Family wants Coroner's Inquest

May 22, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

The final years of Karen Beck’s life were spent living in fear of the man she married and helped raise a family with.
Despite a restraining order, Beck’s husband Richard intimidated her, terrorized her, threatened her life, and ultimately, took it from her.
When Karen’s adult son Robert heard that his father had strangled his mother to death, before setting their Maple Ridge home on fire and hanging himself last November, all he could think was, “He finally did it.”
Robert Beck and his grandmother Phyllis Chichenko, Karen’s mother, held a press conference at the Ridge Meadows Senior’s Centre on Thursday and asked the B.C. Coroner’s Office to conduct an inquest into the case. They feel the RCMP could have done more to protect Karen and hope a coroner’s inquest may recommend steps to help prevent a similar situation from happening again.
“The main reason why we’re here is so we can at least protect some future Karens,” said Robert. “The biggest thing we can do is hope for change, and we can all push for it.”
RCMP still haven’t released their official account of what happened that day, and the file remains open.
In November, police said they were not in a position to offer intimate details of the murder-suicide, and there would be no further information released.
The family claims Karen, 52, suffered for years under her husband’s thumb, and the system let her down.
Some of Richard Beck’s methods of intimidation were subtle, some not-so.
His rifle, for instance, was always kept in the bedroom, in the back of the closet. But some days, the rifle would be right there at the front, taken out of its case for Karen to see, says Robert.
Another time, he held the gun to her head.
Put all your all things in a box, Karen had said Richard told her, where we’re going we won’t need them anymore.
Police were called to the house and confiscated a rifle from Richard, which he gave up willingly.
He was not arrested, though, as RCMP say there was nothing to substantiate criminal charges. The family was told the police could do nothing unless Richard physically harmed Karen.
After 33 years of marriage, she fled the relationship in June 2005 and was referred to the Cythera transition house by RCMP. She filed for divorce shortly thereafter.
The couple were involved in a number of civil suits as Karen tried to force the sale of their house. Although the civil court laid down a restraining order against Richard Beck, RCMP had no knowledge of it, because it was a civil and not a criminal restraining order.
After fleeing to Calgary, where she stayed with family, Karen returned to Maple Ridge, at the urging of her lawyer, to prepare their house for sale after Richard refused to do so.
On Nov. 15, 2007, she visited the home she shared with her husband in the upscale Whispering Falls neighbourhood for the last time, and was murdered by Richard Beck, 54.
Chichenko didn’t think Richard had it in him, she didn’t think he was capable of something so heinous.
“We never thought it would go this far,” she said, her eyes welling with tears.
Robert Beck said his mother did her best to shield the family from their father, but sadly there was no one to shield her from him.
“My mother had a way of protecting all of us, she didn’t want us thinking our dad was an animal,” said Robert Beck on Thursday. “Maybe we didn’t do enough.”
Beck and Chichenko were joined by Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows NDP MLA Michael Sather at the press conference, who said that questions still remain about the RCMP’s role in Karen’s death.
“I think there should have been a criminal charge of harassment against Mr. Beck,” Sather said.
Because Richard Beck never physically assaulted Karen, no charges were laid.
“One of the biggest questions that I got asked by the police officers was, ‘Was your mom ever hurt, or beaten?’ And the answer was, No,” said Beck. “But you never know when that person is going over the edge.”
Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows RCMP Cpl. Ryan Schlecker said, while he sympathizes with the family’s loss, police did all that was within their power
“We work within the laws that we are bound to protect,” said Schlecker. “As police officers, we work within the system. At the end of the day, it’s up to the public to determine what kind of policing system or justice system they want.”
Robert Beck believes better communication between all the agencies involved in his mother’s case could have prevented her death. He hopes an inquest, which does not designate blame, will at least draw attention to this problem, and offer a possible solution.
“If you are in an abusive relationship, run like heck,” said Beck. “Hopefully, we can protect people better in the future.”

