‘They took my son away:’ Mom of dead 6-year-old
REGINA — Lee Bonneau liked to laugh and play. The shy six-yearold especially enjoyed flying his remote-controlled airplane, going to the park, playing computer games and watching cartoons.
Lee was a “beautiful baby boy,” his mother told a coroner’s inquest investigating why the boy died while playing on a reserve in southern Saskatchewan.
How he died is already clear: a 10-year-old boy with behavioural issues struck him with a blunt object, likely “something of opportunity,” the RCMP said.
Because the boy was under 12, he could not be charged under the Youth Criminal Justice Act.
Saskatchewan’s child advocate, Bob Pringle, determined that the boy probably shouldn’t have been in the community unsupervised.
Lee was visiting the Kahkewistahaw First Nation east of Regina on the day he crossed the boy’s path in August 2013. He was there with his foster mother, who was attending a bingo game.
Social Services had apprehended him and put him in foster care just 2 1/2 months before.
His mother, Stacey Merk, testified on Monday, the first day of the inquest, that she has suffered from depression since she was a teen. On June 6, 2013 she was feeling overwhelmed and was late taking her medication. She told a social worker that she felt suicidal.
“I don’t know why I said what I did.”
She said it set things in motion and “then they took my son away from me.”
Merk said child protection workers refused to place him with Lee’s father, David, from whom she was separated.
David Bonneau testified that he was devastated to lose his family. He denied there was any domestic violence, the concern raised in documents prepared by child protection workers.
He refused to sign the document to place Lee in foster care. He last saw his son alive during a visit at the start of August.
“He was all happy and giggling and playing with toys,” he said. “We loved him dearly.”
On the evening of Aug. 21, Lee accompanied his foster mother to the First Nation’s recreation centre. Lee went off to buy a snack and when he did not return, she raised the alarm.
At one point, Lee was seen outside the centre playing with some dogs. It’s believed he crossed paths outside with the boy — named in Pringle’s report as “Derek” although his real name cannot be released.
Lee was found critically injured. He died the next day in hospital.
Derek was already known to social services and was clearly on a violent and dangerous path, according to Pringle’s report, released last year.
Pringle later told the CBC, “It was a train wreck that we could see coming.”
“The lives of these boys intersected in a tragic way,” reads the final page of the report, “and we have much to learn from their experiences.”