Thunder Bay hospital to stop conducting autopsies connected to police investigations

The Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre's (TBRHSC) decision to stop doing autopsies connected to police investigations will lead to increased stress on families, and higher costs, police say.

ATBRHSCspokesperson confirmedthe facility will stop conducting the autopsies, known as medicolegal autopsies, by June. The movewas first made public in a story publishedlast week byRadio-Canada.

The autopsies were conducted by the TBRHSC's lab, "which has put tremendous pressure on staff, capacity and resources at a time when the health care system is under immense pressure and will be for the foreseeable future," hospital spokesperson Marcello Bernardo said in a statement.

"Also, it is recognized that from a quality perspective, medical-legal autopsies are best performed in the recognized Ontario Forensic Pathology Units," the statement reads.

The hospital will continue to conduct medical autopsies, but all medicolegal autopsies will now be done in Toronto.

Thunder Bay police Det. inspectorin charge of investigative services Jeremy Pearson said the hospital's decision is a "concerning development."

Pearson noted that many postmortem examinations already take place in Toronto.

"If we talk about a period from August 2021 to to the present, it was approximately 300 postmortem examinations from this region, and of course the City of Thunder Bay being the primary source ...that were conducted in Toronto," Pearson said. "During that same time period, we're looking at 130or so postmortem examinations that were conducted in the city of Thunder Bay."

"So we're increasing the number of postmortems conducted in Toronto by a third," he said. "That does have an impact."

Shift will lead to increased costs, police say

Pearson said in terms of deciding which autopsies can happen in Thunder Bay, and which need to be done in Toronto, there are a few factors to consider.

"It's a matter of availability," he said, adding that the complexity of an investigation, or complexity of theautopsy itself, is also a consideration.

"We're not talking about the seriousness of the investigation, because of course every death investigation is serious," he said. "But perhaps the complexity of the the postmortem, the invasiveness of the postmortem, the number of questions that are outstanding."

There are issues related to conducting an autopsy for a Thunder Bay-related case in Toronto, Pearson said.

"We have to think about the human impact on the families of the deceased, and the remaining members of that family and the loved ones," he said. "Not only are they waiting for answers from this examination, but they also know that their loved one's body is out of town."

"They're waiting on transport. There are delays, and all of that compounds the impact of this already tragic experience."

In addition, there are increased costs associated with the process.

"We have costs associated with travel, we have costs associated with wages and lodging to send a forensic identification officer to be present at that postmortem examination," Pearson said.

Forensic pathology facility needed

There have long been calls for the province to create a new forensic identification centre in Thunder Bay; it was one of the recommendations in the Office of the Independent Police Review Director's Broken Trust report.

Pearson said the need is there, given the sheer volume of investigations, and the fact that the city serves as a regional hub.

"We're not simply speaking about the experience of the the Thunder Bay police," he said. "We are a regional centre. There are a number of communities that we serve as a regional hub. And so there are a number of communities, a great number of people that are impacted by these delays."

In its statement, the TBRHSC noted Kenora's Lake of the Woods District Hospital (LWDH) stopped doing medicolegal autopsies in November.

CBC News has contacted LWDH for further information, but has not yet received a response.

The TBRHSCsaid in its statement it would "work towards establishing a stand-alone, dedicated forensic pathology unit for Northwestern Ontario."