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Three decades after allegations of sexual abuse at Fort Alexander residential school first made headlines, the RCMP in Manitoba say they have been investigating the institution for the past 11 years.
In a press release, the RCMP said that, while they don’t normally discuss ongoing investigations, they decided it was in the public interest to share information after the Winnipeg Free Press contacted the force about the matter. Details on who is being investigated, how many are under investigation or what charges may be coming were not disclosed in the release.
Though the RCMP’s disclosure suggests the public may soon have a better understanding of what happened to children at Fort Alexander, it has also raised new questions.
“It is really hard for me to understand from this what has prompted this unusual statement, with so few facts, that doesn’t identify the crime,” said Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, director of the Indian Residential School History and Dialogue Centre and a professor of law at the University of British Columbia.
Tanya Talaga: The Kamloops residential school site is a crime scene. When will Canada take responsibility for bringing about justice?
A rock with the message 'Every Child Matters' painted on it sits at a memorial outside the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, in Kamloops, B.C., on July 15, 2021.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
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Officers describe being ‘tortured,’ blame Trump, allies for Capitol attack
Police officer Michael Fanone, who was among those dispatched to quell the violence on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, described being dragged into the crowd, beaten unconscious and repeatedly shocked with a taser to his head. Fanone suffered a heart attack and a concussion.
He was one of four officers who testified yesterday on the first day of the select committee probing the Capitol riot. All four labelled the perpetrators as “terrorists” and “white nationalists” and pinned blame for the attack squarely on former U.S. president Donald Trump and his allies.
“It was not Antifa, it was not Black Lives Matter, it was not the FBI. It was his supporters that he sent over to the Capitol that day,” said Sergeant Aquilino Gonell of the Capitol Police.
Read more: U.S. Justice Department won’t defend Republican lawmaker in Capitol riot lawsuit
Decorated U.S. gymnast Simone Biles bows out of team event, citing mental-health concerns
One of the brightest stars in gymnastics, American Simone Biles, withdrew from the team final after one vault at the Tokyo Games, saying she has to put her mental health first.
The day before the competition, the six-time Olympic medalist gave the world a glimpse of her struggles on Instagram, where she wrote that she was feeling the weight of expectations.
Biles follows the lead of Japanese tennis star Naomi Osaka, who dropped out of a major sporting event earlier this year, citing the need to prioritize her mental health. Osaka ended her run at the Olympics on Tuesday and said that she had also been bearing heavy expectations.
More Tokyo 2020 coverage:
- Cathal Kelly: With six Olympic medals, Penny Oleksiak’s place in Canadian sports history is assured
- Stuck at Tokyo Olympics, Canadian rugby players who responded to 2019 typhoon won’t see the place they tried to help
- Cathal Kelly: Are the Tokyo Games already a failure? The dudness cannot be mitigated
- Canadian weightlifter Maude Charron wins gold at Tokyo Olympics
- Record number of openly LGBTQ athletes at the Tokyo Games reflects watershed moment for Olympics
- Tokyo Olympics daily guide: Penny Oleksiak becomes Canada’s most decorated summer Olympian
Subscribe to our Olympics newsletter: Tokyo Olympics Update features original stories from Globe reporters in Canada and Tokyo, will track Team Canada’s medal wins, and looks at past Olympic moments from iconic performances.
Got a news tip that you’d like us to look into? E-mail us at tips@globeandmail.com. Need to share documents securely? Reach out via SecureDrop.
ALSO ON OUR RADAR
Trucker sentenced to 12½ years in prison in the death of Cindy Gladue: Bradley Barton, an Ontario truck driver, was sentenced to 12½ years in prison in the death of Cindy Gladue, a 36-year-old Métis and Cree woman who bled to death at the Yellowhead Inn in June 2011. He was found guilty of manslaughter by a jury in February.
Tune in to The Decibel: MuchMusic is making a comeback on TikTok, capitalizing on a wave of ‘90s nostalgia for which it has millennials and Gen Z to thank. Culture critic and writer Amil Niazi says its return via TikTok is a smart move, in theory.
Canadian border workers vote to strike as plan to lift restrictions looms: Canada’s border-patrol agents could strike as soon as Aug. 6, three days before the country will be welcoming fully vaccinated U.S. citizens without requiring them to quarantine for two weeks. Strike action could significantly hobble the flow of goods and people, said Chris Aylward, national president of the Public Service Alliance of Canada.
