SIU clears York Region police after man died following 'medical distress' in holding cell

Ontario's police watchdog says York Region police officers are not at fault after a man died in February after going into "medical distress" in a Richmond Hill holding cell. 

The man, 33, turned himself in at a police station on an arrest warrant for breach of probation around 3 p.m. on Feb. 11, according to the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) report, released Wednesday. 

Police searched the man and found a small bag that was later suspected to contain crystal methamphetamine, as well as a crack pipe, the report said. 

Close to midnight, the man was seen on video retrieving what appeared to be "a quantity of drugs from inside his underwear," the report says. He then formed white lines of powder with the substance and snorted them. 

Around 1 a.m., police contacted paramedics after they noticed the man was shaking after watching him on a video monitor.

Officers attempted to speak to the man, who was unable to communicate other than to agree when asked if he suffered from seizures. The man then soon lost vital signs. 

Police performed CPR and administered a dose of nasal narcan. Paramedics took the man to the hospital. He was pronounced dead around 1:50 a.m. 

The man's cause of death is not yet known, the report said. 

Police quickly provided medical care, SIU director says

In his decision, SIU Director Joseph Martino said the first concern in determining police liability was understanding how the man was able to bring and consume suspected drugs inside the cell.

Martino said the police searches conducted before the man went into the cell "seem to have been conducted in a thorough fashion." 

As the drugs seem to have been in the man's underwear, he said it was not surprising police failed to find them. Officers did consider conducting a strip search, but that was denied by a sergeant.

"Given the circumstances that prevailed – a detainee having turned himself in seemingly good health and unimpaired – I am unable to reasonably conclude that a strip search was necessarily warranted in this case," Martino wrote. 

Another issue was whether police sufficiently supervised the man when he was in custody. 

While police did not routinely physically check the man, Martino wrote he was checked via video monitor roughly every 30 minutes while in the cell, "and that none of those checks gave rise for concern." 

Martino also found officers detected the man's apparent drug consumption "in fairly short order" and quickly provided medical care. 

"There is no basis for proceeding with criminal charges in this case," he wrote.