Police, paramedics ‘failed to keep her safe’
Responders didn’t tell ministry Paige Gauchier needed help — but they won’t face charges
No charges will be laid against Delta police or paramedics who were called to help a drunk and bleeding 17-year-old foster child, but did not report her distress to the children’s ministry despite a law requiring them to do so.
The incident involves the high-profile case of Paige Gauchier, who was 19 when she fatally overdosed in the Downtown Eastside, shortly after aging out of foster care.
In a scathing report on Paige’s life, former B.C. children’s representative Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond said social workers, medical professionals, educators and police collectively failed to keep her safe.
The report said that, on several occasions, authorities interacted with Paige, but there was no documented government contact — a violation of the rules requiring officials to tell the Ministry of Children and Family Development when they find “a child in need of protection.”
Following the release of Turpel-Lafond’s May 2015 report, the RCMP investigated the Delta police’s interaction with Paige in 2011 and recommended to Crown counsel that the officers and paramedics involved be charged with failing to make such a report to the ministry.
But B.C.’s criminal justice branch said Tuesday said there was “no substantial likelihood of conviction.”
Paige led a chaotic life, moving dozens of times between her struggling, addicted mother, other relatives and many foster homes.
On Jan. 22, 2011, then 17-yearold Paige walked into a gas station in Delta, intoxicated and with a bleeding nose. She said she had been assaulted by six girls.
Paramedics recommended Paige go to the hospital but she refused. Police phoned her uncle in Vancouver, who they mistakenly believed was her guardian, and he asked that she be sent home in a taxi.
In the report, Turpel-Lafond wrote: “Paige was told to call police if she was able to remember the incident the following morning. She was sent to her uncle’s home in a taxi, and the police file was concluded. The confusion around Paige’s guardianship meant that MCFD was not advised of this incident, and no followup or support was offered.”
Turpel-Lafond’s report asked the attorney general to explain why service providers “persistently” fail to report potential harm to at-risk youth, despite a legal duty to do so.
Two years later, in April 2013, Paige was found dead in a communal washroom in a rooming house near Oppenheimer Park.
The report said the child welfare system and other authorities treated Paige with “professional indifference.”
“Paige was left for years in a situation that no reasonable person would find acceptable for their own child, yet no one questioned it,” Turpel-Lafond wrote.
The report suggested many changes, but 18 months after it was released, there is evidence the system is still failing youth once their government support ends at age 19.
Last week, a 19-year-old girl who had just aged out of care was found dead in a tent in Surrey. Her death is under investigation.
“Paige was left for years in a situation that no reasonable person would find acceptable for their own child.” — Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond