If the authorities had not arbitrarily determined that keeping Ashley Smith on segregation status was an appropriate recourse. If she had received the evaluation and follow-up care that her condition urgently required. If someone had paid attention to the cries for help, in the form of recurring, self-injuring behaviour.She might still be alive. Canada's correctional investigator Howard Sapers says in his report released today that
... Ashley Smith's death followed "the inability of federal and provincial health-care and correctional systems to provide her with the care, treatment and support she desperately needed."
"None of the systems, programs and professionals that Canadians would reasonably expect to have been made available to help this young woman were there to adequately respond," ... "Her death, we believe, if not for a series of significant failures, was entirely preventable."
Her death was entirely preventable. If someone - anyone in the system - had listened to her with empathy, instead of judging her incorrigible.
