Piovesan withdraws application for parole

A parole hearing scheduled for Nicolas Piovesan for Dec. 11 has been withdrawn, said the Parole Board of Canada.

A panel hearing had been tentatively scheduled for that day in Kingston, but a letter from the parole board said Piovesan withdrew his application, and that he is not presently schedule for any further review.

That means he may likely serve out the rest of his sentence until his mandatory release in 2015, said Lisa Jelley, mother of Caitlin Jelley, one of three teenagers killed by the convicted drunk driver on June 21, 2009.

In 2010, Piovesan pleaded guilty to three counts of criminal negligence causing death when he killed Jelley, Jazmine Houle and Steven Philippe in a drunk driving incident on Regional Road 80 in Hanmer. He was sentenced to seven years in prison and a 10-year ban on driving.

Lisa Jelley said she is left with questions as to why Piovesan withdrew his application, but that it's good news.

“We had prepared another statement to try and convince the parole board to not let him out,” she said. “His plan last year was to come back to Sudbury, and the parole board didn't approve it. We figured his plan would be different this year, and we still don't know what that was, but we felt there would be a higher chance he would be let out this time.”

Jelley was given the option by the Parole Board of Canada to update her statement, or to leave it as it was.

“We had planned to go and speak, we prepared another statement, and we even bough our tickets,” she said. “Now we don't have to worry about him being back here, if that was his plan. I don't want to give him any more thought other than that.”