Ontario Coroner commits human rights abuses

The Ontario Human Rights Commission has ruled in favour of mandatory coroner's inquests into deaths that occur in psychiatric facilities. The Crown or the Ontario Coroner's office refused to hold an inquest into the death of a patient when clinical records were altered by the facility. The OHRC deemed the Coroner's actions to violate the patient's right of equal treatment under the law (s. 15 of the Charter, s. 1 of the Ontario Human Rights Act) thus discriminating against individuals within that have mental illness, an enumerated ground under both the Charter and the Code.

See the CBC website for details. Here is the news release from the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

I don't know about you, but I'm personally disgusted that the Crown via the Coroner's office wouldn't totally disregard Charter provisions for individuals with mental illness. But then again, this is Ontario.

Perhaps now the Randy Modgridge case could be looked into by the Ontario Human Rights Commission.