Family reacts to inquest deeming Myles Gray’s death a homicide

It’s been a rollercoaster of emotions for the family of Myles Gray for nearly eight years, but they’re feeling some relief after a coroner’s inquest jury classified his death at the hands of police as a homicide.

“It felt incredibly validating,” Melissa Gray tells CityNews. “This is what we knew all along but to just have that truth be out there feels good. It validates his character. They killed him. They murdered him, essentially,” adds Gray’s sister.

“I knew my brother’s character, but I wanted everyone else to know.”

She feels the process to get to this point took too long.

“I was always like, ‘What is going on? Eight years?’ And then every few years, a few little details would come out and then it would just crumble us and then it felt like it got swept under the rug and then another year, a few more little details and I could never make sense of the [process].

“It’s been awful. Even talking about it, I always felt like I had to defend my brother. ‘He died and the cops did this, but just so you know he wasn’t a bad person.’ I always had to feel like I had to justify. Why did I have to do that? I knew my brother’s character, but I wanted everyone else to know.”

Gray says the ups and downs of the last several years have taken a toll on his loved ones. “Eight years later, here we are. The truth is coming out, the injuries, what happened to him, how this was so unnecessary. It’s been a very crazy process.”

“…A few little details would come out and then it would just crumble us.”

The jury did make three recommendations, including having all Vancouver Police Department (VPD) patrol members outfitted with body cameras that have audio recording capabilities and to review and enhance the department’s de-escalation and containment training.

Gray says despite those suggestions, she doesn’t feel confident another person won’t lose their life the way her brother did.

The coroner’s inquest jury made three recommendations towards the Vancouver Police Department regarding Myles Gray’s death. (BC Coroners Service)

“There needs to be more than recommendations. These officers should have been criminally charged. I don’t know what’s going to happen with that but at the very least… they all need to lose their jobs.”

Gray says despite the pain of losing her brother and going through this process, she feels a weight has been lifted off her now the details around his death have been made public.

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“Knowing his toxicology came back negative for substances. Knowing that he was killed in police custody, that is a weight off my shoulders. My brother is not coming back but I don’t want this to happen to somebody else who was vulnerable or somebody else who is suffering.

“[The VPD] need to be compassionate to these people. These people didn’t choose to have mental health disorders and so they need to work with that — the whole police department, because what has happened has been an incredible embarrassment.”

Gray says the conclusion has left her feeling doubts about police capabilities.

“I have zero faith in police. And I know they say, ‘Well, it’s just a few bad apples.’ Then there needs to be some big change to get these ‘bad apples’ out of there and clean things up.”

The 33-year-old died in August 2015 following a confrontation with Vancouver Police along the Burnaby-Vancouver border. He was beaten by officers and his injuries included a broken eye socket, nose, voice box, ruptured testicles, and a lot of bruising.

Over the course of two weeks, more than 40 people testified at the inquest including firefighters, paramedics, use-of-force experts, a forensic pathologist, and the VPD members on scene. Near the end of his testimony, one officer broke down in tears and apologized to the Gray family.

–With files from Michael Williams