Richard J. Dalton Jr., Vancouver, B.C. (Vancouver Sun) – Just a week before the two-year anniversary of her son’s death at Vancouver International Airport, Zofia Cisowski has filed a lawsuit for damages against the RCMP, the Canada Border Services Agency and the Vancouver Airport Authority.
The lawsuit seeks damages for psychological injury, the loss of her son, Robert Dziekanski, and her inability to work since the incident. The suit, filed in B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver on Wednesday, also seeks punitive damages.
Dziekanski, 40, died on Oct. 14, 2007, after being Tasered five times by four RCMP officers responding to a 911 call at the airport.
Dziekanski, who was immigrating to Canada to live with his mother, had become frustrated after a 20-hour flight from Poland, then spending about 11 hours in the international arrivals area of the airport. He was unable to contact his mother, who was waiting for him in another area.
The lawsuit, filed a week before the statute of limitations would go into effect, says the conduct of the RCMP and four officers breached the Charter of Rights and was “an abuse of power, reprehensible, malicious, oppressive and high-handed.”
The suit claims negligence, assault and battery, malfeasance and charter violations by the RCMP.
The lawsuit also claims the Vancouver Airport Authority failed to provide a safe environment for her son with signage to the customs area, translators, or functioning security cameras, and that airport employees failed to pass messages from her to her son.
It says the border services agency breached its duty to provide Dziekanski with help. The lawsuit also lists the four officers involved in the Taser incident: Kwesi Millington, Gerry Rundel, Bill Bentley and Benjamin Robinson.
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