Joe Paraskevas, Canwest News Service Published:
National Post
Morris MacDougall said he wants the truth to come out about what happened to his son, Craig. "No one tried to help my son," said Mr. MacDougall, his voice shaking, at a joint news conference with other aboriginal groups on Tuesday.
"When I saw my son lying on the ground, I wanted to go to him, to help him, but I was thrown to the ground and handcuffed. I was a few inches away from comforting my son and I was prevented. I was treated like I did something wrong," he said.
Mr. MacDougall also told reporters that during the police interrogation no one told him whether his son was alive.
"We question the Winnipeg Police Services," said Chief David Harper of the Garden Hill First Nation, who called the level of force used "unacceptable."
"Was there a danger to the six police officers that stood behind these walls, that stood behind this fence?"
According to police reports, officers were called about a disturbance at a home and shot a man "brandishing a knife" after attempts to subdue him with a Taser failed.
However, the man's family said their version of what occurred is "entirely different from what the police are saying."
The native groups are calling for a public inquiry into what happened to MacDougall. They also want the government to create a permanent investigation team that includes aboriginal members to probe incidents such as his shooting death.
For now, they say the First Nations groups have hired a private investigator to look into what happened.
McDougall's family is blaming police for "wrongdoing and the senseless killing" of the First Nations man, the nephew of native leader J.J. Harper, who was also fatally shot by police in March, 1988.
"All I did is basicall,ld them the very basic information that we knew at the time," said Mr. McCaskill. He called the shooting "a tragic event."
Mr. McCaskill's efforts are in stark contrast to those of Herb Stephen who, as the city's police chief in 1988, exonerated his department of wrongdoing one day after J.J. Harper's shooting and announced no charges would be laid against Robert Cross, the officer involved.
"I believe it's getting better, but we've got a ways to go, there's no doubt about it," Mr. McCaskill said, when asked about the relationship between aboriginals and the city's police.
On the weekend, some of McDougall's friends indicated through messages to an Internet site they believed he was actually holding a cellphone and not a knife when he confronted police officers outside the home.
The mother of McDougall's girlfriend said McDougall was on the phone speaking to her daughter when the incident took place.
"Why they shot him was wrong, that's all we have to say for now," Cheyenne Parisian said.
She said McDougall was a soft-spoken and caring man who had recently begun attending aboriginal ceremonies and sweat lodges, the aboriginal saunas often used for prayer.