Investigations into Robert Dziekanski’s life before his fateful encounter with four RCMP officers at Vancouver International Airport are irrelevant, said lawyers for the family and the Polish government yesterday.
Walter Kosteckyj, the lawyer for Dziekanski’s mother, Zofia Cisowski, said the strategy by the officers has been to deflect attention from their actions to focus on the victim, who died after he was Tasered by the RCMP at the airport.
“They’ve demonized Mr. Dziekanski and made him responsible for what happened to him at an international airport, where we’re supposed to have facilities to welcome people from around the world,” Kosteckyj said.
For a second day, the Braidwood Inquiry heard video-link testimony from friends of Dziekanski who knew him in Poland.
Lawyers for the RCMP officers have questioned whether Dziekanski was an alcoholic. But Ryszard Krasinski, a friend of the Polish man and his chess partner and fellow gardener, said he had never seen Dziekanski drunk to the point of being unable to walk.
