The province’s police watchdog says it’s investigating police conduct after a man was found dead, floating in a sewage lagoon near Langham, Sask.
The Saskatchewan Serious Incident Response Team (SIRT) opens investigations when a civilian is seriously injured or dies after interacting with on or off-duty police.
This particular incident started on Aug. 24, at about 1:12 a.m. CST.
A Warman RCMP officer turned their emergency lights on to pull over a truck with no tail lights.
The oversight team says the truck didn’t stop, and instead sped off until it was out of sight from the police. The officer reportedly turned their emergency lights off and didn’t chase after the truck.
About 18 minutes later, Corman Park Police Service officers — who had been told about the truck — saw the vehicle driving west on Highway 16 at a normal speed.
The truck then turned off the highway, onto a road. Corman Park police waited a few minutes and drove down the same road to follow the vehicle, without emergency lights on.
The response team says the truck turned off the road and drove into a field, once again out of police sight.
Police were unable to find the truck after that.
It wasn’t until the next morning, when police learned the 18-year-old hadn’t returned home, that they did a search of the area and found the truck partially submerged in the sewage lagoon near Langham, but didn’t find the driver.
On Monday, the 18-year-old driver was found dead, floating in the lagoon.
SIRT says it will release a report to the public on its findings 90 days after the investigation ends.
Langham is about 30 km northwest of Saskatoon.