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The trucker involved in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash in April of 2018 has lost his latest bid to stay in Canada.
A federal court judge has dismissed applications from Jaskirat Singh Sidhu, who was fighting deportation to his home country of India now that he has served his prison sentence.
The Broncos were on their way to an SJHL playoff game in Nipawin on April 6, 2018 when their bus collided with Sidhu’s semi at a rural intersection near Tisdale. The semi had gone through a stop sign and into the path of the bus.
Sixteen people on the bus died as a result of the crash and 13 others were injured.
In 2019, Sidhu was sentenced to eight years in prison after pleading guilty to 16 charges of dangerous driving causing death and 13 counts of dangerous driving causing bodily harm in the wake of the crash.
Sidhu was granted day parole for six months in July of 2022. He got full parole after following conditions set out by the Parole Board of Canada and, according to his lawyer, is now working in Calgary.
However, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) had recommended that Sidhu be handed over to the Immigration and Refugee Board to decide whether he should be deported.
Sidhu’s lawyer, Michael Greene, argued before the Federal Court in September that the CBSA should not have made that recommendation.
Greene told the court during the September hearing that his client caused a national tragedy and “immeasurable pain and suffering,” but the border officials who did the report didn’t factor in Sidhu’s previously clean record and his level of remorse.
“The officer and the minister’s delegate unreasonably restricted their assessment to considering the past consequences of the offence while failing to give any real consideration to the future risk to public safety and security,” Greene told court.
“In effect, they made this case about punishment and retribution.”
Greene also referred to a report from a psychologist saying Sidhu had suffered post-traumatic stress disorder and depression as a result of the crash, and if he was sent back to India, his condition would “continue to deteriorate.”
Greene asked that the CBSA be ordered to conduct a second review of the case.
In the decision released Thursday, Justice Paul Crampton rejected the request.
Crampton wrote that Sidhu was seeking to have two decisions about his future in Canada “set aside and remitted for reconsideration by different decision-makers.”
One decision was by a CBSA officer recommending that Sidhu be considered for deportation, and the other was by a delegate for the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness who found the CBSA officer’s decision to be well-founded.
“I find that the processes followed by the Officer and the Delegate were fair, having regard to all of the circumstances,” the judge wrote. “I also find that the Decisions were not unreasonable.”
He added that Sidhu can still ask for permanent resident status on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.
In the first paragraph of his decision, Crampton called the circumstances leading to the case “heartbreaking” and “truly tragic for everyone involved.”
He later added: “Unfortunately, regardless of my determinations, the healing required to return to some form of a better life may become more difficult for some people who wish for a different outcome than the one I reach.”
Some of the victims’ families have said Sidhu should be deported, while others have supported his bid to stay in Canada.
— With files from The Canadian Press
