Victoria, B.C., woman awarded $1.4 million in accidental damages

A British Columbia Supreme Court judge has awarded $1.4 million in damages — including more than $8,000 for psilocybin-based treatments — to a woman whose vehicle was struck outside a Victoria restaurant in 2018.

Shelley Ann Roy-Noel, 45, filed suit against the executors of Christopher Mark Buckle – the driver of the GMC Sierra truck that struck the Toyota RAV4 SUV that Roy-Noel had just parked outside a restaurant on Wharf Street.

According to court documents, Roy-Noel, a professional singer who had operated a daycare that she was forced to close after the accident, saw the truck in the rearview mirror as she exited her vehicle.

Roy-Noel jumped over her car seat to protect her grandmother, who leaned forward in the passenger seat to pick up her purse from the floor.

The impact threw Roy-Noel forward and upward, Judge David Crerar said in his May 7 ruling.

“She first struck the left side of her head against the windshield and headliner and then against the driver’s side pillar,” the verdict states. “She barely remembers running after the truck and yelling at the defendant.”

Buckle was led away in handcuffs and “smelled of alcohol,” Crerar said, adding that Buckle died a year later under circumstances unrelated to the collision.

The judge said Buckle’s executors – parents Mark Buckle and Dale Buckle – had not responded to notice of the civil lawsuit, with ICBC as the “de facto defendant.”

Crerar said the crash “caused the plaintiff significant disability and reduced her to a shell of her former vibrant, exuberant, enterprising, personable, caring and active self.”

Roy-Noel claimed to have suffered a mild traumatic brain injury from the impact and said she suffered from chronic pain; migraine headaches; debilitating sensitivity to light and sound; tinnitus; hearing loss; dizziness and balance problems; blurred vision; scattered memory and concentration; brain fog; sleep disorder; Nightmares; post-traumatic stress disorder; including generalized anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder.

“These conditions combine to create a state of near-permanent pain, lethargy, distraction, anxiety and hopelessness,” the judge said. “Although these symptoms are more or less constant, they become particularly severe from time to time, individually or in combination, so she does not know whether she will be able to function on any given day or not.”

Crerar found that the allegations were largely supported and corroborated by the medical experts consulted by the plaintiff and were not materially undermined by the medical experts consulted by ICBC.

“ICBC counsel responsibly recognizes that plaintiff has suffered serious physical and psychological injuries that have rendered her unable to work full-time and that she requires significant medical and other interventions and treatments,” the ruling states.

Roy-Noel had requested $1.9 million, including $41,363 for psilocybin-based treatments and therapies for her life. It’s a treatment she began after “her first dark period of suicidal thoughts in late 2018,” Crerar said.

The judge said Roy-Noel stopped taking a daily microdose in 2023 and soon relapsed into suicidal thoughts, depression and an even more diminished ability to manage her pain symptoms.

“She testified that her therapeutic use of psilocybin was critical to her ability to function,” the judge said.

He said the psilocybin cost was reasonable based on the evidence of a physician and Roy-Noel, “if and as prescribed by a physician in accordance with Health Canada protocols.”

“It was literally life-saving because it staved off her suicidal thoughts,” he said.

The price includes $8,042 for psilocybin therapy (sometimes taken as magic mushroom).

The main damages are broken down:

• $902,500 for loss of future earning capacity;

• $220,000 in non-economic damages;

• $367,916 for future care costs; And,

• $151,098 for prior loss of wages and loss of prior earning capacity.