Police seek van in hit-and-run

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This article was published 17/03/2025 (225 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

City police are asking for the public’s help in finding the van involved in a hit-and-run incident in which a pedestrian suffered extensive injuries.

The incident happened in the area of Osborne Street and Mulvey Avenue East at about 12:30 a.m. Saturday.

The Winnipeg Police Service said in a news release Monday afternoon that a 25-year-old woman tried to cross the roadway at Mulvey Avenue East in front of a stopped westbound van. The van drove forward and hit her, knocking her to the ground before heading north on Osborne, police said.

The WPS said “a concerned citizen who came across the victim lying in the roadway summoned emergency services to attend.”

The woman was transported to hospital in stable condition, the release said.

The vehicle was described as a large white cargo-style van. The WPS asked anyone who knows the driver or has video relevant to the incident to contact its traffic division at 204-986-7085, or Crime Stoppers anonymously at 204-786-8477 (TIPS) or online.

“I’m really traumatized and in disbelief because I didn’t do anything wrong,” the victim, Margaret (Macey) Cobiness, told the Free Press from her bed at Health Sciences Centre on Sunday.

Cobiness said she was walking to a bar in Osborne Village to play pool when the incident occurred.

She said she made eye contact with the driver of the van before stepping off the curb. Cobiness said the van struck and drove over her. As she recalled, the driver then backed over her and drove forward over her again.

“He was intentionally driving slow, and you could tell he knew I was underneath the vehicle,” she said.

Her injuries included a broken collarbone, a broken hip, a fractured pelvis and broken ribs. She underwent surgery to repair the collarbone this weekend.

Cobiness, a mother of two who is originally from Buffalo Point First Nation southeast of Winnipeg, said she believes she was targeted because she is Indigenous. She thinks the driver and an accomplice intended to return to the scene to kidnap her.

“I could feel the hate and ignorance displayed by those males, and all I could do was cry out for help,” she said.

There is no indication the incident was an attempted abduction, a WPS spokesman said Saturday.

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca