Blake Corney: Alik Livas pleads guilty to culpable driving causing death

A truck driver has pleaded guilty to culpable driving causing death after he fell asleep and rear-ended the family car of a young boy, killing the child instantly.

Blake Corney died when truckie Akis Emmanouel Livas, 57, fell asleep at the wheel and ploughed into his family's Ford Territory in July 2018.

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A convicted rapist who killed beloved Canberra boy Blake Corney in a horrific rear end collision in 2018 is behind bars and will “inevitably” be sentenced to jail when he returns to court.

Akis Emmanouel Livas, 57, on Wednesday pleaded guilty to culpable driving causing death, having failed to have his sleep apnoea treated.

ACT Supreme Court Justice Michael Elkaim remanded Livas in custody, saying a jail sentence was inevitable.

Livas is yet to formally agree to precise facts but prosecute allege he had for five years reported to doctors symptoms of insomnia, breathlessness and drowsiness.

Livas was twice referred to a sleep specialist but failed to attend his appointments.

Livas also failed to tell his employer, Canberra Sand and Gravel and Landscaping Supplies, about his medical condition, despite a job application form having an option for him to disclose any “long term illness, injury or condition that could affect your ability to drive”.

Alik Livas failed to get his sleep aponea treated before the crash.

Prosecutors allege Livas felt more tired than usual in the day leading up to the crash, in which his tip-truck rear-ended the Corney family’s Ford Territory on the Monaro Hwy

Livas returning to Canberra from a trip delivering landscaping supplies to a property in Burra, while the Corney family were on their way to Toys ‘r’ Us at Majura Park.

The collision, at 70km/h, killed Blake instantly.

Livas, shortly after the crash, falsely claimed he was cut off and couldn’t stop, but told paramedics he “blacked out” while driving and only “came to” after the crash.

Dash cam footage revealed the Corney family’s Ford could be seen for nearly 350m and a police investigation concluded Livas could have stopped well short of the family had he not fallen asleep at the wheel.

A sleep specialist, after the crash, concluded Livas “should not be operating a motor vehicle or heavy machinery” until his condition was properly treated.

The court on Wednesday heard Livas’s criminal record involved driving and drugs charges, as well as a conviction for raping a sex worker, a crime he committed by paying her with an envelope stuffed with blank pieces of paper rather than cash.