VANCOUVER - Aboriginal leaders are demanding the release of RCMP video of the arrest and Tasering of a man who died in RCMP custody more than six years ago.
Clayton Willey, 33, was apprehended in July 2003 for causing a public disturbance in a Prince George shopping mall and later died en route to hospital.
A coroner's inquest into Willey's death in 2004 found he died of a cocaine overdose, and noted that his autopsy revealed previous cardiac damage.
But the president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs says his group has only recently viewed a heavily-edited version of a video that raises questions about Willey's death, and they and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association want the raw footage released to the public.
Grand Chief Stewart Phillip says the video shows Willey being pulled from an RCMP vehicle, dragged through the station and being shocked with a Taser several times while lying on the floor, cuffed and bound.
Phillip says the case is similar to that of Robert Dziekanski, who died at Vancouver's airport after being stunned several times by an RCMP Taser.
