VANCOUVER - Robert Dziekanski's mother says four RCMP officers acted with malice and used excessive force when they confronted her son at Vancouver's airport and stunned him multiple times with a Taser.
With the two-year anniversary of his death approaching, Zofia Cisowski filed a lawsuit this week against the four officers, the federal and provincial governments, and the Vancouver airport, where Dziekanski died in the early morning of Oct. 14, 2007.
The lawsuit alleges nearly everyone involved failed Dziekanski in some way.
"We had hoped to avoid the necessity of doing that, but . . . there hasn't been any interest at all in a settlement," Cisowski's lawyer, Walter Kosteckyj, said Thursday outside an ongoing public inquiry into Dziekanski's death.
"If punitive damages shouldn't be awarded in this case, what case calls out for them?"
The statement of claim, which contains allegations that haven't been tested in court, alleges the four officers "assaulted" Dziekanski with multiple shocks from a Taser.
"Mr. Dziekanski died as a result of injuries he sustained in the assault and physical restraint by the RCMP members," says the statement of claim filed on Wednesday.
The officers were called to the airport after Dziekanski began throwing furniture in the international terminal. The lawsuit notes that the Taser was fired within seconds of their arrival.
Dziekanski then needed immediate medical attention, the lawsuit says, but the officers did nothing to help him.
No one named in the lawsuit has filed a statement of defence but the officers testified at the public inquiry that they felt threatened by Dziekanski when he picked up a stapler.
The lawyer for Const. Kwesi Millington, the Mountie who fired the Taser, said he hadn't seen the lawsuit but repeated what he has already told the public inquiry.
"My position remains . . . my client and the other officers acted in accordance with their training -- the evidence supports that," Ravi Hira said outside the hearings, noting that he hasn't been retained to represent Millington in a civil case.
"It is a tragic outcome, but the outcome doesn't drive the desire or the necessity to blame or find fault."
The Crown did not charge Millington, Const. Bill Bentley, Const. Gerry Rundel and Cpl. Benjamin (Monty) Robinson, saying they acted with reasonable force in the circumstances.
The lawsuit also alleges the airport and federal border officers failed Dziekanski by not providing translation services or adequately helping him when he was making his way through customs or after he began throwing furniture in a public area.
These officials also failed to provide Cisowski any "meaningful" assistance, the lawsuit says.
Airport staff told her they could not give her any information about her son, and a border officer eventually told her Dziekanski wasn't in the airport. She drove back to her home in Kamloops, B.C., while her son was still waiting inside the customs area.
The Justice Department was served with the statement of claim Thursday morning, but a spokeswoman said the department wouldn't be commenting.
The airport's lawyer also declined comment, saying he hadn't yet seen the statement of claim.
Cisowski is seeking unspecified punitive damages for the death of her son.
Kosteckyj acknowledged it is "very difficult" to convince a Canadian court to award punitive damages, but he said the evidence uncovered by the inquiry will help his case.
While witnesses are protected from having their testimony at the hearings used against them in court, he said he can ask for any of the evidence provided during discovery for the inquiry.
"I think the evidence has been pretty straightforward and ample," he said of the hearings that have continued on and off for nine months.
No date has been set for the case. Kosteckyj said he doesn't expect a hearing before the inquiry commissioner issues his final report on Dziekanski's death, which isn't expected to be made public until early next year.
Cisowski's lawsuit is just the latest court case to be connected with Dziekanski's death -- two others are already underway regarding the inquiry.
Three of the RCMP officers are appealing an earlier decision that found the inquiry can make findings of misconduct against them.
And Taser International, the weapon's U.S.-based manufacturer, is challenging the findings of Commissioner Braidwood's report from the first phase of the inquiry, held last year examining Taser use in general. It concluded Tasers can kill.
