Report into Dziekanski death to be released this summer

VANCOUVER — The inquiry into the death of a Polish immigrant after he was tasered by an RCMP officer will make its final report public this summer.

Robert Dziekanski, 40, died in October 2007 at the Vancouver International Airport.

Officials announced this week that inquiry commissioner Thomas Braidwood and British Columbia's attorney general have agreed that the final report on the second phase of the inquiry will be submitted by May 31.

The report in the controversial death, which was filmed by a bystander and made headlines across the world, will be made public in June or July.

Dziekanski had come to Canada to live with his mother and spent about 10 hours at the airport looking her.

She had left the airport to return to her home in the B.C. Interior city of Kamloops after officials told her that they couldn't find her son at the airport.

Dziekanski, who had never flown before and spoke no English, began to toss around furniture, prompting a 911 call to police.

Seconds after four RCMP officers arrived, Dziekanski was tasered five times, restrained and handcuffed. He died at the scene.

The four officers told the inquiry they feared for their safety because Dziekanski grabbed a stapler from a counter. They also believed Dziekanski was resisting arrest.

Zofia Cisowski has launched a lawsuit over the death of her son.

The U.S. manufacturer of the electric stun gun is legally challenging Braidwood's findings in his report on the first phase of the inquiry, which probed the use of conducted energy weapons in B.C.

That report was publicly released on July 23, about one month after it was submitted to the government.

Braidwood's first report concluded that "conducted-energy weapons do have the capacity to cause serious injury or death."

The second report will focus on Dziekanski's death specifically.

The first report can be downloaded at the inquiry's website: www.braidwoodinquiry.ca/

nhall@vancouversun.com