At the age of 57, Linda Michayluk surprised many in her family by announcing she was going to Afghanistan.

The Edmonton resident enlisted as a member of the Canadian Forces Personnel Support Agency and ended up serving two tours of duty – one in Kabul and one in Kandahar. One of her proudest accomplishments while on Afghan soil was helping to run the first Tim Hortons outlet for Canadian soldiers, giving them a little taste of home.

After returning to Canada, Michayluk retrained and found a new job working with e-leaning services  at the University of Alberta. She had recently found new love and was in a committed relationship. At the age of 60, she welcomed the birth of her first grandchild.

“Her life was just starting to jell,” said her long-time best friend Jill Sherstobitoff.

But then, less than four months after becoming a grandmother, Michayluk was killed in a head-on collision about 30 kilometres east of Jasper. This happened on Aug. 5, 2009.

Twenty-seven months later, the woman who caused that crash got what Michayluk’s friends and family believe is the first glimpse of the person she killed.

Linda Alook mostly stared at the floor during her sentencing in a Jasper courtroom last Thursday. But at one point she looked up and her gaze fixed momentarily on the public gallery, where Sherstobitoff was sitting in the front row, holding up a photo of her dead friend.

Shortly afterwards, Alook spoke. In custody and from behind protective glass, she apologized to her victim’s loved ones through a microphone.

“I would like to say I’m sorry for my actions and all the harm I’ve brought to the family,” Alook said. 

The moment was bittersweet.

Prior to the sentencing, Michayluk’s daughter Treena said the family was hoping for an admission of responsibility that went beyond Alook’s guilty plea to dangerous driving causing death.

“I think we just want someone to stand up and say, ‘I take responsibility. I did this,’” Treena said. “I guess we want an apology.”

Hearing Alook say she was sorry brought some degree of comfort to Michayluk’s friends and family, but that was quickly overshadowed by the sentence that was then handed down: 15 months minus 72 days already served. For them, that punishment didn’t seem to fit the crime, especially after hearing an account of what happened on the day of the crash read out again in court.

“There was quite a bit of traffic at that time of day,” Crown attorney David Clifton said, as he began recounting the official version of events for the record.

At about 6 p.m., an off-duty police officer travelling west on Highway 16 saw a Ford Ranger approaching from behind at high speed. The truck, being driven by Alook, proceeded to tailgate and then pass the officer, then pass the next vehicle ahead on the shoulder.

While approaching a right-hand curve in the road, the truck attempted to pass yet another vehicle – this time on the left. That put the truck directly in the path of an oncoming Ford Explorer, which swerved to avoid a head-on collision. There was a glancing impact between the Explorer and the truck but the major crash happened next.

An eastbound Nissan Altima carrying Michayluk and being driven by her partner, Gary Prokop, had been following just behind the Explorer. The couple was returning to their campsite near Hinton after spending the afternoon in Jasper. By the time the SUV in front of them swerved out of the way, there was no time for Prokop to react. The sedan slammed into the oncoming truck.

The resulting crash shut down the highway for hours. Prokop suffered serious injuries from which he still has not recovered. Alook, too, was seriously injured. Michayluk was the only one killed.

Empty beer cans were found inside the truck and Alook was initially charged with impaired driving. Those charges were ultimately withdrawn as Alook pleaded guilty to dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing bodily harm and dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death. She also pleaded guilty for failing to appear at a previous court date in July. That led to her arrest in September at a homeless shelter in Edmonton.

With credit for the time she has served since then, her net sentence issued on Nov. 24 amounted to one year and 18 days. She was also prohibited from driving for seven years and ordered to pay $77,000 in restitution.

“I don’t need to tell you, Miss Alook, the wrecking ball you’ve put into these people’s lives,” judge Vaughn Myers said as he handed down the sentence. “There is no sentence I can impose that will make these folks’ lives any better.”

Turning to Michayluk’s friends and family in the courtroom, the judge said he empathized with their “incredible loss” but hoped they could move past the hurt and the anger.

“I hope you don’t allow that anger to stay in you because it will destroy you,” Myers said. “I ask you to forgive, not for Miss Alook’s sake. I ask you to forgive for your sakes.”

Since the case was in provincial court, the family knew any sentence could not be more than two years. But, after waiting for more than two years themselves to come to this point, they couldn’t help but feel that justice had not truly been served.

“I thought it would be more,” Sherstobitoff said as she left the courtroom. “Our system sucks.”

“Drug dealers get more than that – and she killed a person,” remarked another of Michayluk’s friends, who travelled to Jasper from Phoenix, Ariz. for the sentencing.

“That’s absolutely laughable,” added Treena.

Michayluk’s friends and family left Jasper that afternoon with a mixture of emotions, but among them was hope. Treena, in particular, said she hoped her mother’s story will be remembered and might make an impact in a society where these types of collisions happen all too often.

“We’re almost becoming desensitized to it,” she said. “Oh, there’s another one. That’s too bad.”

“I don’t want my mom’s life to be remembered as police file number 2009-902891.”