(File photo/paNOW Staff)

By Susan McNeil

In custody death

SIRT finds no issues with policing in Pelican Narrows cell death

Mar 6, 2025 | 5:00 PM

A 34-year-old man who died while lodged in RCMP cells in Pelican Narrows two years ago did so after a self-administered overdose, the Serious Incident Response Team has determined.

The man, who is not named in the investigation report, was detained by officers on July 15, 2023, on an outstanding warrant.

He was searched before being put into a cell and later remanded until he appeared in court.

Almost 24 hours later, the man went into medical distress in his cell and was given first aid by officers in the detachment. Medics were called and took him to the community’s medical centre where he was pronounced dead.

SIRT was called as required and sent three officers and a civilian director to investigate.

FOOD BANK

Sask. food banks feel the squeeze as tariffs tighten the belt

8h ago

In custody death

SIRT finds no issues with policing in Pelican Narrows cell death

8h ago

Citizens of the Year

Melfort's Citizen, Junior Citizen of the Year revealed

12h ago

They seized video and audio evidence along with some pieces of physical evidence from two locations within the cell block.

The prisoner’s movements were recorded the entire time he was in cells except for the moments when he had the privacy to call his lawyer and his appearance before a justice of the peace for his remand hearing.

In the physical evidence, police found trace amounts of white powder inside the prisoner’s cell and a bag of white powder in the cell directly opposite his.

The physical search was done by two officers with a third member nearby and concluded with a scan by a handheld metal detector.

Video evidence shows him putting his hands into his groin area and inside the pockets of his sweatpants. At 4:39 a.m. on July 16, he took an item from his pocket and put it on the sink end and, within minutes of that, was seen removing a substance from the sink and putting it to his face. Just before noon the same day, he once again touched the substance and brought his hand to his nose.

It was 10 minutes before 2 p.m. when he took a small white object, later found to be cocaine, and threw it out of the slot in his door and under the door of the other cell.

Around 30 minutes after that sounds from inside the cell alerted officers to an issue who noticed he was shaking and his hands were in the air.

The prisoner told the officers he had taken too much coke. After he began convulsing again, he was put into the recovery position and members administered NARCAN, which is meant for opioid overdoses and had no effect. No antidote for cocaine overdose is readily available.

He was then taken to the medical centre where he was pronounced dead at 3:30 p.m. by a doctor.

SIRT concluded that the search done by members when he was put into cells was done according to the law.

A strip search or body cavity search might have found the drugs hidden on him but courts have ruled in Canada that those kinds of searches require certain grounds and cannot be done routinely.

None of the circumstances in this case met the criteria.

—

susan.mcneil@pattisonmedia.com

On BlueSky: @susanmceil.bksy.social