Too many unanswered questions
Lingering questions remain
As Nova Scotia’s health system continues to grapple with the disturbing case of Lionel Desmond, two of his sisters have come forward to shed new light on what happened to the former Canadian soldier, who was transformed from a funloving family man to a paranoid killer after serving two tours in Afghanistan.
“His shell came back, but that beautiful soul inside of him became a dark cloud,” Cassandra Desmond, one of his twin sisters, said in one of her first indepth interviews.
It’s been almost six months since the murder-suicide in Upper Big Tracadie, in which Desmond killed his wife, mother and daughter.
Even though the killings fuelled a national debate about how Canada treats former soldiers, sailors and airmen living with PTSD, the RCMP and government officials have said little about a case that has raised questions about what happened to Desmond, and how such a tragedy can be prevented from happening again.
On Friday, a senior Nova Scotia health bureaucrat publicly apologized to the Desmond family for miscommunication that led to a delay in setting up a meeting to discuss an internal review of the man’s interaction with the health-care system.
“I did (apologize) in the sense of the frustration that they are experiencing in being able to come together with us,” said Colin Stevenson, the Nova Scotia Health Authority’s vicepresident of quality. “It was miscommunication on my part.”
Earlier in the week, Cassandra and her twin sister Chantel demanded a judicial fatality inquiry, and they spoke at length about their brother and his struggles with his mental illness.
Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and postconcussion disorder after his deployment in 2007, Desmond was 33 when he fatally shot his 52-year-old mother Brenda, his 31-year-old wife Shanna, and their 10-year-daughter Aaliyah in January. He then took his own life in the family’s rural Nova Scotia home.
Before he was deployed to Afghanistan, Desmond was a healthy, animated man with an infectious sense of humour and an endless capacity for hard work, Chantel Desmond told The Canadian Press.
“He was one of the happiest guys,” she said during an interview at her sister’s home in Antigonish. “You could be down in the dumps and he would lift you up. He was awesome.”
Cassandra Desmond was more emphatic, saying Lionel was the “clown of the family” and a definite ladies man.
“He was always imitating somebody or something,” she said, adding that his broad smile matched that of their mother Brenda. “There was never a dull moment around him ... I think of Lionel and I laugh and I smile.”
As a young man, Lionel Desmond met Shanna Borden when the two were attending high school, not far from where they would later live in Big Tracadie.
“He loved her,” said Chantel Desmond. “They were good.”
He enlisted in the military soon after graduating from high school and would later be promoted to corporal as a member of 2nd Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment, based at Canadian Forces Base Gagetown in New Brunswick.
Lionel and Shanna Desmond’s daughter, Aaliyah, was born shortly before he left for Afghanistan in 2007.
“Aaliyah, she was his life,” said Cassandra Desmond. “My mother, that was his best friend.”
However, Lionel Desmond was a radically changed man when he returned home from Afghanistan, and not much had changed by the time he was medically discharged in 2015, his sisters said.
They talked about how his sense of humour had dimmed and, more importantly, how he seemed withdrawn and in a defensive posture much of the time.
And then there was his sense of guilt. In his personal journal, he wrote that the people he was fighting in Afghanistan “were people, too.”
Despite his struggles, Lionel Desmond and his wife worked hard to get help. He spent three months receiving some sort of treatment at a facility in Montreal. He was supposed to be there six months. The couple had appointments with many doctors. There was marriage counselling. And Lionel had a prescription for medical marijuana.
Some days, he seemed like his old self. There were many other days when he would mumble to himself and withdraw.
His twin sisters said last week they were keen to get the recommendations from the Nova Scotia Health Authority’s quality review, but they made it clear they have grown frustrated by delays and what they perceive as a lack of disclosure and accountability.
Stevenson, spokesman for the authority on the Desmond file, confirmed Friday the review was completed in March. However, he said he has been unable set up a meeting with relatives because of confusion over who would be represented.
The province’s medical examiner, Matthew Bowes, has said he is also waiting to see the results of the quality review, which Stevenson said will not be released to the public.
With files from Michael Tutton