Ontario to issue regular reports on COVID-19 case counts in unvaccinated people: The Ontario government plans to share regular updates on how many COVID-19 cases are in vaccinated and unvaccinated people. Dr. Kieran Moore, the province’s top doctor, said the risk of catching the virus is 6.4 times higher for those unvaccinated, adding that providing such information is “essential” in communicating the stakes and benefits of immunization.
Georgia man sentenced to life in four of eight Asian spa killings: Robert Aaron Long, a Georgia man accused of killing eight people – most of whom were of Asian descent – at an Atlanta-area spa, pleaded to guilty to murder in four of the killings and was given four sentences of life without parole. Prosecutors did not seek a hate-crime sentencing enhancement. The four other deaths are being prosecuted in a different county, where the 22-year-old still faces the death penalty.
U of T spinout Deep Genomics raises US$180-million to develop AI-driven drugs: Deep Genomics, led by University of Toronto biomedical engineering professor Brendan Frey, has raised US$180-million to fund its efforts to discover and develop drugs using AI, with help from Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Fidelity Management and Research Co. LLC, among other investors.
MORNING MARKETS
Investors await Fed decision: Global equities regained some poise on Wednesday as a storm in Chinese stocks showed signs of easing, while the U.S. dollar made modest gains as investors awaited a Federal Reserve meeting. Just before 6 a.m. ET, Britain’s FTSE 100 was up 0.29 per cent. Germany’s DAX and France’s CAC 40 rose 0.27 per cent and 0.83 per cent, respectively. In Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 1.54 per cent. Japan’s Nikkei ended down 1.39 per cent. New York futures were mixed. The Canadian dollar was trading at 79.56 US cents.
WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT
Alberta’s report on anti-energy campaigns looks like a multimillion-dollar dud
“This inquiry has been one of the most bogus, ill-conceived, ideologically motivated exercises ever conducted in Alberta. That environmental organizations in Canada received some funding from American foundations was never in dispute. What was also clear, was that money amounted to a fraction of their overall budgets. Did environmentalists want to see the oil sands shut down? Yes. And that, too, was the biggest non-secret in the world.” - Gary Mason
There’s more of a case for requiring the governor-general be bilingual than a Supreme Court justice
“Of course, when the office in question is the governor-general, arguably, symbolism is a requirement of the job. But so is an ability to communicate. English and French may have been the languages of the colonists, but they are also the languages spoken by the vast majority – more than 90 per cent – of the population. No other language is even close.” - Andrew Coyne
TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON
David ParkinsDavid Parkins/The Globe and Mail
LIVING BETTER
How do I know if a beauty product hasn’t been tested on animals?
A brand can only claim to carry cruelty-free products if it doesn’t test on animals at any point in the production process, says Suzana Rose, founder of Cruelty-Free Kitty, a website devoted to beauty and personal care. Rose recommends first checking the packaging to see if it bears the official logo of Leaping Bunny, a worldwide organization that certifies brands as being cruelty-free, or getting in touch with companies directly for their full animal-testing policy.
MOMENT IN TIME: July 28, 1996
Remains of prehistoric Kennewick Man found in Washington State
A plastic casting of a controversial 9,200-year-old skull from the bones known as Kennewick Man is shown on July 24, 1997, in Richland, Wash. The bones were discovered along the banks of the Columbia River in Kennewick, Wash., in 1996.ELAINE THOMPSON/The Associated Press
When two college students came across a human skull during a stroll along Washington State’s Columbia River, they thought they had found a murder victim. Radiocarbon testing revealed that the skull, and the 300-odd bone fragments eventually found around it, belonged to a man who had been dead for roughly 9,000 years. He became known as “Kennewick Man” after the nearby city in Benton County. Nearby Indigenous communities wanted to rebury the remains, believing the prehistoric man to be one of their forebears. But scientists wanted to study the bones for further proof. A custody battle began, and in 2004 a judge ruled the bones should be studied further. There was some debate about Kennewick Man’s ancestry, but a decade later DNA sequencing proved that he indeed had similarities to Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest. The remains were then returned to a coalition of Columbia Basin tribes for a 2017 reburial under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act – but not before a skeletal analysis revealed Kennewick Man to have probably been a spear-thrower and carrier of heavy objects, despite his six broken ribs. Smithsonian Magazine writer Douglas Preston said it best: “This man was one tough dude.” Alex Cyr
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