Victims speak out at Broncos trucker’s sentencing hearing

The widow of the late head coach of the Humboldt Broncos delivered a powerful message Tuesday as she gave her victim impact statement in a Melfort, Sask. gymnasium converted to serve as a courtroom.

“I want to tell you I forgive you,” Christina Haugan said to Jaskirat Singh Sidhu during the second day of his sentencing hearing.

Haugan’s husband, Darcy, was among 16 people killed when the Broncos’ team bus crashed into a semi truck driven by Sidhu on April 6, 2018.

According to a statement of facts presented in court Monday, Sidhu ran a stop sign at the intersection of Highway 35 and Highway 335, placing his truck in the middle of the intersection and leaving the driver of the Broncos’ bus with no way to avoid the fatal collision.

Sidhu pleaded guilty on Jan. 8 to 16 counts of dangerous driving causing death and 13 counts of dangerous driving causing injury stemming from the crash.

Haugan said she still refuses to call the event an “accident,” because the word implies there was no way it could have been avoided. She said she prefers to call the tragedy the result of “a collision.”

While Haugan delivered a message of forgiveness, she also said Sidhu’s actions had robbed her two young sons of a father. She told Sidhu she wanted him to learn as much as he could about the victims of the crash.

Darcy Haugan’s parents delivered a written statement to the court that was read aloud by their son-in-law as they stood alongside him.

They wrote that they didn’t believe Sidhu woke up on the morning of the crash meaning to harm anyone, just as they didn’t know they were speaking to their son for the last time when they wished him luck in that evening’s playoff matchup against the Nipawin Hawks.

“Darcy is the kind of man who never held a grudge. He always chose to see the good things in other people,” they wrote.

‘Everything I see I relate to Logan’: Mother describes anguish of losing son

Next to speak Tuesday morning was Bonnie Schatz, who lost her son Logan in the crash.

She described the scene at the Tisdale hospital following the collision as being like something out of a horror movie leading up to the moment she learned her son had died.

“Then it happened, they called our names. My heart dropped. I didn’t want to go with them. That was the moment my life changed forever,” she said through tears.

Schatz said she ended up having to tell Logan’s sisters and brother the news over the phone, as they were still several hours away when she learned what had happened.

“Everything I see I relate to Logan. Everything I hear I relate to Logan. This has consumed my life … I feel like I am there in body but not in mind,” she said.

After Schatz finished her statement, court heard from Meagan Hartley, Logan’s sister.

“(Logan) was going places, but now Logan and my family will never be able to see where his skills would have taken him … he was way too young to leave us,” she said.

Hartley got married in September, but said the ceremony felt hollow with an empty seat where her brother should have been.

“How could I smile on what was supposed to be the happiest day of my life?”

She said she’s had trouble letting her loved ones out of her sight since Logan’s death, and still calls her family every time she hears a news report of a car crash to make sure they’re okay.

Sidhu’s sentencing hearing is scheduled to run through Friday at the Kerry Vickars Centre in Melfort.

—With files from Chris Vandenbreekel

Jaskirat Singh Sidhu just arrived for day two. Him and his lawyers said nothing, and they were followed by Sidhu's supporters. #HumboldtBroncos pic.twitter.com/3SSLQR52R3

— Chris Vandenbreekel (@Vandecision) January 29, 2019