Inmate commits suicide in London jail

For the second time in less than three weeks, an inmate at a provincial jail has died by suicide.

Raymond George Major died early Tuesday in hospital after hanging himself in his cell Monday at the Elgin-Middlesex Detention Centre in London. Major’s death comes on the heels the May 21 death of inmate Delilah Blair, 30, who committed suicide in her cell at the South West Detention Centre in Windsor by hanging herself.

A Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services spokesperson confirmed that a male inmate from EMDC died Tuesday in hospital, but would not provide further information because “the matter is the subject of multiple investigations.”

Major’s suicide is the eighth known death at the London jail since 2009. Major’s grieving family is struggling to understand how someone could die under roundthe-clock supervision.

“There is something wrong with that place that never seems to be addressed,” Christina Parry, Major’s daughter, said Wednesday.

Parry said her father had been in jail before, and had been on a suicide watch once earlier.

“They know him and they know his history,” she said.

But she can’t find out whether he had been placed in segregation or in the general jail population, or if he’d been placed on suicide watch.

“No one will give us any answers. We know nothing,” Parry said.

“We want simple answers that they are not giving us.”

Parry said her father was in his 50s, and had been struggling with addiction for several years.

Coroner’s inquests are called when inmates die in custody.