Nowhere to Call Home

March 15, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

Everyone makes mistakes, says Pete Johnson, and then you end up out here.
For him, that is the woods behind Catalina Pools and Spas, off the Haney Bypass in downtown Maple Ridge, where Johnson calls home.
On Tuesday, dozens of volunteers scoured local streets, back alleys and shelters looking for people like Johnson, those living without a home in Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows as part of the Metro Vancouver Homeless Count.
While official numbers won’t be released until April 8, many involved with the count said the local numbers were up from the last count in 2005.
“Some people will be shocked with the results,” says David Spears, project manager with Alouette Home Start, who was helping to co-ordinate efforts locally.
Johnson doesn’t need a survey to tell him what he already knows.
“There’s a lot more, a hell of a lot more out here these days,” he says. “A lot people hate it, they don’t want to be out here. They just want a home, but they can’t afford one.”
Johnson has been homeless for more than five years, by choice.
“My wife kicked me out one day,” he says, lying down on a cardboard refrigerator box, sharpening a large metal blade with a whittled whetstone. “She thought I’d come back, but I learned to like it out here.”
Johnson stayed at the Salvation Army shelter for a while, but was asked to leave after getting in a skirmish with his wife, who still stays there.
Rob McGowan stayed at the shelter and was also kicked out. He camps with Johnson now and says he also prefers living in the woods.
“I’m an advocate for freedom,” says McGowan. “It’s a lifestyle.”
Both say they love to sleep under the stars, not having to answer to anyone and doing as they please, but they are not young men any more.
“It’s getting harder and harder,” to live outside, says Johnson. “I’m getting old and I’m sore.”
He is in his 40s and has spent much of his adult life in and out of jail, mainly for parole violations, he says.
“Jail is like a vacation, especially in the winter time. It’s warm, they feed you, and no one messes with you if you don’t mess with them.”
McGowan just turned 50, though his face belies a man who has seen many more years. His coal-grey hands are hard and dirty, and flecked with cuts and scabs. A crescent of ripe pink flesh surrounds the finger nail of his left index finger, it’s clean freshness a sharp contrast to his dark, weathered skin.
“My finger’s all infected,” he says. “So I had to cut away all the rotten flesh.”
McGowan would like to get a place to stay, if he could, but there’s not much available for guys like him.
Most single resident occupancy units are $300 a month, but in Maple Ridge there’s nothing under $500.
“How are we supposed to afford that?” McGowan says.
Johnson has tried to find accommodation, but says he’s always turned away because of his criminal record. Some landlords won’t have anything to do with him because they’ve seen him on the streets, “And they have their own opinions about me.”
The homeless count is an important way to gauge a community’s need for shelters and support, says Spears.
“Essentially, it provides a snap-shot of the homeless situation. If a community shows a need, there will be resources given to them.”
The count also looks to identify trends in homelessness by asking people living on the street what are their reasons for being homeless, how long have they been homeless, where are they from, where they stay at night, and what services they use.
Spears said the definition of a homeless person used in the count is someone who lacks a fixed, regular and/or adequate nighttime residence.
However, the “hidden homeless” are harder to count.
“Someone might have a roof over their head, but no fixed address,” Spears says. “They can’t afford, or don’t have the ability to pay rent, so they’re couchsurfing.”
“Unless they contact us, it’s hard for us to count them.”
Johnson says he talked to the canvassers on Tuesday, but McGowan says he didn’t see them.
In the 2005 count, 42 people were counted as being homeless in Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows, down from 62 in 2002.
Despite the drop in homeless numbers, Sheila McLaughlin, president of the Alouette Home Start Society, says the problem is getting worse, and will keep getting worse until there is more adequate low-income housing in the community.
She’s spearheading a project to construct a three- to four-storey supportive housing apartment complex with on-site outreach staff.
Currently, there is no supportive housing in Maple Ridge.
Her group already has a $5.4 million grant from the Provincial Homelessness Initiative to build the facility, but it is hoping the District of Maple Ridge will provide a site for free.
“That kind of money doesn’t go too far in this construction market,” she said.
Three years ago, Alouette Home Start proposed a similar project on Burnett Street, but that fell through after funding was turned down and neighbours complained.
Salvation Army Captain Kathie Chiu said this year’s numbers at the 18-bed Caring Place shelter she runs were double what they were in 2005, and until there is more affordable housing, those numbers will keep going up.
“No matter how much shelter space there is, there’s still a lack of affordable housing,” Chiu says. “Staying here forever is not an option.”
She says that even if someone gets off the streets and goes into rehab, when they get out, there is nowhere for them to live, and they inevitably relapse.
“It’s a very frustrating cycle.”
She says she supports McLaughlin’s project and hopes this year’s homeless count will help people realize what is happening on the streets.
“Hopefully the community will see what happens without supportive housing and get behind the project.”
Both Johnson and McGowan say they would be interested.
“I think it would help,” says Johnson “It’s just getting crazy out here.”

