Neil Stonechild (August 24, 1973– November 25, 1990) was a Saulteaux First Nations teenager whodied of hypothermia. Members of the Saskatoon Police Service took himto the northwest section of the city and abandoned him in a field ona night when temperatures were below −28 °C (−18 °F). Thepractice is known as a starlight tour, and a number of such cases inthe Saskatoon area have been referred to collectively as theSaskatoon freezing deaths.
Background
Stonechild was an accomplishedwrestler, having won a bantamweight provincial title in Saskatchewan.
Death
Stonechild's friend Jason Roy was withStonechild the night of his death. When first interviewed by thepolice in 1990, 5 days after Stonechild's disappearance, Roy provideda handwritten, signed statement stating that he and Stonechild haddrunk most of a 40-ounce bottle of vodka between them. Roy alsostated that he and Stonechild had parted company at "about1130 pm", and that he had "blacked out" andhad no recollection of what happened after he and Stonechildseparated that night. In 2000, however, Roy stated that the last timehe saw Stonechild alive, Stonechild was handcuffed in the back of apolice cruiser "gushing blood" from a cut on hisface, and that the last words Stonechild said to him were "Jay,help me. They're going to kill me." Jason Roy's family wasultimately put into an RCMP witness protection program.
Roy also stated that he had given thepolice officers a false name – Tracy Lee Horse – when theyquestioned him. Shortly after talking to Jason Roy, Constables BradSenger and Larry Hartwig encountered Neil Stonechild's cousin, BruceGenaille, and questioned him on suspicion that he was Stonechild. In2003, Genaille told the inquiry that there had been nobody in theback of the cruiser at the time.
At 11:56 p.m. on November 24, 1990,Constable Brad Senger performed a query on the Canadian PoliceInformation Center (CPIC) computer system for the names "TracyHorse" and Tracy Lee Horse", the false nameprovided by Jason Roy. Three minutes later, at 11:59 p.m., ConstableSenger performed a CPIC query for the name "Neil Stonechild".Five minutes later, at 12:04 a.m., November 25, 1990, ConstableHartwig conducted a CPIC query of the name "Bruce Genaille".Genaille testified at the Wright inquiry that there had beennobody in the back of the cruiser when Hartwig and Senger questionedhim.
His body was found, with one shoemissing, on November 29 by two construction workers. In the initialinvestigation of his death, the Saskatoon police determined thatthere was no foul play. Ten years later, however, his companion onNovember 24/25, Jason Roy, said Stonechild had been in policecustody. Roy said he had seen his friend in the back of a policecruiser. In 2000 the Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigatedStonechild's death and the deaths of other First Nations individualsthought to have been in police custody.
Inquiry
In 2003, the Saskatchewan provincialgovernment held a Commission of Inquiry (the Wright Inquiry) intoStonechild's death. The report concluded that Stonechild had beenpicked up by the police shortly before he died on the outskirts ofthe city. The inquest reported that the officers did not record theinteraction in their log books. It concluded that marks onStonechild's wrists and on his nose could have been caused byhandcuffs. The report also concluded that relations between thepolice and First Nations are problematic. However, the inquiry foundthat at the time of the death the police investigation was notadequate to conclude what the circumstances were surrounding NeilStonechild's death. The inquiry concluded on May 19, 2004.
Following the inquest, police officersLarry Hartwig and Brad Senger were fired. It was appealed but thefirings were upheld.
Aftermath
In 2015, author Candis McLean published"When Police Become Prey: The Cold Hard Facts of NeilStonechild's Freezing Death", which sought to exonerateHartwig and Senger; a book signing that would have coincided with the25th anniversary of Stonechild's death was canceled.
In media
Canadian musician Kris Demeanor's song'One Shoe', (recorded by Geoff Berner) was written aboutStonechild's death and the Saskatoon freezing deaths more generally.
Thomas King: The inconvenient Indian. Acurious account of native people in North America. The illustratededition. Doubleday Canada, 2017 ISBN 9780385690164 pp. 200–201(First ed. 2013: without illustr.) With a portrait of Stonechild
The podcast Criminal covered the caseof Neil Stonechild, and the Saskatoon freezing deaths, in theirepisode, "Starlight Tours."
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