Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU) has released more information about the police chase that ended in a crash that killed four people on April 29, 2024, in Whitby. They report that a three-month-old baby was killed along with his grandparents, a 60-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman, both visiting from India.
The baby’s parents, a 33-year-old father and 27-year-old mother, were in the same vehicle and were both taken to hospital for treatment. The mother was treated for serious injuries. The parents and baby were identified as residents of Ajax, Ontario, outside Toronto.
The 21-year-old driver of the pursued vehicle was pronounced dead at the scene. A 38-year-old male passenger was transported to hospital for treatment of serious injuries.
A police radio recording, broadcasting conversations between officers and a dispatcher on an Ontario Provincial Police Highway Safety Division communication channel, reportedly includes a caution from an officer that someone was going to get hurt during the chase: “Comms center if we could pass on, just want to make sure the Durham sergeant’s aware that they’re driving the opposite direction. Someone is going to get hurt.”
CTV News safety analyst and former OPP commissioner Chris Lewis has come out to say it is “hard to understand the actions of police, especially given that it stemmed from a minor robbery.” In his view, “It’s pretty tough ever to justify continuing to chase like that, in that fashion, in any circumstances.”
According to Lewis, “The sergeant or higher, the people on the (communications) centre, the senior officers on the road – they can call it off at any time, and the constables have to stop immediately. So if, in fact, that didn’t happen, the big question is, why wasn’t it called off? If it did happen, and why did it continue?”
The SIU has designated two officers as subject officers being investigated and four designated as witness officers. It has assigned seven investigators, one forensic investigator, and one collision reconstructionist to the case.