An inquiry into a controversial plea bargain for an off-duty policeman who killed a Manitoba woman in a car crash has heard from another victim for the first time.

Crystal Taman, 40, died in February 2005 when her small car was rear-ended at a red light by a pickup truck that belonged to Derek Harvey-Zenk, a Winnipeg police constable who later resigned.

The inquiry heard Wednesday that the force of the pickup truck pushed Taman's vehicle into the back of Kathie Beattie's car.

Beattie escaped without broken bones, but she said the crash caused back problems that still trouble her to this day, and she lost her job because the vehicle she was driving was a company car.

Beattie, the wife of another police officer, said it's unfortunate she did not pay closer attention after the crash.

Documents tabled at the inquiry suggest several people at the scene noticed the smell of alcohol on Harvey-Zenk.

But that evidence never came up in court where impaired driving charges against him were dropped and he instead pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing death.

Another witness testfied that his vehicle was passed by Harvey-Zenk's on the highway. Garth Shaw testified that he didn't think the truck was going to be able to stop in time for the light ahead.

"He was going twice the rate of speed I was," Shaw said. "I was going about 40 to 50 kilometers per hour."

Officers to take stand

Meanwhile, Winnipeg police officers who were socializing the night before Crystal Taman was killed will soon testify under oath at the Taman Inquiry.

Commission counsel David Paccioco said he intends to show that off-duty officer Derek Harvey Zenk benefited from an incompetent police investigation or from favourable treatment by investigating officers.

"We intend to put the key Winnipeg police officers under oath and to challenge their memories and the versions of events they provided," he said.

Paccioco says he will present evidence that officers with Harvey-Zenk that night were unhelpful in the subsequent investigation, to the point where they could not recall if he had a single drink.

"None of the 10 either could or would provide helpful information about how much alcohol Harvey-Zenk consumed, if any; not just a number of drinks, but whether he drank heavily or not, or if he drank at all."

With files from The Canadian Press and a report from CTV's Alana Pona.