Ashley Smith suicide prompts probe into other prison deaths

From The Toronto Star by Diana Zlomisitc

The federal prison watchdog is probing two more "troubling" inmate deaths, which he says question the correctional service's ability and willingness to prevent suicides in the wake of the Ashley Smith case.

"There have been subsequent deaths in custody, which I'm investigating – a couple of which are very troubling and which reflect some of the same failings we found in Ashley Smith's death," Howard Sapers, the federal correctional investigator, told theToronto Star.

Smith, 19, killed herself in 2007 at a Kitchener prison for women. A recent Star story detailed how her developing mental illness went untreated and how guards watched as she strangled herself in a segregation cell. MORE HERE