Reyal Jardine-Douglas

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Why did mentally ill man have to die? - Published On Sun Sep 19 2010
Brendan Kennedy

The cases are strikingly similar: a man with mental illness who has stopped taking his medication wields a makeshift weapon, such as a hammer or kitchen knife, and is confronted by police.


He refuses to drop the weapon or threatens the officers and is shot dead.

The latest killing happened three weeks ago, when Reyal Jardine-Douglas was shot by police while fleeing a TTC bus allegedly armed with a knife. His death came virtually on the eve of a coroner’s inquest into Byron Debassige’s similarly deadly confrontation with Toronto police two years ago.


Starting Monday, a jury of five ordinary people will try to answer the same questions at Debassige’s inquest that were asked at the inquests for Lester Donaldson, Edmond Yu, Wayne Williams and seven other men with mental illness who were killed by Toronto police officers over the last two decades: Why was this person killed and what can be done to avoid similar deaths in the future?.....

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http://www.thestar.com/opinion/letters/article/857076--we-must-learn-from-shooting
Re: Police knew of mental illness before fatal shooting: Family, Sept. 1


Once again a mentally-ill man is gunned down by those whose job it is to protect public safety. Everyone can agree that no one should be allowed to harm the public and that officers have a right to defend themselves, especially when facing an armed assailant.

Nonetheless, we also need to recognize that the mentally ill must not be treated like criminals. Their condition is directing their actions. There is no intent to commit violence. The police should make every effort to defuse the situation, including avoiding the type of lethal confrontation that killed Reyal Jardine-Douglas.

Something broke down in the system that is supposed to prevent these incidents. Whether the officers were not properly apprised of Jardine-Douglas’s condition, whether they forgot some piece of their training, or whether their training was not adequate for this situation, a young man lies dead.

Jardine-Douglas could have been anyone’s brother — yours or mine. Please, let’s try to ensure this is the last time lethal force is used against the mentally ill.

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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health/andre-picard/ontarios-mental-health-system-needs-to-be-fixed-now/article1692785/  - Sept 01

Ontario’s mental-health system needs to be fixed now

Andre Picard

Published on Wednesday, Sep. 01, 2010 2:25PM EDT

What a cruel juxtaposition of events.


Last Thursday, a committee of the Ontario Legislature released a hard-hitting report on the need to fundamentally transform the province’s mental-health and addictions system.

Then, on Sunday, as if to underscore the urgency of implementing their recommendations, Toronto Police shot to death 25-year-old Reyal Jensen Jardine-Douglas. The shooting is still under investigation, but his “crime” seems to have been to suffer from mental illness.

The scenario is depressingly familiar: Young man has a psychotic episode, police are called (usually by a concerned family member), the agitated individual (screaming threats and sometimes brandishing a weapon) refuses to obey police orders. Bullets fly. Another “crazy” person dies. Then we are all left to wonder why.

Invariably, police and families are put in this untenable situation because the sick individual was untreated. The shooter, the ill person and the grieving family are all victims – of a broken system.

Mr. Jardine-Douglas is a case in point. Suffering from severe paranoia, he was taken to the family doctor on Aug. 27. His condition worsened so, the next day, his family took him to a hospital, where he was turned away because no psychiatrist was available. Help was sought at a second hospital, but the man refused treatment (not unusual for people with severe mental illness) and fled. Police were called because the family feared for his life. Not long after, Mr. Jardine-Douglas was making a scene on a city bus, then he was shot. He is dead because he didn’t get timely, appropriate care.

“We are convinced that a radical transformation of mental-health and addictions care is necessary if Ontarians are to get the care they need and deserve,” the committee headed by MPP Kevin Flynn wrote in a report tabled a few days earlier.

The MPPs heard many heart-wrenching stories about families’ inability to get care for their loved ones in a byzantine system, and about the frustrations of caregivers who have one hand tied behind their backs by senseless laws. To their credit, the politicians proposed some sensible, no-nonsense solutions.

First and foremost, they called for the creation of a new umbrella organization, Mental Health and Addictions Ontario.

Hold on, you might say, the last thing we need is more bureaucracy. But the single biggest problem with the mental-health system is that there is no system, only a muddled patchwork of services.


