York Region Police Det. Const. Remo Romano has been found guilty of dangerous driving by a third jury examining the 2014 collision that killed pedestrian Natasha “Carla” Abogado.

Jurors returned their verdict after noon Wednesday after starting deliberations at 3 p.m. the day before.

Abogado, 18, was run down by Romano’s truck racing to join his team at an estimated 115 km/h in a 60 km/h zone — with no emergency lights or siren. The young woman — returning home to her Scarborough townhouse from a part-time job — had just hopped off a bus and was hit while crossing mid-block on St. Clair Ave. E.

Abogado was thrown more than 75 metres and died at the scene.

Romano was part of Project Litterbox, a YRP undercover surveillance investigation into a series of non-violent commercial break-ins where thieves made off with over $500,000 in cosmetics and perfumes. He and his colleagues were tailing a suspect in a white van but Romano had fallen behind and was trying to catch up.

But court heard there was no urgency — this was an intelligence gathering operation with no imminent arrest.

Romano’s defence was that the Highway Traffic Act allows police officers to exceed the posted limit if it’s in the execution of their duties.

He testified that he didn’t see the jaywalker until it was too late. But a senior collision reconstructionist from the Special Investigations Unit testified that had Romano reduced his speed to even 80 km/h — instead of going nearly twice the legal limit — he would have been able to avoid hitting Abogado.

Romano’s first trial in May 2016 ended in a mistrial when jurors couldn’t reach a verdict. He was acquitted at his second trial later that year.

The Crown appealed and last fall, the Ontario Court of Appeal ordered a retrial over flaws in the judge’s charge to the jury. According to the appeal court, the trial judge had wrongly instructed the jury to consider not only Romano’s actions but also how Abogado played a “role in her own death.”

“Today, the criminal justice system exposed itself as basically a crap shoot,” said Romano’s lawyer Bill Mackenzie. “While I have and will always have the utmost respect for our jury system, I am at a loss to understand how one jury could be undecided, another acquits and a third says guilty all on the same presentation of facts?

“I can also tell you that my client is devastated even though Carla Abogado’s father approached him in the hallway before the verdict and gave him a hug bringing both of them to tears.”

A date for sentencing will be set in March.