'I didn't know he was hurting'
Edward Snowshoe's mother goes public in hopes of healing after judge releases damning inquiry into her son's death
Kassina Ryder
Northern News Services
Published Monday, July 14, 2014
EDMONTON/FORT MCPHERSON
On the Friday her son took his own life in an isolated cell in an Edmonton jail, Effie Bella Snowshoe said she walked to the post office to send him a letter.
An inquiry into the death of Edward Snowshoe was released last month. Edward took his own life in an Edmonton prison in 2010 after being kept segregated from other prisoners for 162 days. - photo courtesy of Effie Bella Snowshoe |
"I knew there was something wrong," she said. "I wrote a letter to him that day."
Effie said she decided to send it the following Monday instead, not knowing that it would be too late.
"I never got to mail the letter that I wrote to him," she said.
Alberta judge James K. Wheatley compiled an inquiry report released last month after 24-year-old Edward Snowshoe committed suicide at the Edmonton Institution on Aug. 13, 2010.
Snowshoe, who was from Fort McPherson, had been segregated for 162 days at the time of his death.
He was serving a five-and-a-half year sentence for shooting and wounding an Inuvik taxi driver during an attempted robbery in 2007.
His mother said she hadn't known her son had been put in a segregated cell.
"I didn't know he was locked up," she said. "I didn't know he was hurting."
While in the Stony Mountain Institution, a medium-security facility in Manitoba, Snowshoe made a knife out of an inside-out juice box and was placed in segregation. He was later transferred to the maximum security Edmonton Institution in Alberta.
The inquiry found that Snowshoe had already served 134 days in segregation at Stony Mountain before immediately being placed in segregation for another 28 days when he arrived at Edmonton Institution.
The inquiry also found that Snowshoe had attempted suicide three times while in Stony Mountain between 2007 and 2009, as well as a "self-harm" incident in 2010 that led to his being placed on suicide watch.
During the inquiry, officers at the Edmonton Institution stated they were not aware of Snowshoe's mental health history.
The report noted that prisoners' files, such as psychological and medical records, are kept on a database called the Offender Management System and are available to all prison staff. During the inquiry, workers stated that they believed only senior management had access to the database and didn't know they were entitled to access it as well.
All of Snowshoe's suicide attempts had been flagged in the system. The nurse who reviewed his case when he arrived in Edmonton provided the information to the jail's psychology department, but no follow-up was performed.
| "... Snowshoe fell through the cracks of a system and no one was aware of how long he had been in segregation" |
Instead, Snowshoe was placed in a single observation cell even though a full observation cell was available, Wheatley stated in the report.
Wheatley made a number of recommendations in the report, including that prisoners with a history of suicide attempts should be placed in full observation cells where guards can check on them regularly.
He also stated that Snowshoe's 134 days already served in segregation in Manitoba were not taken into consideration when he was transferred to the Alberta prison.
"Edward Christopher Snowshoe fell through the cracks of a system and no one was aware of how long he had been in segregation even though that information was readily available," Wheatley stated in the report.
Effie said she attended the inquiry proceedings and was shocked to learn how long Snowshoe had been left in isolation. He was only able to call her once in the 28 days he was in Edmonton.
"They just left him in that room," she said. "All alone."
Wheatley noted that when Snowshoe arrived in Edmonton, he asked to be placed with the general population. That request was lost until November 2010, three months after his death.
Wheatley also questioned security classifications in Canadian jails when it comes to segregating prisoners.
"How does a juice box knife end up with 162 days in segregation?" he asked in the report.
Effie said she hopes sharing her son's story will help her to heal.
"I'm really hoping I could just get over this pain," she said. "When I got the news, my heart just broke into pieces."
