Man ‘wants answers’ about brother’s death in Yellowknife RCMP custody

The brother of a man who died in police custody last week in Yellowknife says, “We want answers.”

George Anguttitauruq, 35, from Gjoa Haven, died in police custody in Yellowknife, his brother says.

“My brother George,” Ryan David Anguttitauruq wrote in a Facebook post Friday night in which he shared a news article about the incident.

He used a derogatory term for police, saying “they were supposed to watch him,” adding he wondered what police did.

When Nunatsiaq News contacted Ryan Anguttitauruq by Facebook Messenger Monday, he confirmed his brother was the man referred to in the news article.

An external investigation is underway looking into the circumstances surrounding the death of a 35-year-old Gjoa Haven man in Yellowknife RCMP custody on Thursday morning, the Yellowknife RCMP confirmed in a news release Friday.

The Saskatchewan RCMP’s Serious Crimes Unit is heading the investigation, which is still in its early stages.

The man’s family has been notified but police wouldn’t not disclose his name citing privacy obligations, Saskatchewan RCMP spokesperson Janelle Blakley said in an email Monday.

Further details are unavailable, she said.

On Thursday, Yellowknife RCMP officers responded to a report of a person making threats at the Explorer Hotel shortly before 7 a.m., said a police news release issued Friday.

Officers arrested a 35-year-old man on assault charges.

“The man was displaying signs of impairment and was apprehended without incident,” the release said.

The suspect was transferred to the RCMP detachment, where officers requested he be assessed by Emergency Medical Services, who cleared him for incarceration.

The man was later found unresponsive in his cell shortly before 10 a.m. Cardiopulmonary resuscitation was initiated, and officers called the medical team to assist, the release said.

The man was brought to Stanton Territorial Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

When an incident results in death or serious injury while a suspect is in police custody, the RCMP Act — the legislation that governs the RCMP — requires an investigation be conducted by an external agency.

A team of investigators from Saskatchewan was in Yellowknife on Friday to review police actions throughout this incident, including the events leading up to and during the man’s arrest and detention, the release said.

The investigation is ongoing in collaboration with the N.W.T. Office of the Chief Coroner.

Yellowknife RCMP declined to be interviewed for this story. The N.W.T. Office of the Chief Coroner did not respond to an interview Monday.