After decades of searching, Indigenous families in Quebec push for answers about missing children

WARNING: This story contains distressing details.

Laureanna Echaquan was just two months old when she was placed, completely alone, on a plane in Manawan, Que., bound for a Joliette hospital some 150 km away. 

The infant had bronchitis and her parents, who had sought medical treatment for her, were not allowed to accompany her.

They never saw their child again.

Over four decades later, Laureanna's family have not given up their search for her.

They are part of a coalition of about 50 families whose children died or went missing while in the care of Quebec health-care institutions. 

The coalition, called Awacak — an Atikamekw word that roughly translates to "little being of light" — has been pushing for the adoption of Quebec's Bill 79. 

The law would allow Indigenous families to get information about children who went missing between the 1950s and 1990s after being taken to receive medical care. It is currently undergoing review and is expected to be passed in the coming days.

'It was not my daughter' 

Viviane Echaquan Niquay can still vividly remember losing her baby sister, Laureanna, in 1973. 

"She had told me, 'Baby Echaquan is being discharged," Echaquan Niquay recalls a social worker telling her over the phone. 

But the next morning, the family received another call from the hospital, this time with grim news. They were told Laureanna had died. 

When the family arrived at the funeral home in Joliette, they were taken to a Styrofoam coffin, which contained the body of a baby.

They were told that it was Laureanna but the family says the child weighed much more than their daughter, and appeared to be closer to 10 months old, not two months.

"It was not my daughter," said Armand Echaquan, the girl's father. "We knew they had switched her out for another baby." 

(Echaquan is also the uncle of Joyce Echaquan, the Atikamekw woman whose death in a Joliette hospital last September is currently being investigated by a Quebec coroner.)

Still, the couple wanted to give the child a proper burial. They asked that the body be buried in a cemetery in Joliette, but were told they could not bury her there, even though she had been baptized. 

Instead, the child was buried in a corn field on the other side of the cemetery's fence. That space has since been turned into a soccer field. 

For the past four years, Echaquan Niquay and her husband have been trying to find a death certificate, or any information about her sister's death. 

"We were given three different dates of death for one person," said Echaquan Niquay. 

The family is still holding out hope that Laureanna could be alive somewhere. 

"Maybe she's still looking for us," Echaquan said. "What did they do with my child?" 

Laureanna wasn't the first child the family lost. A few years earlier, Echaquan's wife had given birth to twins — a girl and a boy. 

The girl died just days after she was born, reportedly suffering from a heart condition. When the family asked to see the body, they were told it was too late. 

To this day, the Echaquan family still doesn't know where she was buried, or even if she ever was. 

Bill 79 not enough, advocate says

But while Bill 79 might help families get some answers, many in the province feel it doesn't go far enough.

An Indigenous women's organization has been calling for an independent public inquiry into all Indigenous children who went missing in the health-care system, youth protection and residential schools. 

"Loved ones and families of the children have the right to find out the truth in the causes and systemic reasons for the disappearances of their children," said Viviane Michel, president of Quebec Native Women. 

Michel says that many of the changes her group has proposed to the bill were not taken into account by Indigenous Affairs Minister Ian Lafrenière. 

"The bill says nothing about the accompaniment of the families, does not specify what form the information will take," said Michel. 

She is also concerned that families whose children may have been forcefully and secretly put up for adoption outside the province or abroad will be given the runaround and she, like many, is calling for the bill to be expanded to include residential schools. 

"We still ask ourselves, 'Are we currently walking on the bodies of our children?'" Michel said. 

In a news conference Tuesday, Lafrenière said the government wasn't going to expand the bill to include a public inquiry into the disappearances, but he also said the government was open to holding an inquiry later if the demand was made by Indigenous communities.

Alain Arsenault, a lawyer who has been working with the Awacak coalition, says the families are hoping some of those amendments, including the addition of residential schools to the bill, as well as access to information on exactly why their children went missing or died, will be added on eventually. 

"[The families] still have some reservations, but for the moment they prefer … that they be able to start their work and then see what the limits are," said Arsenault. 

Support is available for anyone affected by their experience at residential schools, and those who are triggered by the latest reports.

A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for former students and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour national crisis line: 1-866-925-4419.