A group of B.C. Indigenous leaders is calling for a public inquiry and immediate “systemic change” after a man died following an “interaction” with Vancouver police.
The Union of BC Indian Chiefs is alleging that police officers’ actions led to the death of 42-year-old Chris Amyotte in the Downtown Eastside on Aug. 22.
“The Union of BC Indian Chiefs is calling for an immediate, transparent, and transformative response, including a public inquiry into Chris Amyotte’s death and systemic change to the VPD, especially in their approach to Indigenous peoples and residents of the Downtown Eastside,” the group said in a news release.
Police have said officers responded to East Hastings Street and Dunlevy around 8 a.m. to reports of a man “acting erratically.”
“Following an interaction with police, the man was taken into custody. He then went into medical distress and lost consciousness,” the department said in a news release at the time. “Despite life-saving attempts, the man died at the scene.”
Witnesses told Global News Amyotte had been attacked with bear spray, and had stripped his clothes off and was pouring milk on himself to try to relieve the pain, when police shot him multiple times with a beanbag gun. They also said the large group of people gathered on the sidewalk had been trying to tell officers he was acting that way because he’d been bear-sprayed.
Amyotte’s cousin, Samantha Wilson, later told Global News that when he didn’t get on the ground as ordered, he was shot four more times in the back with beanbag guns.
The member of the Rolling River First Nation in Winnipeg had travelled in Vancouver to visit two of his children and other relatives, Wilson said.
B.C.’s civilian-led police watchdog was called in to investigate whether officers’ actions or inactions contributed to his death.
In response to a request for comment on the UBCIC statement, VPD Const. Tania Visintin released more information about the incident to Global News.
She said the department cannot provide specific details about the circumstances, but can say a man had been involved in a “violent incident,” that he’d been reportedly walking around seeking help though no one offered any, and that he’d been acting erratically and “making people feel unsafe.”
The beanbags are a “safe and effective tool” used as a medium-range force option, she said. “It’s an alternative to lethal force when officers encounter someone who is displaying violent or assault behaviour.”
The VPD has not been shown “any evidentiary link” between Amyotte’s cause of death and any police action,” Visintin added.
The UBCIC also called for funding to be transferred away from police services to de-escalation and trauma-informed, culturally safe services “so people in distress are met with compassion and support instead of violence, death and further oppression and dispossession.”
No video has surfaced from the incident, and Global News has not been able to independently verify details of witnesses’ accounts.
– With files from Simon Little
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