Drama an austere look at death penalty

City rescinds Balmoral Street property owner’s order to clean up encampment

A West Broadway landlord is off the hook for clearing a large riverbank encampment after the City of Winnipeg rescinded an order threatening to stick him with the cleanup bill.

Marvin Sharp, CEO of Astroid Management Ltd., which operates the Pen-Eve Apartments at 35 Balmoral St., said he received a call from the city Tuesday letting him know the order has been cancelled.

In a statement from the city, an official said the order was shelved due to an existing and active easement on the property.

“We have been communicating with the property owner throughout this process and they have been informed of this development,” a spokesperson said.

U.S. tariffs pause elicits relief, frustration in Manitoba

Fifty per cent tariffs weren’t the only thing paused in the Canada-U.S. trade dispute.

‘Frustrated’ Selkirk nurses plead for help

The province must take immediate action to increase low staffing levels that are putting Selkirk emergency room nurses at risk, a letter sent to the premier and health minister says.

The letter, sent by the Manitoba Nurses Union and signed by 35 ER nurses, detailed multiple recent incidents at the Selkirk Regional Health Centre. In one case, a nurse was stabbed with a pen by a patient who had been waiting 24 hours for care. In another case, a nurse was bitten by a patient.

“Nurses in that emergency department are extremely frustrated,” said Manitoba Nurses Union president Darlene Jackson. “This is not something that happened in the last month — or overnight — these are problems that have been growing.”

The five-page letter was sent Tuesday to Premier Wab Kinew, Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara and leaders of the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority. It contained 10 requests to improve safety inside the emergency department, including establishing safer nurse-to-patient staffing levels, eliminating the practice of “single physician coverage” in the emergency department and implementing an institutional safety officer around the clock.

Paralyzed foster girl has system under a microscope

An internal investigation by Manitoba’s Families Department is nearly complete in the case of a six-year-old girl who is paralyzed after being assaulted by her foster mother in Winnipeg.

The review by child-welfare officials is intended to prevent similar incidents, but it’s unlikely the public will learn the findings or recommendations.

“We’re working closely with the (child and family services) authority to make sure that every recommendation is taken seriously and implemented,” Families Minister Nahanni Fontaine said Monday.

“They’re important (investigations) because they help us identify what went wrong so we can make those changes to ensure something like this tragedy never happens again.”

Somali refugee admits he helped to smuggle African migrants into Manitoba for money

A Somali refugee who was twice caught by RCMP assisting in the smuggling of desperate African migrants into Manitoba during the frigid winter — including while out on bail, months after he was first arrested with eight foreign nationals in his vehicle — has admitted he did so for money.

Drama an austere look at death penalty

The drama in this death-row story runs deep. There are no surface fireworks. Forget the crusading lawyers, the rousing courtroom scenes, the last-minute reversals. The feelings in this potent film are anguished but rigorously tamped down. And that’s the point.

In Clemency, which won the Sundance Grand Jury prize in 2019, writer-director Chinonye Chukwu (alaskaLand) explores, with quiet, unsentimental rigour, the emotional toll surrounding the drawn-out legal, bureaucratic and practical processes of capital punishment.

Though there is no obvious scenery-chewing, this restrained psychological study is an actors’ showcase, focusing on Alfre Woodard (12 Years a Slave) as prison warden Bernadine Williams and Aldis Hodge (Hidden Figures) as Anthony Woods, the prisoner awaiting his scheduled, state-sanctioned death.

In the opening sequence, as Bernadine prepares to oversee an execution, one of her guards calls her. “Warden… Warden,” he says, as she stares, unhearing, into space. Then he says her name, “Bernadine,” and she snaps back into focus. It’s a revealing moment, one that suggests how she toggles between her official role and her human impulses.