INSIDE: Times readers share their memories of the Paramount Pg. 3 November 16, 2010
T U E S D A Y
Soccer whiz kid in U.K. 13 shines YOUR SOURCE FOR LOCAL NEWS, SPORTS, WEATHER & ENTERTAINMENT chilliwacktimes.com
Child advocate blasts ministry
B
ritish Columbia’s child welfare watchdog said she was “horrified” to hear a 15-year-old girl with Down syndrome was left alone with her mother’s rotting corpse for nine days in a mobile home park at Cultus Lake. Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, B.C.’s representative for children and youth, said she is now investigating the case—one of the worst she has heard of. “The fact she was trapped in that home with her deceased mother is
Times carrier alerted trailer park manager
a haunting image,” Turpel-Lafond said. “My emotional response is, ‘Can this be possible?’” Tu r p e l - L a f o n d s a i d s h e i s demanding a face-to-face meeting with Children and Family Development Minister Mary Polak as soon as possible. “I’m considering an unusual step here—issuing an interim report,” she said. “I may issue a report as to
why the ministry did not report this to my office.” Turpel-Lafond said that report could be made public in as little as two weeks. Yvonne Prentice’s death was discovered on Sept. 14 at her trailer at the Cultus Lake Village mobile home park. The discovery of Prentice’s body and her emaciated and malnourished daughter was, in part, instigated by a Chilliwack
Times newspaper carrier, according to a neighbour who asked not to be named. The Times carrier delivered the Sept. 7 paper to Prentice’s trailer and found the Sept. 3 paper still there. He apparently told the manager about this, but nothing was immediately done to investigate. A week later when the carrier delivered the Sept. 14 paper there were then four papers on the stoop, something
that—along with a neighbour who realized he hadn’t seen any activity in a long time—finally triggered someone to look inside the trailer. The park resident who entered the home along with the park manager and found Prentice spoke with the Times on Saturday but did not want his name used. He said when he saw the girl through the window she said “hello” to him. Prentice’s sons Mike and Kevin, say the ministry ignored their See CORPSE, Page 7
Plan is nice, but silence wanted BY PAUL J. HENDERSON phenderson@chilliwacktimes.com
T
Paul J. Henderson/TIMES
MP Chuck Strahl, MLA John Les and RCMP Pacific Region Training Centre officer-inf-charge Chief Supt. Bill Dingwall listen to resident Valentine Tobin’s complaints about the PRTC firing range at a community forum held Saturday.
he RCMP’s Pacific Region Training Centre (PRTC) has a 25-year plan, 29 buildings, 221 hotel rooms, 250 staff members, a 350-seat restaurant, an $18 million budget and provides training for hundreds of Mounties every day. But at a community forum held in the drill hall on Saturday the numbers people were interested in were $25 million and three. That’s the approximate cost of a soundproof firing range at PRTC and the number of years until the long-awaited facility becomes a reality. But even those numbers are far from certain. “I don’t know what the cost will be,” said Chief Supt. Bill Dingwall, See PLAN, Page 6
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