Boy, 4, girl, 10, die after teen driver hits three in residential Vaughan driveway, police say

Thestar.com
May 18, 2021
Breanna Xavier-Carter

A four-year-old boy and his 10-year-old sister have died after police say a teen driver veered his luxury car off a residential Vaughan street and struck the children in a driveway in broad daylight Sunday afternoon.

According to police, an adult male neighbour had stopped to help the children fix their bike chain in a driveway on Athabasca Road when he was also hit by the driver’s black 2017 Mercedes sedan. The neighbour was treated for minor injuries.

A 16-year-old driver from Richmond Hill was arrested at the scene and was initially charged with dangerous driving and criminal negligence causing bodily harm. After York Regional Police announced the ten-year-old’s death late Monday, the driver’s charges were updated to two counts of dangerous driving and criminal negligence causing death and one count each of dangerous operation causing bodily harm and criminal negligence causing bodily harm.

“The community has been devastated by this incident,” police spokesperson Const. Laura Nicolle said in an email. “Dangerous driving is a serious problem and an ongoing priority for York Regional Police. We encourage our citizens to slow down and drive safely and report any vehicles that are observed driving in ways that could put citizens at risk.”

Police say emergency crews were called to the scene around noon Sunday.

The children were rushed to hospital with life-threatening injuries, and the four-year-old boy died. His ten-year-old sister later also died in hospital.

It does not appear the driver was impaired, Nicolle said.

He cannot be identified under the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

On Monday, neighbours in the affluent Athabaska Road community described the shock of the crash.

“I’ve been sick to my stomach since yesterday, and then today we heard the news that no parent ever wants to hear, that the little one passed away,” said Coun. Marilyn Iafrate, whose Ward 1 includes the Athabasca Road neighbourhood.

“You are in your own driveway. What better and safer place to be than that? I feel upset because I see this all the time, whether it’s in my own neighbourhood or elsewhere. People just don’t care, they just speed through, barrelling through stop signs, and I don’t understand the rush.”

Iafrate said her staff are working on a speed policy review to limit most residential subdivisions to 40km/h -- the problem, she said, is that many drivers won’t abide by the rules.

Janet Joy Wilson, a longtime road safety advocate in Toronto, said the tragedy resonates in residential neighbourhoods across the GTA, where she said collisions with pedestrians and cyclists are common to the point there’s a “collective numbness to road violence.”

“Parents are frightened enough to let their kids on a sidewalk a few feet away from them, let alone walk to a park or bike to a school, and now you can’t even be safe letting your children be free in your own front yard or driveway. Just astounding,” she said.

Wilson especially pointed to the absence of sidewalks in many suburban streets, including the side of Athabasca where the crash occurred.

“Imagine anybody with children, or who is using a walker or in a wheelchair, how stressful it is to have to walk on the streets with very little space to share with the cars,” she said.