Man pleads guilty in hit and run death of Ryan Jimmo

“I was telling him I love him and to fight. And he fought really hard, Ryan did, for his life.”
Fiancee Roxie Reece

On June 26, 2016, at around 2:00 a.m., in Edmonton, Alberta, Anthony Getschel, his girlfriend, and a friend had just left Cook County Saloon after getting in a fistfight. He raced his 1998 GMC Sierra aggressively west on Whyte Avenue, and came up behind UFC light heavyweight Ryan Jimmo, 34, who was driving in a Jeep Patriot, showing his girlfriend the town after the pair went to see a movie together.

Seeing the truck approach so aggressively, Jimmo pulled into the parking lot of the H2O Lounge, to have words. Claire Theobald described what happened next for The Edmonton Star. 

Jimmo walked up to the truck, slapping the window and yelling at Getschel, challenging Getschel and his friend in the truck to a fight. Getschel stayed in the truck.

As Jimmo walked back toward his Jeep, Getschel slammed on the accelerator, driving over two concrete curbs. The truck hit Jimmo, dragging him to the front of his Jeep.

Knowing he had just run a man over, Getschel sped out of the parking lot, nearly colliding with another car before racing away.

Bystanders flagged down a nearby police officer and called 911. Jimmo was still alive but badly injured. Emergency crews treated Jimmo at the scene before loading him into an ambulance and rushing him to the University of Alberta Hospital. En route, Jimmo went into cardiac arrest. He was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at the hospital.

Meanwhile, Getschel dropped off his passengers before hiding his truck in the Mill Creek Ravine near 91st St. and 73rd Ave., taking a cab home. He told a family member his truck had been stolen and went to bed.

When he woke up the following morning, Getschel confessed what he had done to a family member. Getschel then picked up his truck and backed it into his driveway. Getschel then went to a registry office, claiming his license plate had been stolen so he could get a new one to help disguise his truck. On Monday, Getschel went to Fort McMurray for work. When he returned home late that night, his family urged him to turn himself in.

Police officers had already identified him as a suspect and were surveilling his home.

Just under 48 hours after the incident, Getschel turned himself into the police, and was charged with second-degree murder, criminal negligence causing death, dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death, and failing to stop at the scene of an accident involving death.

On Monday, Getschel pleaded to the lesser charge of manslaughter and to hit and run. He will be sentenced on December 3.