WESTLOCK - One half of the duo that led police on two 2018 high speed chases that featured a spike belt, RCMP helicopter, two Camaros, two trucks, a 30-foot motor home and a canine unit will remain in jail for nearly another six months.
In Westlock Provincial Court Dec. 11, Eric Michael Unger, 29, from Red Deer, made an appearance, in street clothes with feet shackled, in the prisoners’ box, to hear Judge Vaughn Myers hand down a sentence on two charges of failing to stop for and evading police and one count of dangerous driving.
Unger received 172 days in jail on one of the failure to stop charges, along with a three-year driving prohibition and another 172 days concurrent on the dangerous driving charge. On the other failure to stop charge he received a $1,000 fine and a concurrent six-month driving prohibition.
Unger has been in custody at Edmonton Remand Centre since he was arrested in Westlock Sept. 1, 2018. He has already been in custody 463 days. He was given credit at a rate of 1.5 days, totalling 695 days. The additional 172 days will make for a total sentence of 867 days, or 29 months.
Unger stood trial in Westlock Oct. 9 after a three-hour preliminary hearing that found he was fit to stand trial the previous February.
Court heard at the time that at the end of August 2018, after a series of break-ins and a variety of other crimes, Unger and his partner were tracked by the Alberta Crime Reduction Unit (CRU) to a 30-foot recreational vehicle the pair had been using as a base near Hinton.
Around the same time, Hinton RCMP received a complaint of two stolen Camaros that were soon tracked to the Westlock area.
On Aug. 31, 2018, Westlock RCMP were notified of a stolen Dodge truck from a local dealership. Witnesses said the male suspect was dropped off by a woman in a yellow Camaro.
The next day, the stolen Dodge and the Camaro were seen at a local gas station, where both vehicles proceeded to ram the RCMP vehicle before fleeing the scene. A chase ensued, but was soon called off out of consideration for public safety.
It just so happened the CRU was on standby in Westlock at the time and joined in the search for the stolen vehicles, setting up a spike belt on Highway 18, near Range Road 273, to stop the Camaro.
The woman driving the car swerved to avoid the spike belt, hit the ditch and struck a tree. She tried to flee on foot, but was soon tracked down by the canine unit and arrested.
That night, the CRU located Unger, near a stolen Ford truck in Westlock. He fled, but with the help of an RCMP helicopter and the canine unit, he was soon arrested.
Back in the courtroom last Wednesday, judge Myers called Unger “a wrecking ball that endangered the safety of officers and the public” that day. The ramming of the police vehicle was especially troubling to the judge, who considered it as the biggest aggravating factor in his sentencing decision.
Unger’s guilty plea and his rehabilitation work in jail were taken as mitigating circumstances.
“This is a case where significant rehabilitation has taken place,” Unger’s defense lawyer David Keyes told the court, adding his client had taken advantage of boot camp and other programming while in custody, including academic upgrading.
Unger plans on pursuing his GED when released, Keyes said.
Keyes went on to say these were several steps in the right direction and that Unger was remorseful about what he had done, calling the crime spree out of character for his client.
Judge Myers also received and read a stack of reference letters in Unger’s favour before handing down his sentence.
Keyes said his client had developed a drug addiction and found himself associating with the wrong crowd, noting his lack of a criminal record until 2018.
