A coroner’s inquest into the death of a missing young Indigenous woman in Metro Vancouver is set to begin next month, four years after her body was found. Twenty-year-old Tatyanna Harrison was reported missing on May 3, 2022. Her remains were found on a dry-docked yacht in Richmond the previous day, but would not be identified until months later. B.C.’s chief coroner announced last year he was reopening the investigation into Harrison’s death and calling an inquest, the date of which has now been set for July 2. “An inquest will provide an opportunity for a broad, open and transparent review of the circumstances related to Tatyanna’s death, and my hope is that the jury will be able to make meaningful recommendations that will prevent similar deaths from occurring in the future,” Dr. Jatinder Baidwan said in a statement on May 6, 2025. In addition to making recommendations, juries in coroner’s inquests can make a verdict classifying a death as accidental, natural, suicide or homicide, but they cannot assign blame. Read more: B.C. coroner orders inquest into death of Tatyanna Harrison The woman’s mother, Natasha Harrison, has spent four painful years not knowing what happened to her daughter. “Four years is a long time to wait to get basic answers on the death of your child,” she told CTV News earlier this year. She said police informed her Harrison’s death was not considered suspicious, despite her being found naked from the waist down. An early coroner’s report attributed her death to fentanyl toxicity, but it was later determined to be caused by sepsis. In February, the Office of the Police Complaints Commissioner found that two Vancouver officers—whose names have not been made public—committed misconduct during their response to Harrison’s disappearance. It found one officer omitted several risk factors in his initial assessment, including Harrison’s Indigenous identity, transient lifestyle, mental health history and drug use. The other officer was found to have failed to review, or document a review of the investigator’s risk assessment report before recording the missing persons case as “not high risk.” Read more: Police watchdog finds misconduct by two VPD officers in Tatyanna Harrison case The inquest is scheduled to take place at 9:30 a.m. at the Burnaby Coroners’ Court and will be livestreamed online. With files from CTV News Vancouver’s Becca Clarkson
