‘A lot of courage’: Men recall fateful night caused by drinking and driving
The effects of impaired driving were apparent at a special presentation in La Ronge this afternoon where two men talked about the traumatic circumstances which brought them together.
Students at Churchill Community High School were brought back in time to a fateful day on Aug. 9, 2014, when the lives of Harold Johnson, Hillary Cook and many others were changed forever. Johnson’s late brother Gary Johnson, who was 52 years old at the time, was walking home along Highway 2 in Air Ronge after babysitting his grandchildren when he was hit by a vehicle driven by Cook and killed. Cook plead guilty to impaired driving causing death and served a three-year prison sentence. After sharing a stage with the man who took his brother’s life, Johnson said it took a lot of courage for Cook to speak as he did.
“Imagine how he must feel to be the scorn of the community the way everybody is who is involved in a tragedy like that and stand up and make something good out of it,” Johnson said. “I’m really impressed by him. He has no memory of that night. The last thing he remembers is walking from a house on the reserve to his house. He woke up in the morning and he was told during the night he killed somebody.”