Sister of man choked on city bus says more mental health services needed

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This article was published 19/10/2017 (2379 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

An incident involving a man who was choked to the point of unconscious on a Winnipeg Transit bus Wednesday afternoon shows the need for more mental-health services, the victim’s sister says.

“Chances are that this man is mentally ill and had a delusion when he attacked my brother,” said Irene Thomas. She said her 45-year-old brother, who is considered a vulnerable person under the Vulnerable Persons Act of Manitoba, has some bruising but otherwise “he’s doing OK.”

Thomas, who is her brother’s legal decision-maker, asked he be identified by only his middle name, Martin.

Martin had just finished volunteering at Winnipeg Harvest and was on his way home to Charleswood when he was attacked Wednesday while riding aboard a Transit bus.

Police said they responded to the Tuxedo Park Shopping Centre area around 1:30 p.m., after being alerted to an allegedly violent man on a public bus. In a news release, police said a man approached a fellow passenger and, unprovoked, choked him to the point of unconsciousness.

A bystander on the bus stepped in to help Martin, who, Thomas said, has an intellectual disability, anxiety and Asperger’s syndrome. “I’m really so grateful that, whoever it was, stepped in and helped,” she said Friday.

The Good Samaritan who tried to intervene was also choked and assaulted, receiving minor injuries, police said.

Thomas said she later contacted police, wondering if her brother, who is 6-1 and sometimes talks to himself, might have said something to trigger such a violent response. Police told her that was not the case, she said. “He was at the front of the bus and this guy started hassling him.”

Martin takes the bus every day and is “bus trained,” Thomas said. “If he’s out in public and people are harassing him, he knows to leave or go get help.”

On Wednesday, when Martin was getting hassled on the bus, he moved, she said.

“He went to the back of the bus and the man followed. That really freaks me out — that it could’ve been worse. This man could have had a knife or a gun,” Thomas said. “It is a concern when you have sibling like my brother out in the community, because he’s very vulnerable. He’s been harassed and ridiculed because he’s an easy target.”

The man who allegedly attacked her brother appeared to be under the influence or had “some delusion going on,” Thomas said she later told. “Obviously, the man was very disturbed.”

Thomas, who volunteered with a mental-health organization when she lived in the Maritimes, wonders if the alleged attacker had been receiving any neccessary help.

“This should not be about getting more law and order on Transit buses,” said Thomas. “This should be about getting mental-health services to people who need them and are not getting them… These people need advocates. Cutting mental-health services is not a quick-fix solution. It is complicated and underfunded. It is challenging. Mental health and mental illness are challenging.”

Joseph James McKay, 43, of Winnipeg has beed charged with two counts of assault and failing to comply with a probation order.

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca