James Smith Cree Nation inquest will give 'true' account of stabbings, coroner says

Saskatchewan's chief coroner says the inquest into the violent killings in James Smith Cree Nation may be the only way for the victims' families to get a factual account of what happened.

On September 4, 2022, 32-year-old Myles Sanderson killed 11 people and wounded 17 others in a violent spree in James Smith Cree Nation and the nearby town of Weldon before a three-day manhunt that ended with Sanderson going into medical distress and dying in police custody.

Monday marks the beginning of two weeks of testimony into the killings, held at the Kerry Vickar Centre in Melfort to accommodate an unusually large audience for such an inquest. Lawyer Blaine Beaven will preside as coroner.

“There’s not going to be a trial, so this is the only way that the families and the public can hear exactly what happened and get a true public factual account of what happened," Chief Coroner Clive Weighill told reporters on Monday morning.

He said he's spent the past year and half meeting with the survivors and family members of the victims.

“It’s been really heartfelt to listen to the stories, to see the pain and try to help the community through this,” he said.

Weighill told media on Monday morning the inquest would begin with testimony from the RCMP.

“You’ll hear today evidence from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the investigators that were on scene, and they’ll walk everybody through exactly what happened for the first hours leading up to the event and through the event itself.”

(Rory MacLean / CTV News)

Over the next two weeks, he said the inquest will hear testimony about Sanderson from the parole board and Correctional Service Canada, as well as a forensic pathologist who will give a detailed account of the cause of death of each of the 11 victims.

Weighill said there's never been a coroner's inquest of this size in the province before, or possibly anywhere in Canada.

According to Weighill, the coroner's office started with a list of 150 potential jurors, before narrowing it down to a smaller pool who were selected at random on the first day of proceedings.

A second inquest into the circumstances of Sanderson’s death is scheduled in Saskatoon from Feb. 26 to March 1.

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RCMP say Sanderson went into medical distress shortly after police drove him off Highway 312 on Sept. 7, 2022 and took him into custody. Paramedics took him to a Saskatoon hospital for treatment, where he later died.

The cause of Sanderson’s medical distress and eventual death is expected to be revealed in that separate inquest.

Sanderson had a record of violent assaults and had received statutory release earlier in 2022.

A joint investigation into the reasons for his release by the parole board and the Correctional Service Canada is being withheld, despite calls for its release from the lawyer representing James Smith in the coroner’s inquests.

A spokesperson for the parole board has said the joint investigation won’t be released until after the inquest, but did not specify if they meant one or both inquiries.

A timeline of the attacks was released by Saskatchewan RCMP in April of 2023.

-With Canadian Press files from Kelly Geraldine Malone