The province’s Independent Investigations Office is looking in to the circumstances surrounding a fatal crash in Saanich Saturday morning that involved a Victoria police officer.
The IIO says an officer spotted an Acura travelling on Quadra Street near Hillside Avenue at a high rate of speed around 2:38 a.m. The driver of the vehicle didn’t stop for police when the officer attempted to pull it over, and instead fled westbound on Hillside, then turned northbound onto Blanshard Street.
A release from the IIO indicates Victoria police say the officer “terminated his attempt to stop the vehicle” at Hillside and Blanshard.
The Acura travelled another 1.4 kilometres, when it crashed into a lamppost on the northeast corner of Blanshard and Cloverdale Avenue in Saanich. The driver of the vehicle died in the single-vehicle crash, and he was the lone occupant.
The IIO investigates police-involved incidents in B.C. that result in death or serious injury “in order to determine whether or not an officer may have committed an offence,” its website reads.
The B.C. Coroners Service said the man who died is Darcy David Cole, 29, of Victoria.
According to court records, Cole has a criminal history of theft and mischief in Victoria and Nanaimo.
kslavin@saanichnews.com