Nunavut man shot by Winnipeg police was in ‘really sad’ situation, judge said days before his death

Warning: This story includes details about a suicide attempt and violence.

A man shot and killed by Winnipeg police earlier this week was from Nunavut and is being remembered as a proud Inuk who craved connection and needed help to overcome his violent past.

Jordan Charlie, 24, was released from custody in Manitoba on Nov. 19 after he pleaded guilty to assault with a weapon, possessing a weapon for a dangerous purpose and three other related charges for incidents that happened this year, court recordings reviewed by CBC News reveal.

The Inuk man from Taloyoak, Nunavut, was brought to Manitoba to serve time at the Stony Mountain Institution north of Winnipeg, court heard, after he was sentenced to 4½ years in federal prison in September 2019 for two unprovoked attacks that took place in Yellowknife earlier that year.

Charlie’s mother confirmed to CBC News that he was the person fatally shot by police at a bus shelter in the parking lot of Winnipeg’s Unicity Shopping Centre on Sunday night.

Lucy Angnakok, who met Charlie through her work at Tunngasugit Inuit Resource Centre in Winnipeg, said she last heard from him during his most recent incarceration and brought him Inuit food that he’d asked for.

He mentioned to Angnakok that he wanted to get treatment for drug addiction and find a job, but she also remembers he was proud to speak some Inuktitut and to connect with other Inuks in Winnipeg, she said.

“I think he was overly independent. He knew he needed help, but he would often mention that he’s going to wait until he’s ready,” Angnakok said.

“I would always just remind him that, when he is ready, that I’m here to help, and unfortunately that never came. Like, he was never ready.”

Winnipeg police said Charlie had an edged weapon, but didn’t drop it when officers told him to, and video posted to social media shows him taking a couple of steps toward the officers before they shoot him.

Police said he stabbed another officer in the neck before guns were drawn.

The Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba, which examines all serious matters involving police in the province, is now investigating Charlie’s killing.

String of charges in Winnipeg

Last week, Catherine Rogers, Charlie’s defence lawyer, told Manitoba provincial court Judge Don Slough that he had no way to return to Nunavut after his release from Stony Mountain.

“He’s essentially been stuck in Winnipeg for about a year,” she said. “He’s been transient during that time. He’s been either sleeping rough or staying at the shelter. He doesn’t have any resources here or any support.”

Court heard Charlie was charged with assault with a weapon after slashing a security guard’s hand with a knife at Winnipeg’s Health Sciences Centre in February. He had been intoxicated when he was placed on a resuscitation bed at the hospital and pulled a knife out of his pants.

He was charged with possessing a weapon for a dangerous purpose at the end of April, after he refused to get off a transit bus at the end of its route in downtown Winnipeg, and police officers found a seven-inch retractable saw in Charlie’s pants pocket, Rogers said.

Three months later, Charlie was riding his bike in the Seven Oaks neighbourhood when he fled from police officers who were investigating a stabbing nearby, and he was charged with breaching a probation order after officers found a kitchen knife on him, she said.

Slough sentenced Charlie to six months, time he’d already served, as well as 18 months of supervised probation for the 2024 charges.

Rogers said Charlie would return to a homeless shelter upon his release, but that he had connected with Manitoba’s public trustee and other supports he could access once he was out.

“The eventual plan is to get him back up to Nunavut,” she said. “Unfortunately, he doesn’t have a lot of good family supports there, either.”

Charlie attempted to end his life while he was at Stony Mountain, after “depression got the better of him,” Rogers said.

“The period of time where his brain was without oxygen has resulted in some lasting brain damage, and he has some issues with his memory,” she told Slough.

“This is really sad,” Slough said at the end of the hearing.

“I suspect Mr. Charlie didn’t start out with the easiest upbringing or life, and now as the result of a suicide attempt, there’s more damage.”

The judge told Charlie that the public trustee would be notified of his release.

“Hopefully they can give you some help, so good luck, Mr. Charlie,” Slough said at the end of the hearing.

“Thank you,” Charlie replied quietly.

Charlie’s upbringing was marred by addictions, physical violence, witnessing sexual violence, as well as intergenerational effects of residential and day schools. He also was sent to a range of group homes and foster homes, says a Parole Board of Canada decision from 2023.

He also had a history of self-harm, behaviour Charlie’s case management team described as a “maladaptive and impulsive method of seeking connection and affirmation” as he was cared for by staff, which was likely due to the lack of caregivers during his childhood, the decision says.

‘High level of impulsivity, instability’

A psychiatric risk assessment in 2022 found that Charlie had chronic mental health issues and other conditions, such as fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, a traumatic brain injury, intellectual disability and low cognitive function, the parole board said.

“Your mental health contributes to high level of impulsivity, instability and has contributed to your involvement in criminal activity,” the parole board told Charlie in its decision.

Substance abuse impacted his mental health and he used violence to deal with conflict, the board said.

The parole board also outlined the two separate attacks that led to Charlie being sent to Stony Mountain: he stabbed another man in the neck and later beat a jail guard.

Charlie approached the stabbing victim at random in Yellowknife in March 2019 and stabbed the man in the neck with a four-inch curved knife, the decision said.

Two months later, while Charlie was being held at Yellowknife’s North Slave Correctional Complex for the stabbing, he turned on a guard while being escorted back to his cell after a video court appearance.

“You continued to punch the officer in the face over 20 times, knocking his head against the wall and causing him to fall to the ground. You repeatedly assaulted the victim until assistance arrived,” the board said, adding the guard suffered physical and psychological harms.

After being given credit for time he had served awaiting sentencing, Charlie had three years and eight months left on his sentence for the two attacks.

The parole board revoked Charlie’s statutory release and ordered him to remain in a halfway house in an undisclosed location for the final third of his sentence, because they had “little confidence” that his behaviour out in the community would be “any different but unmanageable.”