Coroner to hold inquest into Riverview patient’s death
Posted August 23, 2012 12:59 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
PORT COQUITLAM (NEWS1130) – The BC Coroner’s Service will look into the death of a woman who went missing from Riverview Hospital last year and was later found dead on the hospital grounds.
Patricia Donna Reed, 59, was committed to the mental hospital in 2011 but it was not her choice; she was put in involuntarily. She went missing on February 9th. One of the questions at the inquest in December will be why staff didn’t find her.
“Five days later, somebody who was passing by, not somebody who was officially searching for her, did find [Reed’s] body, and it was in a ditch beside a disused road on the Riverview property,” explains Coroner Barb McLintock.
Foul play was ruled out in Reed’s death.
McLintock says the Coroners Service takes a special interest in the deaths of people who, for whatever reason, don’t have control over their own lives. “Children in care, people who are in the custody of the police, or in this case, people who are committed involuntarily under the Mental Health Act.”
“[Reed] was not free to leave Riverview, so basically, we consider that the authorities in these cases have a bit of an extra role and responsibility in ensuring that these people do stay safe, which is why this case is going to inquest,” she explains.
The issue of patients vanishing from institutions is not new; two men let out on unescorted day passes from Colony Farm Psychiatric Hospital in May did not return when they were supposed to, although one was found earlier this month in Stanley Park.
“The issue here, obviously, is how does an involuntarily-committed patient go missing to the point where they can’t be found or aren’t found,” says McLintock.
“Basically, what the coroner can do… is call experts on this issue from other institutions, academe, perhaps there are some professors at UBC or Simon Fraser [University]… who look at issues around protecting the safety of the mentally ill. So, they’re allowed to take a reasonably broad view of the issue.”
The inquest is scheduled to run from December 3rd to 7th in Burnaby.
