Police accused of seeking some 'dirt' on taser victim

By Ian Bailey
Globe And Mail
May. 22, 2008

VANCOUVER — Robert Dziekanski's mother accused the police of looking for "dirt" on her son by travelling to his native Poland for background information on the newcomer to Canada who died last fall after being tasered by police at Vancouver International Airport.

The head of the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team, which is conducting an investigation in the case, has described the April 12 to 17 trip by four officers as a routine measure aimed at gathering background on the victim as police conduct a sweeping investigation into the incident. That probe could lead to charges against the officers involved.

But Zofia Cisowski, speaking to reporters yesterday after appearing before the provincial Braidwood inquiry into police taser use, said she was skeptical about the foreign trip.

"They are looking for something, I think, dirty, a record of medication," she said, suggesting police appeared to be hunting for "dirt" in her son's past.

But in her first comments on the trip, Ms. Cisowski said her son was healthy, and noted that a preliminary autopsy result, released after the Oct. 14 incident, found no signs of drug or alcohol in her son.

"[My son] never had any disease like a heart attack or any other diseases," she said. "He was a healthy boy."

The coroner's office has yet to fully release the autopsy results, and a spokeswoman said yesterday that the office will not comment until the second phase of the Braidwood inquiry, which will focus more on the Dziekanski case.

In a brief submission, Ms. Cisowski told inquiry head Thomas Braidwood that her faith in the RCMP and Canadian authorities had been "shattered" by the events around the death of her 40-year-old son, her only child.

Mr. Dziekanski had arrived in Canada to begin a new life with his mother, a 61-year-old Kamloops resident who emigrated to Canada nine years ago, and worked as a janitor.

But Mr. Dziekanski was approached by police when he began acting erratically after an hours-long wait to meet his mother. He was subjected to taser blasts and died soon after, prompting ongoing questions about the police use of tasers.

"I want justice, truth and accountability. I know that my son would not die if he would not be tasered, and I know that he did not deserve the treatment he encountered at the Vancouver airport," Ms. Cisowski said, reading from a prepared statement and occasionally dabbing her eyes.

Her lawyer, Walter Kosteckyj, speaking on his client's behalf, called for a moratorium on taser use until questions about the safety of the devices and concerns about the training officers received have been properly answered.

"It's time to put the genie back in the bottle and start from square one. The advocates for the taser need to prove that the weapon is safe by thorough research, and that it will be used in the right circumstances and those safeguards exist that the public can rely upon."

He also noted that police are resorting to tasers too easily before thinking through situations, referring specifically to the Dziekanski case.

On another issue, Mr. Braidwood, a retired Appeal Court judge, said through a spokesman that he will not follow the example of RCMP Commissioner William Elliott or others, such as Taser International Inc. chairman Tom Smith and various police officers, who have agreed to be tasered in order to better understand the impact of the stun gun.

Mr. Elliott agreed to the experience earlier this month after watching a demonstration of the device by the RCMP emergency-response team.

"Mr. Braidwood will not subject himself to a tasering," Chris Freimond, Mr. Braidwood's spokesman, said in an e-mailed response to a Globe and Mail query. "His role is to listen to and understand the information presented to him. It is not necessary for him to undergo a tasering to be able to do that."