B.C.’s civilian police watchdog has cleared the RCMP of any wrongdoing in the death of a man in his 50s near the Mary Hill Bypass last December.
A report from the Independent Investigations Office (IIO) concluded that officers used appropriate force to detain the man, dubbed the affected person or “AP” in the report, who was running on the highway and trying to get into vehicles.
It also noted that an autopsy determined the man’s cause of death was unrelated to the use of force, but rather a product of the consumption of cocaine and methadone and an underlying heart condition.
“Those factors would undoubtedly have been amplified by the stress and exertion of the incident, but the officers cannot be blamed for that,” wrote IIO chief civilian director Ron MacDonald.
“AP presented as someone who was creating a serious danger and needed to be brought quickly under control. That is all they did, and they did it with a necessary and proportional degree of force.”
MacDonald goes on to note that while police did hold the man down, they did so in a manner that would not have stopped him from breathing.
Coquitlam RCMP said they had attended a Port Coquitlam home on the evening of Dec. 22, 2019, to arrest the man on an outstanding warrant, but that he had left a short time earlier.
Not long afterward, another officer conducting traffic enforcement saw him walk onto the westbound lanes of the Mary Hill Bypass and begin to try and flag down vehicles.
Citing witness and police interviews, police dashcam video and witness video, the IIO says the officer pursued AP on foot calling for him to stop.
An officer said the man had blood on his face and clothes and appeared “almost fearful” as he ran in traffic, causing several vehicles to stop, according to the IIO.
When AP opened the door to a stopped SUV and tried to get in, the officer caught up with him, but AP was able to push him to the ground, according to the report.
A witness arrived and held AP against a vehicle. After a struggle, the witness and the officer fell to the ground with AP, and the officer used his forearm to hold AP’s head to the ground as he tried to get up.
“On the police audio recording, AP can be heard shouting, ‘Help!’ and, ‘You’re hurting me.’ (The witness) responds, ‘We’re trying to help you bud,’ and (the officer) tells AP, ‘Lay on your stomach,'” states the report.
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“AP is clearly panicked, saying, ‘I can’t breathe,’ and (the witness) tells him, ‘You’ve just got to relax, and you’ll be able to breathe.'”
Other officers arrived, handcuffed AP’s hands behind his back, and rolled him from side to side to search him, states the IIO report.
About a minute later, AP stopped breathing, and police called for paramedics and began CPR.
He died at the scene a short time later.