02.23.2016 12:54 PM

Marco Muzzo, may you burn in Hell

You have to read what our friend Caryn Lieberman has reported today from that courtroom. It’s very hard to read, be forewarned.

(Apologies I could not make Storify work. For self-hosted WordPress sites like mine, it doesn’t.)

28 Comments

  1. Cory says:

    Can they go after him in civil court? I hope so.

  2. Peter says:

    Much as I hold no brief for Muzzo and can’t even begin to imagine her anguish, I’m really not comfortable with these kinds of highly emotional (and seemingly carefully crafted) victim impact statements reported line by line on Twitter. Too close to the mob yelling at Pilate in my view. If she were a devout religious person who believed in forgiveness or even just a nervous introvert who gave brief, understated testimony, should his sentence be less?

    • Warren says:

      Don’t be a fucking asshole.

    • MississaugaPeter says:

      Are you for real you dussbag?

    • Kevin T. says:

      Let me guess: you’re not a parent.

      • Peter says:

        Yes I am a parent and if you think I was expressing any sympathy for Muzzo or think a light sentence would be appropriate, you are wrong. Victim Impact Statements are relatively new and date from the 80’s when conservative-oriented victims’ advocacy groups in the States were upset about too-light sentences. The best critique I’ve ever read is here. Perhaps this is the wrong day to raise it, but the issue of the influence of public opinion on criminal charges and sentencing has always been a genuine one and has become more so in the age of social media .

        • nobonus4nonis says:

          don’t be that guy. why are you being that guy.

        • Kevin T. says:

          Then “fucking asshole”, “dussbag” and “fucking dick” are all warranted.

        • Steve T says:

          Peter, it seems clear to me that no one is willing to discuss or listen to your points in a rational, reasonable way. They just want to throw ad-hominem attacks at you.

          It’s too bad, because good law is never made when emotions are allowed to creep in. While Muzzo may be a scumbag, it doesn’t alter the need to discuss the benefits and drawbacks of victim-impact statements.

          When simply raising a topic results in personal attacks, and the mixing-up of legal discussion versus support for the criminal, you know something is wrong.

    • e.a.f. says:

      No his sentence should not be less. Although I tend to agree with you about victim impact statements, where the “victim” has a whole new career. Tthere is the case to be made for family of the deceased to tell the defendant what they did to them and their lives.

      In these types of cases it certainly is important. The defendant has pled guilty, most likely on the advise of his lawyer, but he needs to hear what his actions did to this family.

    • Justin, not in Ottawa says:

      I think everyone has made Peter’s point now.

  3. pipes says:

    The piece of privileged shit will by his way out of Hell too!

    This horror is incomprehensible, I doubt anyone has the language to express the permanent impact this has. This is an unrelenting inconsolable sorrow.

    I know several people who have lost children, and I have witnessed first hand their agony.

    Peter, you really are a fucking dick.

  4. Gord says:

    When are we going to start imposing lifetime driving bans on people who drive while impaired? It’s high time in this country we stopped treating drivers’ licenses as a God-given right. I really think that if people knew getting behind the wheel after drinking could potentially cost them their drivers’ license – permanently – instead of a fine and a few points on their license (i.e. a slap on the wrist) I think a lot more people would think twice.

  5. Jack D says:

    I really hope the judge sets a precedent with the sentencing. I really don’t think anything less than maximum sentences, or something just short of life, is acceptable in this situation.

    If we continue to hand down sentences that have little consequence relative to the crime, there will never be a deterrent to drunk driving. Life in prison would be most appropriate considering the devastation this man has caused. If the sentence is too light, it could be seen as another example of the affluent escaping accountability.

  6. Kevin T. says:

    I wish I hadn’t read those, my fucking heart is aching at the unimaginable thought of such a loss, and my eyes won’t stop blurring. Drunk driving sentences need to treat cases like this like murder.

  7. e.a.f. says:

    They won’t treat drunk driving as seriously as it ought to be because so many of the middle class and up participate in this particular crime. No one wants to send their friends and neighbours to jail for life or a very long time, etc.

    There are very few people even in the judicial system who have not been over the limit and driven at some time in their life. I know, I did it in my early 20s in the early 70s.

    We are not socialized to think of drinking and driving as murder, although it is changing.

    I can not begin to feel what this family must be going through, loosing all your children and a parent not through some disease or weather induced accident, but through some one’s decision to just get drunk and then drive.

    I don’t know what the penalty ought to be for this crime, but if its less than 10 years, I’m not going to be happy, so that would mean a 15 year sentence.

    In some countries its even a crime to be in the car with a drunk driver. Its go to jail for the first offense. It might clog the courts and jails for awhile but it might start to deal with the problem.

    a few years ago we had a member of the B.C. provincial leg. pulled over for drinking and driving. We’ve had cops in drunk driving accidents,

    What prompted this man to be this drunk and then drive is beyond me. Who feed him all this booze and then let him drive is something we might want to consider also.

    • A Blanas says:

      I understand from the court testimony that he stumbled off a private jet at Buttonville airport, blitzed out of his mind, stepped into his sports car, tore off along the 404, and 15 minutes later the crash occurred. So the boozing occurred in the jet.

