PENTICTON — A Calgary man responsible for striking and killing a teenager with his boat on Osyoos Lake, and then fleeing the scene, has now been sentenced to 27 months in prison.
Ryan Symington, 30, has pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing the death of Marco Corbin and failure to stay at the scene in a Penticton court room Tuesday.
“It is even more tragic that when Marco died, his family died emotionally with him,” said Judge Gale Sinclair. “The sentence, I know, will be totally unacceptable to Mr. Corbin’s family. However, I am bound by precedent.”
Corbin was an 18-year-old teenager from Mission, B.C. who was tubing with a few friends on August 16, 2011.
The court heard how Symington had been drinking vodka and beer throughout that day, while driving his boat.
It also heard how when Symington’s boat struck the teen, he was urged to stop and help but he refused saying he had hit a log.
Crown prosecutor Mallory Treddenick said Symington eventually called 911, telling the operator that someone was dying in the middle of the lake but did not offer any other details.
An autopsy report determined Corbin died of head trauma.
Symington’s lawyer, Balfour Der, said his client displayed an absence of care but did not commit a deliberate act.
The victim’s father, Bob Corbin, told the court how, after hearing of his son’s death, he went into coma for a few days after overdosing on medication.
Corbin’s mother, Elena Di Giovanni, described her life as a “war of zone of broken doors, broken walls, broken hearts, broken relationships, broken lives, broken spirits and broken hope.”
Di Giovanni said her son earned an engineering scholarship and was planning to attend university that fall.
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