Jury recommends mental health education for RCMP members following inquest

BURNABY – Make mental health a priority.

That’s the focus of five recommendations made by a coroner’s jury reviewing the suicide of RCMP Sergeant Pierre Lemaitre.

The jury is recommending the RCMP make changes to mental health programs for its officers and their families after the death by suicide of a sergeant in 2013, who was involved in a high-profile case in B.C., that resulted in criticism of the department.

All five non-binding suggestions made at the end of this week’s inquest require action by the police force. Some of them include making sure mental health is considered during mandatory physical assessments, which must take place every three years.

Lemaitre was suffering from depression and anxiety when he killed himself at his home in Abbotsford more than five years ago.

Witnesses, including his widow, testified he was haunted because of misinformation he unknowingly passed onto reporters after Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski was repeatedly Tasered by Mounties and died on the floor of the Vancouver airport in 2007.

After the incident, Lemaitre told reporters that officers approached a ‘combative’ man and jolted him twice with a Taser, but two days later a video emerged that showed Dziekanski was agitated but not violent when the Mounties arrived and that they used the stun gun five times.

Lemaitre’s former family doctor and psychologist testified he had post-traumatic stress disorder from dealing with victims of crime but the incident involving Dziekanski increased his depression and anxiety.

Lawyer representing Dziekanski’s mother sympathizes with Lemaitre

Walter Kosteckyj, the lawyer representing Dziekanski’s mother, says it appears Lemaitre was an honest man, who was prevented from telling the truth. He says that came across during the Braidwood inquiry in 2010.

“He talked about how he went to his superiors and wanted to clear the record. He wanted people to understand that he had not tried to mislead the press, that he was a trustworthy guy. But they wouldn’t let him,” he says.

“Maybe there needs to be a fuller, complete public inquiry of what the culture in the RCMP is.”

And he remembers Lemaitre offering up an apology to them after the inquiry.

“I walked away from that feeling I met a thoroughly decent human being, and I felt bad that he had been put in that position.”

He says nobody in the force has been held to account for many of the allegations it’s facing, and he says it’s time to have a public forum to review the problems so the RCMP gains back its reputation.