NO INQUEST INTO DEATH OF INMATE AT FRCC

Two years after 20-year-old Kyle Wigham died in custody at the Fraser
Regional Correctional Centre in Maple Ridge, the B.C. coroner decided
his death doesn't warrant an inquest.

But Wigham's mother Pat isn't bitter. The Chilliwack mom doesn't hold
a grudge against the coroner or corrections.

However, she is determined to see changes made.

"I don't believe children belong in prison," she said
Wednesday.

Wigham wants to see young, first-time offenders like Kyle sent to
restorative justice programs so "they have a chance to redeem
themselves," not to prison, where "naive" kids are fed into the hands
of street-wise criminals.

"They taught Kyle a new drug as far as I'm concerned," Wigham
said.

Coroner Vincent Stancato found her son died from a heroin overdose and
classified his March 14, 2008 death as "accidental," although he noted
that a centre staff member did not follow the standard operating
procedure of checking inmates every 30-60 minutes.

A B.C. Corrections spokesperson would not say whether the staff
members mentioned in the coroner's report were reprimanded or
disciplined.

"We never comment on personnel matters," Marnie Mayhew
said.

Wigham was sentenced to nine months in jail for robbing a Chilliwack
7-Eleven store, despite the recommendations of a drug counsellor.

It was Wigham's mother who basically turned him over to the judicial
system, hoping that he would get help for his cocaine addiction.

But as predicted by the drug counsellor, Wigham instead found prison
an easy place to score drugs and he was introduced to heroin, which
proved to be fatal when combined with marijuana.

She said blocking the flow of drugs into prisons is one step
politicians could take by enacting laws to add jail time to the users
and dealers discovered in custody.

'Sporadic' checks

A prison guard inspected a cell at a Maple Ridge men's prison three
times before realizing an inmate was unconscious, even though the
20-year-old was foaming at the mouth.

A coroner's report into the death of Kyle Wigham found the guard
conducted inspections of the cell "sporadically" throughout the night,
not every 30 to 60 minutes as required.

Wigham, a Chilliwack resident, was found dead at 8:45 a.m. on March
14, 2008.

Coroner Vincent Stancato found Wigham died of an accidental heroin
overdose.

After Wigham was discovered, prison staff found that the door to the
cell he shared with another inmate had been taped shut from the inside
and clothes were placed to cover the crack at the bottom of the door.

Staff also found a crack pipe to smoke cocaine, fashioned from a pen,
in a garbage can as well as a flap with oxycodone in his cell mate's
pillowcase, several empty flaps and cut-off fingers from latex gloves,
which are commonly used to transport drugs around the jail.

The coroner recommended the Maple Ridge prison revise visual
inspections to include observations of breathing as well as re-train
and test employees to make sure they are aware of standard operating
procedures regarding visual cell inspections.

B.C. Corrections has implemented several changes following an internal
critical incident review after Wigham's death. The changes focused on
limiting opportunities for drugs to get into the prison.

Spokesperson Marnie Mayhew could not provide details on the changes
for security reasons, but assured the prison does all it can to
prevent inmates from accessing illegal drugs.

Mayhew added that the coroner's recommendation that staff make sure
inmates are breathing during visual cell inspections will not be
implemented for safety concerns.

"In order to determine if they are breathing or not, [the guards]
would have to enter the cell and get up close," Mayhew said. "In the
course of doing that, they would wake up the inmate and continue to do
that on a regular basis throughout the night. No one wants to get
woken up repeatedly during the night."

by Monisha Martins