British Columbia’s Ministry of Public Security says it was unaware of the BC Coroners Service persevering with a follow of attending sure dying scenes remotely after 2019.
Ministry spokeswoman Tasha Schollen says the ministry’s understanding was that in-person scene attendance had been “restored” six years in the past, and it’s now discussing the state of affairs with the service.
Her remarks come after a former coroner instructed The Canadian Press that two our bodies went unnoticed on the Vancouver dying scene of a 3rd particular person in 2022 partially as a result of the coroner attended remotely by phoning a police officer on the single room occupancy house.
Former neighborhood coroner Sonya Schulz says the service stopped requiring coroners to bodily attend sure scenes to economize a number of years in the past.
A delegate of B.C.’s director of employment requirements additionally mentioned in a March ruling that when a subject coroner isn’t accessible in a area the place a dying is reported, a coroner from one other space “will sometimes conduct their investigation of the scene remotely.”
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The physique of “Jimmy” Van Chung Pham was present in a tiny house in February 2022, however the our bodies of lacking Indigenous teenager Noelle O’Soup and a girl named Elma Enan went unnoticed there for months till residents complained of the odor.
The ministry says it was a “tragic state of affairs,” and the ministry “is in touch with the BC Coroner’s Service about these allegations.”
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