Crown council withdrew all charges against Mark Patterson in the case of the death of Windsor cyclist, Meredith McPhee. Patterson failed a roadside alcohol screening, which lead to a breathalyser test at the police station. He was charged with impaired driving causing death and driving with more than the legal limit of alcohol in his blood.
McPhee, 32, was killed while on a 24km training ride from her family’s Tobermory cottage in July 2008. She was preparing for the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada Bike Tour.
Superior Court Justice Robert Thompson found that Patterson’s rights were twice violated by police misconduct. As such, he excluded a roadside sobriety test and a breathalyser test. According to the Owen Sound Sun Times, Thompson wrote in the Sept. 26 decision that “real evidence is to be rejected only if the manner in which it was obtained was very serious and the misconduct of the police egregious.”