A man who severely injured another while driving after consuming alcohol, on the wrong side of Island Highway, will serve time in jail on the weekends at Nanaimo Correctional Centre.
In December, a jury found Maverick John Millen, 32, guilty of impaired operation of a vehicle causing bodily harm and dangerous operation of a vehicle causing bodily harm in a Jan. 11, 2019 incident near the Fredheim Road turnoff at Nanoose Bay. He was sentenced to a 90-day intermittent sentence by Justice Brenda Brown in B.C. Provincial Court in Nanaimo on Thursday, May 21 on the recommendation of both Nick Barber, Crown counsel, and Garen Arnet-Zargarian, defence counsel, who made a joint submission.
Brown ruled that Millen must report to the correctional centre on Fridays at 5:30 p.m. and remain incarcerated until Sundays at 6 p.m. – his sentence begins Friday, May 22. He is also subject to a one-year driving ban.
Millen, who received 90-day suspensions after failed breath tests in August of 2018 and 2019, had four shots of tequila and four rum-and-cokes before leaving a Nanaimo pub, headed north on Island Highway on the day of the incident, Brown stated. While driving on the wrong side of the road, he narrowly avoided an ambulance. Police were notified, but not before Millen collided with another vehicle, causing the driver to suffer a broken wrist and injured knee. Both vehicles were totalled.
Arnet-Zargarian told the court that his client is “a completely different man today then he was in 2019.” He will be seven years sober, as of August, and is gainfully employed as a helicopter mechanic in Parksville and is a parent of two children. The attorney noted that Millen had been in Australia prior to the incident, where people drive on the other side of the road. In addition, while he had a happy childhood, his mother was addicted to drugs and wasn’t always present and died in 2020.
Barber noted that it took seven years for the case to come to conclusion and it was through luck that no one died. Considering the length of time and distance Millen drove, it required convictions on both counts, according to the Crown attorney.
Addressing the court, Millen expressed regret to the driver for causing him harm; first responders, for taking up their time and the courts for taking up time and resources.
“This was the lowest point of my life. I cannot be back here again … I am six-plus years sober and actively engaged in sobriety every single day. I have put an immense amount of effort into changing the person whom I’d like to be in this community for the better, and I can never change what happened, but I will do everything I can to improve my community,” he stated.