Paramedic’s testimony contradicts police account at inquest

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This article was published 10/11/2023 (700 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg firefighter-paramedic Jeffrey Peters told an inquest Friday a Winnipeg police officer had a knee on Michael Bagot’s back, as the man lay handcuffed beside a transit bus.

Police officers who testified at the inquest a day earlier indicated that such a restraint, a knee on Bagot’s body, was not used at that time – after the distressed man had been handcuffed, put in a fabric leg restraint and carried off the bus by officers.  Bagot stopped breathing during the incident and died three days later, on May 24, 2019.

Winnipeg police officers, who testified Thursday, said they used their hands to prevent Bagot from moving outside the bus, all while he was yelling incoherently and struggling, on and off, up until firefighters arrived, when he became unresponsive.

In its fourth day, the ongoing inquest is examining the circumstances of Bagot and four other men’s deaths – each following an altercation with the Winnipeg Police Service over a roughly 12-month period in 2018 and 2019. Peters was the first non-police witness to testify, either in the Bagot case, or, earlier this week, into the death of Patrick Gagnon.

Inquests, which are not permitted to lay blame, are meant to determine the circumstances of a particular death and make recommendations that might prevent similar deaths in the future.

Peters told the inquest, which is being presided over by Judge Lindy Choy, that when he first arrived and looked at Bagot, who was being restrained on the ground, it appeared Bagot wasn’t breathing. When Peters got down to feel for any breathing, Bagot took one “agonal respiration – one last breath,” Peters said.

“(Agonal respiration) is your body’s response to having oxygen cut off for a long time – or, not a long time – but any period of time,” Peters told the court, saying he then asked police for Bagot’s handcuffs to be removed, which was done. He looked for a pulse, found none and started CPR, the primary care paramedic said.

Pressed repeatedly on his testimony by Winnipeg police lawyer Kimberly Carswell, Peters politely pushed back and did not waver in his description of the events.

During the cross-examination – which marked the first heated questioning at the inquest – Carswell told Peters that the court had heard evidence from “numerous individuals” and had statements from “numerous other individuals” all indicating that officers “were not doing what you described.”

Peters replied that he specifically remembered the event because it matched a video he’d watched during his paramedic training, which depicted that police restraint can cause people to not be able to “breathe properly.”

That video, Peters said, showed police restraining an individual, and in the video, the person stopped breathing. Peters said the event with Bagot was a “carbon copy” of what he’d seen in this training. Had Bagot simply been lying on the ground in handcuffs, it would have been unremarkable, he added.

Carswell asked Peters if he believed that officer testimony – that no one was “on” Bagot when he arrived – was “mistaken.”

“I saw it the way I saw it,” Peters replied simply, without commenting on the officers’ testimony. Pressed again, he added, “I am saying what I saw when I showed up.”

There was, however, a civilian witness, who worked for a nearby pizza restaurant and watched the scene outside the bus, who also described an officer as “kneeling” on top of Bagot. The person spoke to the Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba (IIU), but is not scheduled to testify.

“At first, (Bagot) appeared unconscious but then began yelling ‘get off me’ and ‘I can’t breathe,’” the witness told the IIU, according to the watchdog’s report into Bagot’s death. “(The witness) stated that the police were kneeling on top of (Bagot) as he was laying on his side.”

The IIU interviewed 13 civilian (non-police) witnesses in Bagot’s death; this included Peters and a bus driver who interacted with Bagot. The driver was scheduled to testify Friday, but a personal matter delayed his appearance until Nov. 20. He is the last scheduled witness in the Bagot case.

Emily Bagot-Sideen, a cousin of Michael’s who listened to the inquest testimony alongside her family, told reporters Friday, her family “definitely” would have wanted to hear the pizza shop employee testify. She called it “really unfortunate” that additional civilians won’t be testifying.

She said the family was relieved to hear Peters’ testimony, as they felt it matched what they’d heard of the altercation, and seen, so far, from the video evidence played in court. When Bagot was initially brought to the hospital, she said, their family was told by the attending emergency physician that his brain looked, according to scans taken, like the brain of someone who had been without oxygen for upwards of ten minutes.

“We were also told by police that they had given Michael CPR right away, but now that we’ve seen the video, Michael appears pretty lifeless and motionless outside the bus and I didn’t see police intervening in any way,” she said. “And quite frankly, I didn’t really see him still agitated, or even aggressive, the way they said he was.”

Bagot-Sideen and her family are concerned with the lack of attempt at de-escalation taken by the police.

“Obviously, Michael was not in the right state of mind when that event was taking place. And I reflect on that and he looked very scared. He looked very vulnerable,” Bagot-Sideen said. “I don’t think Michael got the dignity or the empathy that he deserved.”