Sask. man says he was held to the ground, kneed in the head as his daughter looked on

An Indigenous Saskatchewan man says he was assaulted in an unprovoked attack in front of his young daughter.

Colby Tootoosis, 40, says three men attacked him in Battleford when he was dropping off a trailer at a friend’s house Sunday evening.

He says three white men got out of vehicles and demanded back stolen property; a cell phone, bag and pants. He says one of the men said they’d tracked the cell phone to that location.

“I looked in the direction he was pointing to and I figured that I would help him find it, as I know the owners and I was already mentally preparing to contact them to let them know of the situation,” Tootoosis said in a written statement.

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Tootoosis says his six-year-old daughter was waiting in the truck as he unhooked the flat-deck trailer he borrowed from Eleanore Sunchild.

He says the verbal assault was followed by a punch in the face by the man he was talking to.

“As I fell forward the same man grabbed my braid and used it to keep me held to the ground. He then hit the back of my head with his knee. Blood was spilling out of my nose and mouth,” Tootoosis said.

He sought medical care at the hospital after the incident and he’s at home still recovering.

He says he took photos of the vehicle as it drove away and provided them to police.

Sunchild said her yard is located on the southeast edge of Battleford near an open field of municipal property.

Her 13-year-old son was in the house at the time and she’s worried that the same thing could have happened to him if he had been in the yard, she said.

Sunchild is also the lawyer for Colten Boushie’s family. She says ever since the acquittal of Biggar area farmer Gerald Stanley in 2018, racist attacks on the Prairies have been on the rise.

Stanley had been charged with second-degree murder in connection to the shooting death of Boushie.

“I’ve seen these sorts of incidents where people take to vigilante justice. I’ve seen those incidents against Indigenous people and often it goes badly and someone gets terribly hurt. And to see that level of violence right in my own backyard against my friend is just appalling and shocking,” said Sunchild.

Officers were dispatched to a home in the 100 block of 17th Street East in Battleford at 6:50 p.m. July 17, RCMP said in a statement.

“Charges have not been laid at this time and North Battleford RCMP are continuing their investigation into this incident, including working to identify and locate the suspects involved."

The Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations (FSIN) is calling on the RCMP to “lay all appropriate charges in this matter.”

“This was an unprovoked racial attack,” said FSIN Vice Chief Dutch Lerat.

Tootoosis said in his statement that his daughter is continuing to process emotional traumatic distress.

“This was uncalled for. I am not ok and I am not ok that this happened ... So often we hear stories of violence like what happened to me and many Indigenous peoples choose not to speak out or address it. This is an encouragement for all our relatives out there who are experiencing ongoing settler-colonial violence to stop tolerating it.”