Smith nonchalant about possible brain, eye damage from tying ligatures

TORONTO – The Ashley Smith inquest is hearing the teenager did not seem to care she could be causing permanent harm to herself by tying ligatures around her neck.

The former head of the Regional Psychiatric Centre in Saskatoon says he saw a nurse explain to Smith that oxygen deprivation could kill brain cells or damage her eyes.

Peter Guenther choked up as he recalled Smith’s response, which was: “Whatever.”

Smith, then 18, was sent to the custodial forensic psychiatry facility in December 2006.

She had been transferred from a prison in Nova Scotia where she was first sent as an adult offender because they couldn’t handle her.

After more than a dozen further transfers, Smith choked herself to death in a prison in Kitchener, Ont.

Guenther, who was effectively the warden at RPC, said Smith presented a level of intensity and sustained level of self-harm that was unlike anything he had ever experienced.

Within days of her arrival from Nova in Truro, N.S., Smith started tying ligatures around her neck, sparking a cycle of forceful interventions.

The assessment was the self-harming behaviour was an attention-getting device, so Guenther’s directive to staff was to be matter-of-fact in removing the ligatures.

“Go out and save life, but save the drama,” he said he told them.

Guenther also discussed his opposition to “very invasive” cavity searches given Smith’s creativity and ingenuity in obtaining ligatures and hiding them in her body cavities.

He said it was not a particularly helpful way to stop her self-harming behaviour.

“You could conceivably do this many times a day,” Guenther testified. “The futility of this occurred to me.”

The now-retired head of RPC also said there were several methods of force used against Smith that were “not inappropriate,” Guenther said.

He did not immediately elaborate.

On several other occasions, including when Smith would kick or spit on guards, use of force was considered appropriate.

“I kicked the officer. Yes I assaulted her. They did what they needed to do so I would stop,” Smith told Guenther after one incident in April 2007.

Smith was sent to the Regional Psychiatric Centre — operated by Correctional Service Canada — because authorities at the prison in Nova believed she would get intensive mental health treatment there.

RPC is the only federal correctional facility that can take female inmates with mental health issues.