In the life of Aboriginal people, as in that of any human being, there are those moments when news reaches us, often in the form of a number or a verdict in our case, and which takes our breath away. .
A moment, inscribing itself in us like a shock, an injustice, where we no longer really know what we have just heard, where we are, what day it is or how we feel. As if all the little pieces of our skeleton ended up on the ground in an instant. As if all that was left to do was pick them up and stick them back together to try to function normally.
The shock that I try as best I can to describe to you, I felt it last Friday while watching the series Thunder Bay Murdersoffered on Crave.
Thunder Bay Murders is meant to be a continuation of the podcast Thunder Bay, released in 2018. No need to have listened to one to see the other. The number I heard there had the same effect on me as the number 215 did on a certain afternoon in May 2021, when so many unmarked graves had just been discovered in Kamloops, British Columbia. I had to rewind the episode twice to be sure of what I had just heard.
However, this time, no one talks about what is happening there. No one except Anishinaabe journalist Ryan McMahon who produced, wrote, co-directed and hosted the series.
The episode opens with the murder of Barbara Kentner, an Indigenous woman living in Thunder Bay who died in the most heinous of ways: having a steel trailer hitch thrown at her from a moving vehicle shouting “I got one! “. To freeze the blood. The perpetrator, Brayden Bushby, will be convicted of manslaughter after the Crown dropped a charge of second degree murder.
Ryan McMahon therefore strives to discover the truth about the death of many Aboriginal people in this city, which also holds the record for the highest number of murders per capita in the country.
Nearly one-third of hate crimes against Indigenous peoples in Canada are reported in Thunder Bay.
Why are so many Native people dying in this town? Why is nothing being done to solve the problem? These are the questions that McMahon asks from the outset.
We will understand, over the four episodes, that this mission cannot be done without exploring the failures of the city’s police department as well as the systemic racism that surrounds this whole file.
After the story of Barbara Kentner, Ryan McMahon reveals the cases of seven mysterious deaths of aboriginal teenagers, focusing more on the story of Jordan Wabasse, a hockey prospect from the Webequie First Nation.
All young natives, all “fallen” into or near a stream. All classified as accidental deaths, sometimes before the coroner could even examine the body. They will be called “The Seven Fallen Feathers”. The same conclusion for all: no reason to suspect a criminal act, according to the investigators. But suspicious deaths in Thunder Bay, there are many others. Much more than seven. No one knows the exact figure, which the authorities are careful not to reveal. Deaths that we just want to forget so as not to know the truth.
But what could be the cause of all this? For real, I mean? Because the puzzle is so incomplete that you can’t even guess the picture. All the hypotheses pass: a serial killer, street gangs and the one that makes you shudder the most: racist supremacist organizations that target Aboriginal people.
One of the biggest missing pieces is a full police investigation. Do you hear me sigh from where you are? In any case, I told you: the conclusion of the “investigations” was death by drowning and/or cold due to alcohol consumption (oh easy conclusion when you have us), without suspicious act.
If there’s only one Indigenous series you need to watch this year, it’s this one. A difficult police chief who will eventually resign, unsolved murders, conspiracies and conspiracies, ambient racism. A cocktail worthy of the best films. But that’s life. The real life.
Now I’m going to reveal the number that made me lose my breath. A figure that finally allows us to understand the full extent of the problem. Stop reading here if you plan to watch the series.
One thousand seven hundred and eighty. 1,780 sudden Indigenous deaths that warranted further investigation between 2010 and 2017. But nothing. It is enormous. By comparison, the 1,200 Indigenous women and girls who went missing or were murdered across the country over a 30-year period were the subject of a national inquiry. Here in the small city of Thunder Bay, we’re talking about an unenviable average of 253 aboriginals a year.
How is it possible ? And above all, why are we not doing anything to understand and stop this bloodletting? Because that’s what it’s all about, a bloodletting.
Thunder Bay is known to be a stinky city with bad smells from pulp and paper mills. But there floats there another strong odor, the persistent and undeniable odor of racism.