WARNING: Details in this story are disturbing. Discretion is advised.
Two men have been sentenced to three years in prison and handed a three-year driving ban for deliberately dragging a man they struck with their vehicle for 1.3 kilometres through Surrey, B.C., in 2024, before dumping his body in the street.
The men, both 22, came to Canada on international student visas and will be deported back to India after serving their sentence.
They pleaded guilty to dangerous driving, failing to stop at an accident and offer assistance and interfering with a dead body.
The victim, identified in court as J.G., was a 47-year-old father.
“The victim was well loved by his family, his friends, and members of his First Nation and his community. Left behind a young child, wife, and it’s an incredibly sad case,” said Crown prosecutor Adam Jantunen.
According to an agreed statement of facts, Gaganpreet Singh, Jagdeep Singh and a third individual who was never charged were driving around Surrey in a red Ford Mustang in the early hours of Jan. 27, 2024.
Around 1:40 a.m., they left a pizza shop on 102 Avenue near King George Boulevard with Gaganpreet at the wheel of the Mustang owned by Jagdeep, who was sitting in the front passenger seat.
At the same time, two witnesses driving north on University Drive noticed a man lying on the roadway and called 911 at 1:41 a.m.
Seconds later, court heard, Gaganpreet struck the man.
The impact occurred as one of the two witnesses was on the phone with a 911 operator.
Both witnesses, the Crown said, saw the Mustang hit the victim but didn’t see the victim after and assumed he was being dragged.
Chilling audio from the 911 call was played in court.
After the caller states, “There’s a man lying in the middle of the road,” voices can be heard saying “Oh my God, Oh my God, someone just hit him,” followed by “Oh my God, where is he?” and “Oh my God, he’s stuck under the car.”
According to the agreed statement of facts, Gaganpreet stopped briefly at 105A Avenue and University Drive, where he and Jagdeep exited the vehicle and looked at and under its front.
At 1:42 a.m., friends of the accused pulled up in another vehicle, followed by the SUV of the two witnesses, which also stopped.
“Hey man, there’s a man underneath your car,” the witness is heard saying on the 911 recording.
Gaganpreet, the Crown said, drove away with the victim still under the vehicle.
Surveillance video, the Crown said, shows the witness standing by the road as the accused accelerates away with the victim’s body stuck to the vehicle.
After Gaganpreet unsuccessfully tried to dislodge the body on 132nd Street by pulling forward, stopping and reversing, the prosecutor said he and Jagdeep pulled into a cul-de-sac and “worked in concert to dislodge the victim’s badly mangled body.”
By this time, the Crown said, the victim was deceased.
Surveillance video entered as an exhibit during the sentencing hearing shows Jagdeep reversing the Mustang while Gaganpreet holds onto the victim, in what was eventually a successful effort to dislodge the body.
In reading the sentencing report, Judge Mark Jette said it was an aggravating factor that the two accused demonstrated complete indifference.
“From their first discovery that someone was trapped under the car through their joint decision to discard J.G.’s remains to the side of the road and drive away without providing assistance,” he said.
The victim suffered horrific injuries, court heard, and died as a result of being hit and dragged by the Mustang.
“J.G.’s injuries were horrific. Some of those injuries must’ve happened while he was still alive,” Jette said.
Gaganpreet’s hand, court heard, contained the victim’s DNA.
“They panicked and they don’t know what to do, and they kept on driving. That’s what was said by them in court during the sentencing,” said Gagan Nahal, defence lawyer for Gaganpreet.
Part of the mitigating factors are their age, neither has criminal or driving records and the judge accepted their remorse as genuine.
The judge noted that if it had been a motor-vehicle incident, it likely wouldn’t have resulted in criminal charges, but it was the two men’s actions after discovering they had hit J.G. and continued driving.
“They made a terrible decision that day, and I think it sends a message to members of the community generally, whether they’re here as international students or Canadian citizens, that these are serious offenses that will be taken seriously,” said crown Jantunen.
— with files from Kristen Robinson