UPDATE: Irwin Richard Franz, the driver involved in a hit-and-run that killed 16-year-old Annie Leung, is expected to be sentenced in court today. More to come.
A Port Coquitlam man has been charged in the hit-and-run death of 16-year-old Annie Leung. On March 18, 2015, he pleaded guilty to failing to remain at the scene of an accident that resulted in the death of another person.
His case has now been adjourned to April 8, 2015 at 2 p.m to fix a date for sentencing
73-year-old Irwin Richard Franz spoke to Global News reporter Ted Chernecki in July, 2014, and says he confessed to police just days after the accident.
“I was in a haze, just in shock,” says Franz. “I walked down there and said ‘oh my god’ – am I involved in this? I didn’t know for sure, I didn’t know.”
“I walked down, and to see if I could help, and she had all the help she could have, and I heard the ambulance coming, so I just — I just gotta walk away and get my thoughts sorted out,” says Franz.
“I wasn’t even thinking – I don’t remember driving home.”
Leung was crossing the road in the crosswalk with another girl at the corner of Pitt River Road and Mary Hill Road when the accident happened on September 12.
Police said a black pick-up truck, possibly without a canopy, being driven by an older male with graying hair fled the scene after hitting the teenager.
After the incident, investigators say, the driver stopped a short way down the road, got out of his truck, saw what happened, got back in and then drove away. Mounties say there is no way the driver did not know he had hit someone.
In the days following the crash, Coquitlam RCMP released surveillance footage from the scene, asking for public’s help to identify the driver.
Leung’s parents also made an emotional plea for the driver of the truck to come forward.
Cpl. Jamie Chung with Coquitlam RCMP says they reviewed countless hours of surveillance footage and interviewed numerous witnesses before being able to charge Franz.
More than 100 tips from the public have also been received.
WATCH: Cpl. Jamie Chung with the Coquitlam RCMP announces the charges
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