GUELPH – The mother of an Arthur man who died in police custody has filed an official complaint against the OPP.
Nathaniel Schofield, a 36-year-old father of six, died on July 10 after spending a night at the Wellington OPP station in Rockwood. He was arrested the previous evening following a domestic dispute.
Schofield’s death is being investigated by the province’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU).
On Jan. 9 his mother, Faye Dzikewich, filed a complaint against the OPP with the Law Enforcement Complaints Agency, an independent civilian oversight agency responsible for receiving, managing and overseeing public complaints about police misconduct.
Dzikewich told the Advertiser she filed the complaint “because I believe they’ve definitely done something wrong.”
“They are here to serve and protect us. That is their job – to keep us safe,” she said.
Dzikewich said if police officers break the law, “their consequences should be just as severe, if not more severe, than a civilian that does the same thing.”
To date there is no evidence in this case of any OPP officers breaking a law.
In her complaint, Dzikewich states, “OPP officers have been discreditable, deceitful, neglectful in their duties and have unlawfully exercised their authority.”
She also alleges OPP officers gave false information about Schofield’s death to court officials, firefighters, paramedics and the SIU.
None of Dzikewich’s claims have been proven in court or substantiated by the SIU or any other oversight agency.
The complaint quotes reports from paramedics and Guelph General Hospital obtained by Dzikewich’s lawyer, Davin Charney.
Six months after Schofield’s death, Dzikewich said the most information she’s received about her son’s death has been from paramedics.
Dzikewich said she sat in a Guelph courtroom all day on July 10, waiting for her son to appear.
She said she called the Rockwood OPP station in the early afternoon to ask when her son would appear, but was not given a clear answer.
Schofield was pronounced dead at Guelph General Hospital at 11:20am.
“The person I spoke to must have known that Nathaniel had died, or at least that he had been taken by paramedics to the Guelph General Hospital,” Dzikewich states in the complaint.
Nathaniel Schofield was pronounced dead at Guelph General Hospital on July 10 after spending a night at the OPP’s Rockwood station. His mother, Faye Dzikewich, centre, organized a memorial across the street from the station on Aug. 4.
Shortly after 4pm, Dzikewich states a Wellington County OPP official informed the courtroom Schofield would not be attending because he had just been rushed to hospital in medical distress.
“This was an outright lie,” Dzikewich alleges.
Minutes later, Dzikewich got a call from the SIU, telling her they were on their way to the courthouse and she needed to stay there.
In the 10 minutes it took for SIU officials to arrive, Dzikewich received a call from her son’s fiancé saying her son had died.
“I collapsed in the parking lot near my car … I was screaming ‘my son is dead,’” Dzikewich states in the complaint.
When the SIU investigators arrived, Dzikewich said she felt “pressured and obligated” to do a recorded interview.
“I was in shock and disbelief having just learned that my son had passed … and should definitely not have been asked to do an interview in that state of mind,” she states in the complaint.
But Dzikewich feels that “if the OPP were honest in the first place, none of that would have happened.”
Officials from the SIU and OPP declined the Advertiser’s requests for comment as the SIU investigation is ongoing.
The Ontario Provincial Police Association sent a brief email reply to the newspaper stating the union “fully supports the actions of our members in this tragic situation.”
Support group
Dzikewich expressed deep gratitude for the paramedics and firefighters who “did everything possible they could,” as well as for the media coverage of her son’s death and the support she has received from her lawyer.
This gratitude is part of what motivated her to launch a group to support other families in similar situations, “so they know they are not alone.”
With this group, Dzikewich hopes to push for legislation to expand and strengthen the SIU and increase consequences for officers charged with misconduct.
“That’s what I’m hoping for, just changing things to make them right,” she said.
