The Abdirahman Abdi inquest is being livestreamed during the day here.
More than eight years after 38-year-old Somali-Canadian Abdirahman Abdi died following a violent altercation with Ottawa police, a four-week coroner’s inquest is diving back into the circumstances of his high-profile death.
The constable who punched Abdi in the head while trying to handcuff him was acquitted of manslaughter in 2020, and the family settled a lawsuit with police later that year.
So what’s left to unpack?
Lots, according to the inquest’s statement of scope, especially when it comes to the police service’s policies and training on everything from use of force to anti-Black racism.
The fact-finding mission is also looking at what happened before the encounter including Abdi’s background and his struggle with mental illness, as well as the event’s aftermath.
The fully virtual inquest began Nov. 18 and is expected to last 21 days or more. At its conclusion, five jurors pulled from the Ottawa region will likely present a list of non-binding recommendations for how to prevent deaths like Abdi’s in the future.
Inquests are not criminal proceedings but are more free-ranging in their lines of inquiry than trials.
Here’s a guide to what’s been learned so far — and what we can expect next.
Day 1: A rare glimpse into Abdi’s past
Through a lawyer, Abdi’s loved ones delivered an opening statement cataloguing the emotional toll suffered by his family — including a daughter born seven months after his death.
The inquest then heard from its first witness, a psychiatrist who was visiting Ottawa and who happened to be one of the civilians to come in contact with Abdi before police stepped in.
Day 2: What led police to Abdi
Officers were responding to calls that Abdi had groped women in his Hintonburg neighbourhood.
An off-duty paramedic gave his account of the chaotic moments before police arrived.
Day 3: Former constable testifies
David Weir, the first officer to try to arrest Abdi, told the inquest that July 2016 day is the reason he’s no longer working as a police officer.
“This call has been traumatic for me, and still is to this day,” Weir said.
Day 4: Weir and Abdi family lawyer spar
Weir accused Lawrence Greenspon, an Abdi family lawyer, of trivializing parts of his testimony, while Greenspon dug in on the issue of de-escalation.
Under later questioning by an advocacy group for people in police-involved incidents, Weir said he was not aware anti-Black racism is a systemic issue in policing.
Day 5: Montsion breaks his silence
Const. Daniel Montsion didn’t testify at his own criminal trial, but did offer his first public account of the Abdi arrest to close out the inquest’s first week.
“It was on my mind that this might be a mental health call,” Montsion said, later adding that with Abdi being, in his view, assaultive, “it was past that point.”
Day 6: Tension and confusion at the hospital
The second week kicked off with a family friend who documented the altercation’s aftermath on video and fought for the family’s need to say a final prayer for Abdi as he lay in hospital.
The ICU doctor in charge of Abdi’s care then talked about a lack of information from police around the circumstances of what brought Abdi to the hospital.
Day 7: A view from within
The lone witness was Carla Shipley with Unity Housing, the group that operates the apartment building where Abdi and his family lived. Weir and Montsion grappled with Abdi outside its front entrance.
Most residents are from marginalized and racialized communities, and tenants have resisted increased police presence and the idea of having an Ottawa police representative sit on Unity’s board, Shipley said.
Shipley has also heard from some Ottawa police officers since Abdi’s death that they’re concerned about going to the building because they fear the residents will not work with them.
“It’s definitely a very strained relationship,” she said.
Day 8: The paramedic and the psychiatrist
The advanced care paramedic who took Abdi to the hospital said he did not recall police telling him about Montsion’s blows to Abdi’s head during the chaotic aftermath of Abdi’s arrest.
The back half of the day then took an intensely personal swerve into Abdi’s mental health history in the months before his death.
Day 9: Abdi’s meds and new 911 call training
The last psychiatrist to treat Abdi filled in one of the last remaining narrative gaps on offer at the inquest, which has transitioned to a new phase focused on testimony from experts and institutional representatives.
The operations manager of the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) communications centre, which takes 911 calls and relays information to the officers who respond to those calls, said the police service is preparing to roll out new training in early 2025 for how to “deal better” with calls that involve mental health.
Day 10: How to help those like Abdi
At the end of its second week, the inquest heard from the Ottawa Guiding Council for Mental Health and Addictions that, while some systemic changes have taken place since Abdi’s death, they wouldn’t have applied to people in Abdi’s situation on the day of his arrest.
Some programs might have been of aid to Abdi in the months before his arrest, a senior paramedic helped show.
Day 11: Inside Ottawa police’s mental health unit
The sergeant who leads the force’s mental health unit outlined plans to expand the group, which is still the same size as it was when it launched over two decades ago.
The senior OPS official tasked with handling public outcry after Abdi’s death then began his testimony, which will carry over into Day 12. He recounted how, since 2020, officers filling out use-of-force forms must note their perceptions of a person’s race.
Who’s left to testify
At least two witnesses — one of the civilians who saw part of the altercation, and one of the two paramedics called to the scene by police — have already been dropped.
Here are the remaining witnesses still expected to testify. This is not to say they will testify in this order:
- An expert in psychiatry.
- An Ontario Police College instructor.
- Several members of the Ottawa Police Service including Deputy Chief Steve Bell and a superintendent who will discuss training on “intercultural competence.”
- Also on tap from Ottawa police: The sergeant who purchased the reinforced gloves Montsion used when striking Abdi, and a sergeant who will talk about the internal police review into the Abdi incident.
- An expert pathologist to help jurors work through Abdi’s manner of death. They have five choices: natural causes, accident, suicide, homicide and undetermined. It could get complicated.
- A member of the Empowerment Council, a group that represents people struggling with their mental health.
- An expert on use-of-force data.
- A representative of the Ottawa Police Services Board, the police force’s oversight body.
After the testimony
Lawyers representing Abdi’s family, police, the board and other interest groups will pitch their ideas to the jury and make closing remarks.
The jury will then retire, decide on, and announce the manner of Abdi’s death and the final slate of recommendations for how to prevent others from meeting the same fate.
Key texts
A number of exhibits are being submitted and helping inform the inquest testimony. Here’s a link to some of the major ones, along with a decision that hovers over the proceedings: the judge’s written decision of non-guilt in Montsion’s manslaughter case.