ban.
The post Double drunk driver avoids jail appeared first on Kamloops This Week.
