Recommendations from the Jerry Knight Coroner's Inquest

We the Jury in the Jerry Knight inquest wish to recommend the following:

To the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services-Policing Services Division (MCSCS):

1. To provide hand restraint devices to all Tactical, Supervising and frontline Officers which allow the subject to be restrained with the hands of the subject to the side of the hips.

To the Ministry of Health and Long Term Care – Emergency Health Services Branch (MHLTC-EHSB) and to the MCSCS:

2. To reinforce and identify through regular and refresher training, the risk of death associated with Excited Delirium.

To the MCSCS and the Ontario Police College (OPC):

3. To create a dispatch code, or call, to announce that officers are dealing with a subject whom they suspect is suffering from Excited Delirium and that EMS dispatch be notified.

4. To reinforce, through regular and refresher training, the risk of death associated with the use of prone restraint and the Hog-tying restraint.

5. To encourage increased research and training in Excited Delirium and restraint; including, the advisability of using the Taser in drive stun mode and pepper spray.

6. To encourage all police services currently using Tasers to update their Taser technology.

7. To reinforce, through regular and refresher training, the risk of death associated with the use of neck restraint techniques.

8. To encourage the development of better forms of leg restraints and have all Police vehicles equipped with such devices. ie: flexicuffs

9. To encourage the development of a coordinated approach to rapidly restrain non-compliant subjects. ie: starfish technique.

10. If possible, when multiple Officers are dispatched, the more experienced Officers should take the lead role in dealing with the situation. The senior Officer in charge, or designate, should be responsible for communicating with Officers newly arriving to the scene as to the status of the situation and remain on scene for the full duration.

11. Development of alternate standardized procedures to replace hog-tying and once these procedures are in place, hog-tying be banned altogether.

12. Development of procedures and policies for Police Officers to communicate to the subject during a violent struggle, to include instructions of a potentially hazardous or fatal outcome if resistance continues.

To All Local Governments:

13. To encourage development of a protocol whereby Advanced Paramedics and/or Tactical Paramedics would attend during cases involving excited and non-compliant subjects.

To the MCSCS:

14. To consider authorizing all front line Police Officers to carry a Taser or have access to a Taser.

To the National Research Council and the Ontario Government:

15. Encourage funding for continued research into sudden death that may occur in police custody.