Vancouver Island hit-and-run killer died on street from toxic drugs: Coroner’s report

A North Vancouver man convicted of killing two motorcyclists on the Malahat Highway in 2010, died from toxic drugs on the streets of Maple Ridge in Dec. 2020, according to a newly released coroner’s report.

Lucas Ian Brown, 35, was found unresponsive by a passerby on a public sidewalk on Dec. 17, 2020, and was last seen alive the previous evening by staff at an area business.

BC Ambulance paramedics did not undertake resuscitative efforts as “Brown was clearly deceased,” wrote coroner Debra Rees in a report dated May 13, 2022.

Drug paraphernalia was found nearby including baggies, pipes, straws, burnt tin foil with residue, and a lighter – while toxicological analysis detected “fentanyl within a range where therapeutic and lethal concentrations overlap and methamphetamine within a range associated with recreational use.”

Rees determined Brown died of mixed illicit drug toxicity and classified his death as accidental, making no recommendations.

In Nov. 2011, Brown was sentenced to seven years in prison for criminal negligence causing the deaths of Martha Ralph and Lawrence Machnee, failing to remain at the scene of an accident and four other offences related to a crime spree before and after the fatal collision.

Ralph, 56, and her partner Machnee, 59, were thrown from their motorcycle on the Malahat Highway on Feb. 20, 2010, after Brown struck them as he made an illegal left-hand turn in a Honda stolen from North Vancouver.

Machnee was killed instantly while Ralph succumbed to her injuries in hospital.

Witnesses said the suspect driver fled the scene, running down an embankment near an old cement plant.

In July 2011, a jury found Brown guilty of all seven charges he was facing.

by Global News