A repeat drunk driver who struck and killed a young woman in Montreal East in 2007 was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Monday.
Raymond Levesque, who had seven prior convictions for impaired driving, hit 23-year-old Karine Methot as she was getting into a friend's car in May of 2007.
As she handed down her sentence at the Montreal courthouse, the judge called Levesque a "coward" for fleeing the scene of the accident. He told police that he thought he had just hit a car, not a woman.
Methot was taken off of life support four days after she was pinned against Levesque's van.
He's barred from driving for the rest of his life.
Grieving family
Jeanne Methot, who is still grieving the loss of her beloved daughter, told reporters outside the courtroom that the sentence did give the family some degree of closure.
"I'm happy, we feel free," she said, her voice breaking with emotion.
The family will lobby politicians for tougher jail sentences and they want to strike down a provision that calculates time already served as double time.
The provision means that Levesque will serve just five-and-a-half years in prison.
A decade of drunk driving
Levesque's criminal life as a drunk driver began in 1985 when he received the first of seven convictions over the next 11 years, including a jail sentence.
Ten years later, on May 8, 2007, Levesque was driving with twice the legal amount of alcohol in his blood when he hit several parked cars and then pinned Methot as she tried to get into her vehicle.
Police caught up with Levesque not long afterwards based on witnesses who reported his license plate number.
