One January night in 2022, Myranda Tizya-Charlie and Cassandra Warville entered a shower room at Whitehorse’s emergency shelter. They were discovered, unresponsive, by staff nearly four hours later. Despite medical intervention, both women died. The next year, in the same shelter, Josephine Hager also died. Two months later, in April 2023, it was Darla Skookum.
Last spring, a coroner’s inquest investigated the deaths of the four First Nations women. Drugs and alcohol had played a role, but the ultimate causes were far more complicated. According to the CBC, a former supervisor testified that the shelter was chaotic and understaffed the night Tizya-Charlie and Warville died. At the time, there was no policy or standard practice around regular checks of bathrooms and showers. As for the 2023 deaths, there were no directives mandating bed checks or specifying when staff should call an ambulance if a guest was unwell. Employees testified that it was common practice to put intoxicated people into a wheelchair and then into bed rather than calling for help.
