BY KEITH LACEY
Breaking an unwritten rule that drivers should always stop for picket lines has resulted in careless driving conviction against a Sudbury woman.
Kyle Paden, 52, pleaded not guilty to one count of dangerous driving Monday.
After a full day of testimony, lawyers returned to court Tuesday and said Paden had agreed to plead guilty to careless driving.
Paden, who has no criminal record and no history of bad driving of any kind, was fined $500. She did not lose any driving privileges.
Defence counsel Christopher Corbett said his client didn?t mean to hurt anyone during the incident. Events unfolded quickly, and Paden feared for her own safety after being surrounded by angry picketers.
The trial heard unionized workers at the Canadian Revenue Agency (Taxation Data Centre) were involved in a legal rotating strike last Sept. 15.
Picketers say an obviously angry Paden ?plowed through? them, refusing to listen to picket information.
Workers were told to walk in circles and block cars that travelled onto the property, and to share information before allowing them to proceed.
Paden refused to stop while entering and leaving the tax centre.
?She swerved around a group of people very quickly...me and another girl put our hands up for her to stop, but she didn?t stop,? said Carole Dupuis, who was on the picket line when the incident took place.
?There was no eye contact whatsoever...and she didn?t stop and pushed the vehicle up against my legs...I had to jump off to the side.?
Several workers pleaded with the driver to stop, but she wouldn?t, said Dupuis.
?She accelerated and pushed us out of the way,? she said.
?I felt I was going to lose my balance and I didn?t want to fall so I jumped off to the side. I wasn?t injured, but I was scared.?
When the same driver tried to leave the premises, three dozen picketers surrounded her vehicle and yelled at her for what she?d done going through the picket line, said Dupuis.
Eventually, a picket captain told them to allow her to leave, and the driver picked up speed and spun her wheels before leaving the property, she said.
When Corbett suggested there were only two or three people on the picket line in the direct path of Paden when she entered the property, Dupuis did not disagree.
She also didn?t disagree one person had opened a door on the vehicle as Paden tried to leave the property.
Picketer Colleen Burns gave a similar version of events, saying the driver wouldn?t stop her vehicle at any point on the way onto property or on the
way out.
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