Heather Brenan's daughter dips into life savings to cover inquest legal fees

The daughter of Heather Brenan, a Winnipeg woman who died after being sent home from a hospital in a taxi, says she has spent almost all her life savings on legal fees for her mother's inquest.

Dana Brenan said the past year and a half has been a struggle, as she has spent more than $100,000 in legal fees.

"It's been an emotional roller-coaster," she told CBC News outside the Winnipeg courthouse on Wednesday morning.

The Heather Brenan inquest is examining the circumstances surrounding the death of the 68-year-old woman, who had been was discharged from Seven Oaks Hospital and driven home by a cab driver on Jan. 27, 2012.

• Heather Brenan didn't want to leave Winnipeg hospital, inquest told
• Brenan needed to stay in hospital, doctor tells inquest

She did not have her house keys and collapsed just outside her home. She was rushed back to hospital, but died shortly afterward from a blood clot that had moved to her lungs.

Dana Brenan has standing at the inquest. She said she was previously told by her lawyer that she qualified for provincial funding to help cover her legal costs.

But after a year of waiting, her application was rejected last year, forcing Brenan to cash in some RRSPs, dip into her savings and sell her home in England.

"I had savings, I do own my own house, but because it's gone on for so long, my savings are gone. My RRSPs, every time they open up, go to pay legal fees," she said.

Brenan said Manitoba Justice officials informed her that she did not need the funding because the inquest process and the presiding judge would be enough to protect her and her wishes to seek answers.

She's calling for changes to be made to Manitoba's legal system to make it easier for more families to have their legal fees covered when they take part in inquests.

"There's a lot of families who decide not to stand up, take a stand and fight and publicize what's happened to their families, because they just can't afford it," she said.

What the province says

A Manitoba Justice fact sheet on inquest funding requests states that "Crown counsel represents the 'public interest' at the inquest" and "for most inquests the interests of the family will be the same as the public interest."

"The Government of Manitoba will only consider a request for a contribution to help pay for legal fees for a lawyer to represent the family of the subject of an inquest in extraordinary cases where the circumstances of the death and the family make it such that it is in the interests of justice for the family to have independent counsel," the fact sheet states in part.

A letter from the province to Brenan said that of the 64 inquests that have taken place since 2002, funding was provided to families in only two cases:

• At fhe inquest into the death of Brian Sinclair, who had waited 34 hours in the ER waiting room at the Health Sciences Centre in 2008.
• At the inquest into the death of Matthew Dumas, who was shot by Winnipeg police in 2005.

The province says it has also approved funding for an upcoming inquest into the death of two-month-old Drianna Ross.

Brenan said the expense associated with having her own lawyer at her mother's inquest is worth it, especially when it comes to getting answers from the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority about what happened.

"I really do need a lawyer to explain things and to deal with the WRHA's lawyer … to really understand what's going on," she said.

"I'm more than willing to fight for my mother. I want justice, I want the truth, and that's coming out."

Government's policy 'disrespects families' 

The lawyer who represented Sinclair's family, Vilko Zbogar, says the government's policy doesn't make sense.

He says the province should provide families whose interests are the subject of inquests with funding to hire a lawyer. 

"That argument has been made over and over again and it is really, I think, it just totally disrespects the families of victims of tragedies."

Zbogar says members of the Sinclair family had to fight before they finally got financial assistance from the province during the inquest.

"What the judge said in the Sinclair inquest was that the family needs their own advocate for them to be able to participate in the inquest in a way that's meaningful and influential."

Zbogar says Manitoba should adopt Ontario's policy, which provides financial support to hire legal representation during inquests.