Aiding and Abetting Murder

Is there no insistence of responsibility on the part of Correctional Service of Canada or the authorities at Mountain Institution in Agassiz, British Columbia, over the murder of one of its inmates? That murder was one that should have been foreseen. The cellmate of the murdered man had stated flat out time and again, even in newspaper interviews, that nothing would stop him from murdering again.

Murder was a pleasurable indulgence to Michael McGray. He made no secret of it.

And he and his cellmate disliked one another. The cellmate, Jeremy Phillips, feared Michael McGray, a man notorious for having killed repeatedly. And whose psychopathic temper and utter lack of conscience was well known by other prisoners in the institution.

Jeremy Phillips had begged to be separated from Michael McGray. For that matter, Michael McGray made it well known that he was dissatisfied with having a cellmate. He had demanded, in fact, time and again, that he be given a single cell.

It wasn't that there were no single cells available. Even if conditions were crowded at the prison, so that it would be difficult to find a single cell for this man, his isolation from other prisoners should have represented a high priority. But even that wasn't the case; there were cells available.

Prison authorities were simply disinterested in separating the men, in ensuring that McGray did not represent a dire and present threat to other inmates. All of whom, other than the cellmate, whose direct proximity to his nemesis was unavoidable, gave the psychotic murderer wide berth. And anticipated that trouble would follow.

Jeremy Phillips' fear was realized when he was murdered on November 22, 2010 in the cell he shared with McGray. Who confessed to having assaulted Phillips with a ligature he fashioned from a sheet, then flushed down the toilet. Despite the evidence of the confession that simply confirmed what everyone already knew, and the following investigation, no charges have been laid.

A $11-million lawsuit has been filed with the claim that prison staff demonstrated "reckless indifference" and negligence that led directly to the death of Jeremy Phillips. His constant pleas to be removed from the shared cell were steadfastly ignored, despite his obvious fears, well founded and ultimately realized.

Society should care, but we don't seem to.