No charges for Winnipeg officers in death of woman who was restrained, sedated: police watchdog

Manitoba's police watchdog says officers shouldn't be charged after they helped restrain a woman who later died in hospital after being put into a medically induced coma.

The 37-year-old woman died at Winnipeg's Health Sciences Centre less than two weeks after she was taken there in critical condition following an encounter with Winnipeg police last fall, according to a report from the Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba, which is mandated to look into all serious incidents involving police in the province.

The report on the IIU's investigation into the October 2023 incidentwas released Tuesday, but is dated April 15, 2024. The agency's civilian director, Roxanne M. Gagn,recommended no charges be laid against the officers who were at the scene.

"I am satisfied that the interaction of the officers did not contribute to the serious injury or death of [the woman]," Gagn wrote.

"This is a tragic set of circumstances where it is believed that [the woman] had consumed drugs causing her to act erratically. There is no evidence of use of force by any of the police officers. Rather, police were called to assist firefighters to provide care to [the woman]."

Thecause of the woman's death has not yet been determined, and toxicology results haven't been received, Gagn also said in the report.

The report says police told the IIU they were called to a home on Arlington Street in Winnipeg on the morning of Oct. 23, to help paramedics who were already at the scene with a report ofa woman experiencing what was described as a "medical event."

The woman had been acting erratically and was becoming combative with paramedics, the investigative unit's report says. When police arrived, they found paramedics in a physical struggle with the woman inside a bedroom in the home.

Police helped restrain the woman so that paramedics could sedate her, but she experienced what was again referred to as a medical event almost immediately after being injected with the sedative, the report says.

She was taken to hospital, and though she wasresuscitated at one point, she remainedin a medically induced coma until she died on Nov. 3.

Stopped breathing after sedation: report

The police watchdog's investigatorslistened to 911 recordings andpolice dispatch recordings, andinterviewedthree attending police officers and four members of the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service who were also on scene.

One firefighter said the woman "was in distress and was making strange, growling noises, exhibiting erratic body movements and was 'banging off the walls'" when they found her in the home, while another first responder said the woman appeared to be experiencing methamphetamine psychosis, according to the report.

The woman's mother, who was at the home at the time, told police she called 911 because she thought her daughter, who had epilepsy, was having a seizure, which she was prone to.

The woman's brother also told first responders his sister was a drug user, and a drug pipe was found inside her bedroom, the report says.

Paramedics tried to keep the woman from hurting herself, since she was "repeatedly banging her head against the walls and floors and flailing her arms and legs," one firefighter said.

When police arrived, one of them cuffed her hands behind her back and "gently lowered [her] to the ground onto her stomach," the officer told the IIU. That officer then pinned down the back of her legs to stop the woman from thrashing around.

The officer and another firefighter also put a spit sock a hood that prevents spitting on the woman, since she was spitting up blood and was moving her head from side to side, the report says.

"[The woman]was still screaming and there was some blood on the floor," an officer told the IIU. Another officer also helped pin down the woman's legs.

Paramedics then administered the sedative, but witnesses said she stopped breathing and her body went limp just seconds later, according to the report.

Police got off the woman and took off the handcuffs and spit sock before paramedics carried her outside to an ambulance, an officer told the investigative unit. As they were putting her into the ambulance, the woman went into cardiac arrest, a paramedic told the IIU.

She was then taken to hospital.

The IIU has closed the investigation.