      • Nicole says:

        Weren’t his mother and fiancee in the car with him? Why aren’t they charged for letting him drive when it was obvious he was drunk? I understand outrage against the driver, but there were two other adults who could have prevented this tragedy as well.

  8. Steve T says:

    I too hope Muzzo burns in hell. Right alongside the unnamed La Loche murderer, who perhaps deserves even a hotter corner of Hades because he planned specifically to kill people. I hope that the La Loche murderer isn’t given some special dispensation because he wasn’t a rich a-hole like Muzzo, or because of some other irrelevant factor. Murder is murder.

  9. Warren says:

    You’re right as usual, John. Hell is too good for him, anyway.

    • MonteCristo says:

      Sorry, the issue really isn’t Muzzo, it’s society as a whole.

      Society allowed Muzzo to keep driving cars over the speed limit and getting away with it:

      “The 29-year-old was charged last March with holding a handheld communication device while driving in Caledon, Ont., according to a copy of the ticket obtained by The Canadian Press.

      A Caledon courthouse clerk says he failed to respond to the ticket and was automatically convicted and paid the $280 fine.

      On Feb. 9, 2012, Muzzo was charged with speeding, allegedly travelling 134 kilometres per hour in a 100-kilometre-per-hour zone on Highway 407 in Oshawa, Ont., at 10:46 a.m.

      A Durham Whitby court clerk said the speeding ticket was withdrawn and no reasons were given. ”

      Traffic rules are basically a suggestion for many affluent citizens. What a normal citizen considers a burden, they consider a night out at the restaurant.

      Muzzo isn’t alone, look at Ethan Couch, Martin Shkreli, Lizzie Grubman he’s actually systematic of the affluent in North American society.

      It’s “affluenza” a disease that affluent people, which is characterized by the complete disregard for others, it’s narcissism at it’s most extreme and it’s fueled by ever increasing wealth.

      You don’t have to look very far to find similar events of affluent people who have ignored the law until someone gets injured or killed. The affluent grow to become complacent to rules and basically think they are immune to laws.

      All until these horrible events occur, then all of a sudden the remorse suddenly flows, the PR people and lawyers come out to soften the blow, it’s a well worn soap opera script that we see in the media far too often.

      It’s disappointing when the affluent suddenly claim they are the victims, when they are the cause. But it’s even more disappointing that society allows them to reach these levels of irresponsibility.

      Perhaps, its time to consider real consequences to stymie the irresponsible conduct of the affluent, a good start would be what they do in Scandinavia where the fine is proportionate to your income:

      http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/03/finland-home-of-the-103000-speeding-ticket/387484/

      Ask the Leafs Leo Komarov if his $40,000 speeding ticket in Finland had any impact:

      http://www.thehockeynews.com/blog/report-leo-komarov-slapped-with-40000-fine-in-finland-for-speeding/

      Making an example of Muzzo isn’t going to bring those kids back to life because the issue is how cold and callous the more affluent have become in society as a whole.

      When you have someone called Vlad Precup who runs over a homeless man for touching his precious red Mazda RX8, then floored the gas pedal and continued “street-racing” through the ByWard Market, one of Ottawa’s “densest and busiest neighbourhoods ” then society has a problem, a big problem.

      http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/0313-precup

      • Cory says:

        I wouldn’t mind seeing fines proportional to income. I’d also add that it looks like the Tim Bosma murder may have also been affected by “affluenza”.

  10. MississaugaPeter says:

    Father John, eternal estrangement from the Good Guy is the fate of many who did less than murder three innocent children. Including too many in the clergy. I hope you have done God’s will and are doing your part before critiquing Brother Warren who wears his heart on his sleeve. Not only was the innocence of many destroyed, but unfortunately lost faith in God and in Church. Coming to the defense of murderers may be admirable Christian behaviour, but worthless if no defense was made of Innocents.

  11. Eric Weiss says:

    I was thinking the exact same thing. Self-righteous anger may make us feel good for a time, but it not up to us to pass final judgement on someone’s soul. We’re simply not qualified.

  12. Yomin Postelnik says:

    Warren, It’s terrible and excruciatingly painful. At the other end of that, and to be fair there is almost always another end to human tragedies, there’s someone who committed an awful and tragic accident and was awfully reckless, but is a human being, did not mean to cause this tragedy and will live in horror for life as well. Societal justice needs to be tempered with mercy for it to have any effect at all. Overkill also usually causes the pendulum to swing back the other way.

    There’s a point at which a sentence actually becomes counterproductive in terms of it being a deterrent, because people can’t conceive such harsh sentences, G-D forbid, befalling them. The emphasis on hatred of the individual menace also prevents society from delving into real ways to prevent such horrors (ignition locks, mandated cut offs at bars, etc.).

    Modern society seems to be preoccupied with a culture of hate. This has shown time and again to work against any betterment in society. And on an individual level, society and everyone is better off erring on the side of mercy 99% of the time. This is not true with regard to group policy, but the tendency today is for many to ignore general societal dangers, and to spend negative energy directed at individuals, in a way that doesn’t allow for the tempered justice that is absolutely essential to the continuation of any society.

  13. Eric Weiss says:

    Nobody is defending Muzzo.

  14. Ian Howard says:

    This tragedy underlines why driver-less cars will soon be a reality.

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