Security footage shows Regina drivers passing man waving for help before he died in cold
CBC News | Posted: January 12, 2024 11:00 AM | Last Updated: January 12
Footage shows man lying on ground for hours after stumbling off bus; police say death not criminal in nature
WARNING: This story contains disturbing video.
A Regina business owner says he is deeply disturbed after his security cameras captured a man apparently trying to flag down passersby for help for several hours before he died out in the cold late last month.
"When you see a guy sitting there, and you're watching him die on video, it's not a TV show — it's real life, so it's going to hit you," Jeff Holt said in a Thursday interview.
"What kind of society are we?" he remembers asking himself when he saw the footage.
The video, which Holt shared with CBC News, appears to show the man talking briefly with a driver on a bus around 8 p.m. on Dec. 30. The video then shows the man stumbling out the rear door of the bus and falling onto a lawn on Fourth Avenue E.
The bus waits for a couple of seconds before driving away from the man, who appears to be unable to get up on his own.
WATCH | Man waves for help for hours before his death (WARNING: video is disturbing):
Over the following hours, several pedestrians, vehicles and at least three more city buses can be seen in the surveillance footage passing by the man, but none stopped for more than seven hours.
"He laid there from 8 o'clock until … at least midnight with some movement, trying to wave people down," Holt said.
"He would kind of get up as much as he could, wave his arm, and nobody had stopped for the poor gentleman," he said.
"I guess [it's] the fear factor — nobody wants to stop to help anybody anymore, [but] I mean, roll your window down, call 911."
Around 3:30 a.m. on Dec. 31, a cyclist passing by stopped and checked on the man, according to the footage, and called emergency services.
Regina police found the man dead soon after, the police service told CBC in an emailed statement on Thursday. His death is not considered criminal in nature.
Holt says police asked for the footage last week and told him at the time the man had likely died from exposure to the cold.
Temperatures that night had dipped to nearly –8 C, according to Environment Canada.
The Saskatchewan Coroners Service is investigating the cause of death, but declined to comment on preliminary findings in an email to CBC Thursday.
'Please call': police
While the cause of the man's death is still unclear, the footage has raised questions about whether it could have been prevented if someone had helped sooner — and why no one did before it was too late.
Holt thinks the bus driver should have stopped to check on the man after he first fell off the bus, and he can't understand why other passing transit drivers didn't stop either.
"I think the drivers are responsible for passengers that are getting off their bus," he said. "They should have checked to see if that gentleman was OK or not."
On Thursday, Mayor Sandra Masters said the city is investigating how Regina Transit staff handled the situation.
Transit operators "go through quite a bit of education and deal with quite a bit on our city buses, and so it's under review as far as what happened, how it happened," she told reporters at city hall.
The incident has also prompted calls for better cold-weather shelters and supports for people who are homeless.
Many of those living and dying on the streets are Indigenous, said Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network CEO Margaret Kisikaw Piyesis.
"We can't ignore people anymore. These are human beings and we need to look at solutions that are going to make a difference in their lives," she said in an interview Thursday.
"We should be prepared to have places set up for them to go so they don't freeze in the streets of Regina."
Police say people should call 911 if they see someone in distress or danger, or who has been injured.
"Even if you aren't sure, but something seems off, please call," a Regina Police Service spokesperson said in an email. "We must work together in order to keep our community and our city safe."