Global News has obtained surveillance video showing the driver involved in the fatal hit-and-run of a Burnaby motorcyclist speeding and changing lanes prior to the impact three years ago.
The footage was presented in B.C. Provincial Court as evidence at the sentencing hearing for Marcel Genaille, who pleaded guilty in May 2023 to leaving the scene of an accident involving death in the June 19, 2021, collision.
James ‘Mark’ Peters, 59, was riding his Harley Davidson motorcycle to work at North Vancouver’s Richardson Terminal when he was rear-ended at 9:46 p.m. by Genaille’s Honda Accord as he stopped for a red light at Canada Way and Imperial Street in Burnaby.
Prior to the collision, surveillance from a home on Goodlad Street approximately one block south showed Peters’ motorcycle approaching Imperial Street at 58 kilometres per hour in the left side of the curb lane.
At this location, the Accord was five seconds behind in lane 1, travelling 74 kilometres in the 50 km/hr zone with its passenger tires encroaching into the curb lane.
Half a block from the Imperial intersection, dash-camera video from an oncoming southbound driver captured the motorcycle in the number 1 lane being followed closely by the speeding Accord.
Surveillance from a home adjacent to the collision scene showed the motorcycle came to a stop at Imperial as the light turned red, and the Accord struck the motorcycle less than a second later.
In the footage, one little spark flying up over the fence is the only indication of the crash.
According to an agreed statement of facts read in court by Crown prosecutor Mark Myhre, Peters was “ladled onto the hood of the Accord where his head struck the A pillar.”
Peters, who was grievously injured and never regained consciousness, came to rest 17 metres north of the stop line while his motorcycle was thrown 64 metres.
The husband, father of two daughters and member of the Grain Workers Union Local 333, was pronounced dead in hospital two hours later.
Three eyewitnesses confirmed the Accord did not stop after the collision while residential surveillance captured the vehicle at various points as it fled, blowing stop signs and losing its front bumper and licence plate along the route.
The line carrying fluid in the Accord was sheared in the collision and this fluid, said Crown, leaked onto the roadway leaving a clear trail as the vehicle zigzagged through side streets for 1.1 kilometres before it was abandoned outside witness Dody Reimer’s home on Burnfield Crescent at 9:48 p.m.
“I noticed an unusually parked car in the front of the house which is not normally there and when I looked a little closer I noticed that the front end was missing,” said Reimer, who witnessed police checking out the car the next day.
The Accord’s front bumper was found on Berkley Street 37 metres east of Canada Way.
About 20 minutes after the hit-and-run Genaille was captured on surveillance walking into the Esso at 5059 Canada Way from Sperling Avenue.
While inside, he is seen chatting with the clerk as he purchased some items and then walking out eastbound on Canada Way.
Genaille, who apologized to Peters’ family during the sentencing hearing on May 15, is expected to learn his sentence on Thursday.
The Crown is seeking two years in jail for Genaille followed by a five-year driving ban.
Defence counsel is asking for a six-month conditional sentence to be served in the community and a six month driving ban.
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