The man charged after a little boy was killed by a vehicle on an Edmonton restaurant patio has been granted bail.
Richard Suter was driving the SUV that crashed into the patio and killed toddler Geo Mounsef.
READ MORE: ‘It just sunk me’: Man who crashed into Edmonton patio, killing toddler
He was serving a 26-month sentence for failing to provide a breath sample. Suter was granted bail as he waits for the Supreme Court of Canada to consider his appeal.
“Mr. Suter has been granted leave to appeal his sentence to the Supreme Court of Canada,” Suter’s lawyer Dino Bottos said,”Which is a rare thing because they don’t usually hear sentence appeals, but the whole point of his appeal is to have his sentence reduced and in my opinion he’s already over-served what a fit and proper sentence should have been.”
In December 2015, Suter was sentenced to four months in jail and a 30-month driving suspension after he pleaded guilty to refusing to provide a breath sample after a collision causing death.
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The judge ruled that witnesses wrongly assumed that Suter was drunk after his vehicle plowed into the southwest Edmonton restaurant patio in May 2013.
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Earlier this year, the supreme court agreed to hear his case, which is scheduled for Oct. 11.
READ MORE: Supreme Court of Canada will hear Richard Suter’s appeal
The appeal is to get Suter’s sentence reduced to its original four months, Bottos said in an interview.
“It would have been pointless for Mr. Suter to have granted leave to appeal and having to wait until October 11 to pursue the appeal before the Supreme Court and deny him bail because by October 11 he would be effectively serving the vast majority of his sentence,” Bottos said.
“In order to find a true effect to his sentence appeal, he had to be released otherwise it’s just unfair to keep him in when in fact he could be grossly over-serving what a fit and proper sentence would be.”
Suter is expected to be released Wednesday afternoon, once the paperwork is processed.
Bottos describes Sutter as “shell shocked” and “apprehensive” and said it’ll take a while for this to sink in.
With files from Scott Johnson, 630 CHED
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