Deaths of 3 Calgary railroaders should go to B.C. coroner's inquest: investigators
Chief coroner to ultimately decide whether to move ahead with inquest
British Columbia's coroner's office has recommended a full inquest into the deaths of three Calgary railroaders who were killed in a derailment near Field, B.C. in February 2019, according to one of the victim's mothers.
Pam Fraser's son, conductor Dylan Paradis, 33, was killed alongside engineer Andrew Dockrell, 56, and trainee Daniel Waldenberger-Bulmer, 26, on Feb. 4, 2019, after the brakes on Train 301 failed.
Fraser says she was emotional after receiving a call from the B.C. coroner's office last week confirming investigators had filed the paperwork recommending an inquest.
"My immediate reaction was one of hopefulness … in our country, railways, they hold a lot of power and great deal of autonomy with that power, so if they ever do anything wrong, it's darn near impossible to hold them to account," Fraser said.
"With a public inquest we may get some transparency on everything that surrounds the Train 301 event."
Inquests are a public court hearing before a five-to-seven person jury where the circumstances of a death are reviewed to determine whether similar incidents can be prevented in the future.
The chief coroner in B.C. must now decide whether to accept the recommendation and move ahead with the inquest.
CP 'normalized' problems: TSB
Last year, the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) released the results of its three-year investigation, finding Canadian Pacific Railway had "normalized" potentially deadly problems like old, failing brakes.
The TSB found that over the years, several CP train crews submitted reports outlining dangerous conditions involving braking issues on the notoriously dangerous Field Hill.
On Feb. 4, 2019, after sitting for hours in the frigid cold without hand brakes, Train 301 began moving on its own with the three crew members on board. It picked up speed and hurtled down Field Hill, derailing on a corner and landing in the Kicking Horse River.
After the fatal derailment, CP deployed its own federally authorized police force, Canadian Pacific Police Service (CPPS), which is paid for and owned by the railway.
One of two lawsuits filed by the Paradis and Dockrell families alleges CP has a long-standing pattern of "directing, interfering with, accessing, and controlling the CP Police Service conduct of criminal investigations."
It wasn't until 2020 when Fraser filed official complaints with RCMP, begging them to look into potential negligence and obstruction by the railway, that the Mounties agreed to take on the investigation, which is still ongoing.
Inquest would be 'pretty historic'
Tavengwa Runyowa, lawyer for two of the victims' families, says an inquest would mean a transparent examination into the railway industry and how railway deaths are investigated in Canada.
"The recommendation is a big deal," Runyowa said.
"To create the first-ever process in Canada where you're going to have witnesses, transparency and people asking questions in an open forum about what happened, who did what and when: that is pretty historic."
"And it seems that it's going to be accomplished on the provincial level in British Columbia, something that our federal government has deliberately failed to do for decades."
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