'Hug your kids': Saskatoon man speaks out after son's homicide

A man’s violent death outside a Saskatoon gas station earlier this month has prompted his family to advocate for change.

Warren Pegg, 25, was found dead outside a business on the 1600 block of 20th Street West on the afternoon of Dec. 2 following reports of a violent altercation. Police said he had “succumbed to a serious injury.” Twenty-three-year-old Eugene Noah Caisse faces a second-degree murder charge in Pegg’s death.

Pegg’s father Ray told CTV News his son was a “normal kid” who faced challenges and fell in with the wrong crowd as an adult. The grief-stricken father says his son spiralled into addiction after getting hooked on prescription drugs.

Ray said his son’s death underscores the lack of support available to people who use drugs. You can put people through detox, but if there’s no support after, drug users are even more vulnerable, he says.

"You can’t detox people and have them thrown onto the street, because you've lowered their resistance, they take the same amount of drugs, and now we have fatalities everywhere."

Every person out there struggling with addiction is someone’s child, he says.

In light of this family tragedy, Ray is urging people to cherish every moment they have with loved ones.

"Hug your kids. Love them. Make each day a different day. Dump your dump trucks. Forget about any pain in the past. Like my family has this weekend."