Saskatoon deaths from frostbite

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The Saskatooner Erfrierungstode (English Saskatoon freezing deaths were) a series of deaths of at least three indigenous Canadians in Saskatoon , Saskatchewan in the early 2000s. Their deaths were caused by members of the Saskatoon police who arrested indigenous people, usually men, for drunkenness and / or administrative offenses, sometimes for no reason, and then drove them out of the city at night in winter and left them there.

The practice was known under the euphemism of taking indigenous people on "starlight tours" and goes back to at least 1976. As of 2020, despite convictions for crime-related offenses, no member of the Saskatoon Police Department has been specifically convicted of freezing deaths.

Incidents

Victims include Rodney Naistus , Lawrence Wegner and Neil Stonechild . Naistus and Wegner died in 2000, their bodies found in the Saskatoon area. Autopsies in 2001 and 2002 found that they died of hypothermia, and made recommendations with respect to Polizipraktiken and the relationship between the police and indigenous people. Neil Stonechild's body was found in a field outside Saskatoon in 1990. An inquest in 2003 failed to determine the circumstances that led to his death.

In January 2000, Darrell Night was suspended in the suburbs of Saskatoon, but was able to call a taxi from the nearby Queen Elizabeth power station and suffered no health damage. The two police officers involved, Dan Hatchen and Ken Munson, claimed that they had simply brought Night home and let Night out of the car at his request, but were sentenced to eight months in prison in September 2001 for illegal detention.

The Saskatoon police initially insisted that the cases were isolated . In 2003, Police Chief Russell Sabo had to admit that the police may have been leaving indigenous people outside the city for years. He had previously made public that in 1976 a police officer had been disciplined for taking an Indigenous woman to the outskirts of the city and leaving her there.

Attempts at censorship

Between 2012 and 2016, the "Starlight tours" section of the Saskatoon Police Department article on Wikipedia was removed several times. An internal investigation revealed that two of the processes were processed by a computer inside the police force. A police spokeswoman denied that the removal of the content was officially ordered. On March 31, 2016, the Saskatoon daily Star Phoenix reported that "Saskatoon police confirmed that someone inside the police force removed the mention of the" Starlight Tours "from the Wikipedia police website." According to the article, "a police spokeswoman acknowledged that the starlight tours section had been deleted from a computer within the department, but said investigators could not determine who had done it." The police spokeswoman said the police are working "to move forward with all of the positive work resulting from the Stonechild investigation that has been and is still being done."

reception

Movies

The incidents were covered in two films. Darrell Night's experiences were captured in Tasha Hubbard's documentary Two Worlds Colliding , made with the National Film Board of Canada in 2004 , which won the Canada Award for Ethnic and Cultural Diversity. A fictional incident was portrayed in the half-hour drama Out in the Cold , directed by Colleen Murphy and starring Gordon Tootoosis , Matthew Strongeagle and Erroll Kinistino.

music

The Canadian punk rock band Propagandhi released the album Potemkin City Limits in 2005 , on which the song "The Bringer of Greater Things" was dedicated to "Rodney Naistus, Neil Stonechild and Lawrence Wegner, Murdered by Members of the Saskatoon Police Department". The song "One Shoe" by the Canadian musician Kris Demeanor is about frostbite, especially that of Stonechild. The Wailin 'Jennys song "Starlight" was also inspired by the Deaths.

In 2017, Mi'kmaq artist Cathy Elliott led a five-week workshop with students from Sheridan College for her musical Starlight Tour . This work was commissioned by the Grand Theater in London, Ontario, together with the Canadian Music Theater Project of Sheridan College.

Podcasts

The Criminal podcast covered deaths in its episode "Starlight Tours".

literature

  • King, Thomas : The inconvenient Indian. A curious account of native people in North America. The illustrated edition , 2017.
  • Razack, Sheren: Dying from Improvement. Inquests and Inquiries into Indigenous Deaths in Custody , 2015.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Meagan Campbell: New light on Saskatoon's 'starlight tours'. In: Macleans.ca. Accessed June 2020 (English).
  2. ↑ a b New film renews community discussion about Aboriginal freezing deaths in Saskatoon. In: Dispatch. University of Regina , archived from the original on November 2, 2008 ; accessed in February 2010 (English).
  3. ↑ a b Saskatoon police chief admits starlight cruises are not new. In: Windspeaker. Aboriginal Multimedia Society of Alberta , June 1, 2003, accessed February 2010 .
  4. ↑ This report updates the information contained in the Third Report of Canada on the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. In: Canadian Heritage / Pátrimoine canadien. March 23, 2009, archived from the original ; accessed on July 13, 2020 .
  5. ↑ Who was Neil Stonechild? In: CBC News. CBC , November 3, 2005, archived from the original on August 11, 2018 ; accessed in February 2010 (English).
  6. ^ A b Christopher Thrall: Justice of the police. In: Vue Weekly . April 7, 2005, archived from the original on February 2013 ; accessed in February 2010 (English).
  7. ↑ Deneen L. Brown: Left for dead in a Saskatchewan winter. In: MSN . November 22, 2003, archived from the original on September 2005 ; accessed in November 2010 .
  8. ↑ Neil Stone Child: Timeline. CBC News , Nov 3, 2005, archived from the original on June 5, 2020 ; accessed in September 2012 .
  9. ↑ Dan Zakraski: Student claims Saskatoon police removed 'starlight tours' section from Wikipedia page. CBC News , March 31, 2016, accessed March 2016 .
  10. ↑ a b Someone at city police headquarters deleted 'starlight tour' references on its Wikipedia page. In: Saskatoon StarPhoenix. March 31, 2016, archived from the original on April 1, 2016 ; accessed on July 13, 2020 (English).
  11. ^ Two Worlds Colliding. In: Online film. National Film Board of Canada , accessed September 2011 .
  12. ^ Canadian arts community mourns loss of indigenous playwright. In: CBC News. Accessed November 2017 (English).
  13. ↑ Nova Scotia Indigenous play wright, actor remembered as 'a bright light'. In: National Post. November 17, 2017. Retrieved November 2017 (American English).
  14. ↑ This Week in True-Crime Podcasts: The Case of Woody Harrelson's Father. In: Vulture.com . May 8, 2020, accessed April 2020 .
  15. ^ Starlight Tours. In: Criminal . April 17, 2020, accessed July 13, 2020 .