MHAO would be modelled on Cancer Care Ontario, which has been revolutionary by organizing cancer care in the province. Mental health needs the same medicine.

Currently, getting medical treatment, particularly for acute problems such as psychotic episodes, is nearly impossible. Emergency-room protocols are uneven at best; 24/7 mobile crisis-intervention teams work marvellously, but they are few and far between. There is an acute lack of treatment beds, particularly in psychiatric hospitals. While these institutions have fallen out of favour, they are essential for the sickest of the sick.

Most people suffering from mental illness live in the community, but getting appropriate care in the real world is dizzyingly complex. They need housing as much as medication and they need income as much as counselling, but our social welfare system operates in silos.

Mental-health and addiction services are funded or provided by 10 different provincial ministries. Community care is delivered by 440 children’s mental-health agencies, 330 adult mental-health agencies, 150 substance-abuse treatment groups and 50 problem-gambling centres. There are many well-meaning programs, but there is no co-ordination and little collaboration.

The lack of leadership and accountability is disturbing, and sometimes deadly.

The legislature committee pointed out, quite astutely, that while mental illness and addictions are medical conditions, they have become criminalized to a troubling degree. More than one-third of people in custody in Ontario suffer from a diagnosed mental illness and substance abuse is a factor in half of all criminal offences.

“Far too many Ontarians experience their first contact with the mental-health system through the justice system,” the MPPs wrote.

Police need to be better trained to deal with people suffering from mental illness and these sick individuals need to be sentenced to care, not jail.

One of the most compelling aspects of the report – and one that will probably prove to be the most controversial – is the call to broaden the criteria for involuntary admission (and, by extension, limit the right of severely mentally ill people to refuse treatment.) “The right to autonomy must be balanced by the right to be well,” the committee wrote.

It is a travesty that families have trouble getting care for family members who are clearly very ill, yet refuse treatment or are too quickly discharged.


This is not freedom, it’s a death sentence.

Similarly, privacy laws create perverse situations where families are emotionally and financially invested in caring for a loved one but are denied even the most basic information about their condition.

The recommendations made by the all-party committee are not new, but they are stated plainly, concisely and with an appropriate sense of urgency. Given the unanimity, there should not be a moment’s hesitation to act.

As the MPPs said succinctly in the report’s conclusion: “The necessary changes have yet to be made and individuals continue to suffer.”

Implementing the recommendations would launch a new era of compassion, care and safety for mentally ill people and their families. Inaction will leave us all with blood on our hands.

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Aug 31, 2010
Brendan Kennedy

Reyal Jardine-Douglas’s family called police to get him help. Later on, after a confrontation with officers, he was dead.

The family of the 25-year-old Pickering man fatally shot by police on Sunday says he suffered from mental illness, including paranoia, and that they had called police to get him admitted to hospital.


In a statement released Tuesday through their lawyer, Jardine-Douglas’s family said they phoned 911 early Sunday afternoon from Lawrence Ave. E. and Victoria Park Ave. to get him help. “He was not exhibiting any violent behaviours at the time,” the statement noted.

The family told 911 that Jardine-Douglas had boarded a southbound Victoria Park bus, informing the dispatcher of his mental state “on more than one occasion.” The family’s lawyer, Glenn Stuart, said they believed that message had been communicated to the attending officers.

Jardine-Douglas was shot by an officer after he fled from the bus when it was pulled over by police at about 3:10 p.m.


Witnesses said police cruisers boxed in the bus and a man bolted through the rear as officers boarded through the front door. According to one witness, three shots were fired in a confrontation.

A knife was recovered at the scene.

The revelation has reignited criticism of the police three weeks before a coroner’s inquest opens into a similar police shooting two years ago.

On Feb. 16, 2008, 28-year-old Byron Debassige, who had schizophrenia, was shot dead by police in Oriole Park after he stole lemons from a local grocery store armed with a 10-centimetre knife.

Officers were cleared of wrongdoing by the Special Investigations Unit, which said Debassige “advanced” toward them and ignored repeated commands to drop the knife. But Debassige’s family and Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto say the officers needlessly escalated the situation.

Police knew of mental illness before fatal shooting, family says - thestar.com

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