An inquest begins today into the death of Craig McDougall, a First Nation man who was shot by Winnipeg police in 2008, with questions about what role systemic racism played in the fatal shooting up for discussion.
McDougall, 26, was shot in the early morning hours of Aug. 2, 2008, by officers responding to a disturbance call at a house on Simcoe Street in the city’s West End.
At the time, police said McDougall had refused repeated demands to drop a knife, and officers had to use a firearm after they could not subdue him with a Taser stun gun.
Family members, however, have refuted that claim, saying police had been called to deal with a fight between two young women.
McDougall had just arrived home that morning and was talking on a cellphone to his girlfriend as the situation unfolded, family said at the time.
An inquest must be called for shooting deaths involving police. Manitoba’s chief medical examiner called the inquest into McDougall’s death in 2013.
Hearings are expected to run for four weeks.
Racism to be considered as a factor
McDougall was from the Wasagamack First Nation, located about 600 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.
Corey Shefman, a Winnipeg lawyer representing McDougall’s family, said this is the first inquest in Manitoba that will explicitly consider racism as a factor in the shooting.
Shefman said systemic racism can include, police officers’ perceptions about Winnipeg’s inner city and how those perceptions could influence the way people are treated.
McDougall’s uncle was J.J. Harper, an Indigenous leader who was shot dead by Winnipeg police in March 1988 after he was stopped by officers who mistook him for a suspect in a car theft.
Harper’s death sparked outrage and helped prompt Manitoba’s Aboriginal Justice Inquiry, which looked at how the province’s justice system treats Indigenous people.
The report, which looked at Harper’s case and the death of Helen Betty Osborne in 1971, concluded that race was a factor in the way they died and how their deaths were investigated.