The Kid is Alright

Jan. 26, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Staff Reporter

Excited murmurs and whispers run through the small crowd of parents gathered in the Gold Rink at the Pitt Meadows Arena to watch their sons play hockey on a chilly Thursday night.
Number 10 is on, and the second his skates touch the ice, what local hockey dads and WHL scouts alike have been saying for months, becomes apparent.
The kid is good.
He takes off, and after only a couple of strides he’s skating at full speed down the boards, chasing after the puck. He glides calmly, and his movements are efficient, showing none of the teenage awkwardness most 14-year-old’s experience.
As the defence collapses in front of the Coquitlam net, he picks up a rebound and wrists it through traffic, somehow finding the back of the net.
It’s not the prettiest goal, but it counts. So did the other 70 goals Connor Sanvido has scored so far this season with the Ridge Meadows Rustlers.
“He’s a special player,” says Tim Knight, coach of the AAA bantam team.
Although Sanvido is only in Grade 9 at Archbishop Carney Catholic School in Port Coquitlam, he is already on his way to career in hockey.
Sanvido first started raising eyebrows last season as a rookie with the AAA bantam Rustlers, when he led them in scoring with 102 points in 67 games. This season, he’s already got 109 points in 46 games.
Jason Ripplinger, head scout for the WHL’s Vancouver Giants, first saw Sanvido’s potential at the Chilliwack Invitational Bantam Hockey Tournament in October.
“His competition level was very high, and he wasn’t scared to get into the dirty areas and fight for the puck,” says Ripplinger.
Which is not surprising, since Sanvido says the player he looks up to the most is the Washington Capital’s high-scoring and hard-hitting star forward Alexander Ovechkin.
Knight also remembers the tournament as being a break-out for Sanvido.
“With his offensive talent, he often gets labelled as one-way player. But in Chilliwack he was finishing his hits, getting in on the back-check, and playing some really good two-way hockey,” he says. “Connor is a hungry player, but he was even hungrier than usual at that tournament.”
But what really sets him apart on the ice is his speed.
“He’s got that second gear and that really helps him out there,” says Ripplinger. “And teams are always looking for someone with hands like that who can score.”
Ripplinger thinks Sanvido will go in the first two rounds of the 2008 WHL bantam draft in Calgary this May, which means he could be going anywhere from Prince Albert, Saskatchewan to Seattle, Washington.
While the hockey player in Sanvido is excited about the prospect of playing in a high calibre league with 20-year-olds, the ninth-grader in him is nervous about the prospect of leaving home.
“It’s so early to be making these decisions,” he says. He wants to play with the Giants in the WHL, but that means forgoing the possibility of an NCAA scholarship and moving away from home. And while going to the BCHL might mean being a little closer to home, he could be hurting his chances of getting drafted into the NHL someday, his ultimate goal.
“I mean, I don’t want to commit to anything too early,” he says.
It can all be a little overwhelming for someone just two years out of elementary school.
For his parents, Bonny and Ray Sanvido, their son is still growing up, and now they are faced with the prospect of being apart from him for eight months of the year.
“Sometimes you feel like you’re losing your kid,” says Ray. “We just have to make the best of our time together before he’s gone.”
Bonny and Ray are at all of Connor’s games, and anything he’s needed along the way they’ve provided. Including giving him the skills to keep his ego in check, says Knight, and that might be his best selling point of all as potential professional hockey player.
“The kind of success he’s having can go to your head if you're not grounded, but Connor’s not like that,” he says. “He doesn’t celebrate his victories too long and he doesn’t mourn his losses too long either. Anyone who’s steady like that can handle adversity”
Knight, who has coached Sanvido for the past four years, credits the player's parents for bringing him up right, and instilling in him a down-to-earth sensibility that he thinks will keep him from getting swept away with all the attention lavished upon professional athletes.
His parents say they are more proud of the focus and hard work he has put into his goal of playing professional hockey than of any of his actual on-ice achievements.
But the one thing his parents have never done, Knight says, is push Sanvido.
“Everything he has ever accomplished is because he wanted it, and he put in the hours and worked for it,” he says.
Sanvido first realized hockey was his future when he was playing in his second year of peewee, and decided he was going to take it seriously. Still in elementary school, he decided to start doing push-ups and working out in his room just to get stronger.
The scouts first started showing up to his games last season, and this season Sanvido’s had to get used to playing in front of crowds who’ve come to see the phenom play.
“I like the crowds a lot, it really gets me pumped up” he says. “I just love playing and I love being on a team, and I love scoring and hitting.”
In addition to playing two to three hockey games every week, weekly practices, and playing on his school’s senior soccer team, Sanvido works out nearly every day, be it dry-land training or lifting weights, or cardio.
And of course, there’s high school.
“There’s not a lot of free time and sometimes my schoolwork suffers,” says Sanvido. “I don’t have a lot of time to study.”
Be that as it may, his parents say his grades are good and he’s doing well in school.
It’s a good thing too. On the Rustlers, poor grades get you a one-way ticket to the bench.
“Our philosophy is that school comes first,” says Knight. “But I don’t think Connor has to worry about being a healthy scratch.”
Having coached a slew of players now playing in the WHL – Garet Hunt, Mike Piluso, and Matt Ius among them – Knight sees similarities between them and Sanvido.
And while Knight says Sanvido’s scoring output and skill level is comparable, what really puts him in their company is his never-say-die attitude and his commitment to the game.
“He’s a game breaker,” says Knight, who was named the Rustlers’ MVP when he played for them in 1994. “When the team is down, he can lift you out of the mud and carry the whole team on his back.”
That attitude has helped the Rustlers to a 29-19-5 record overall this season.
For now, Sanvido will remain at home, with his family, and they are happy for that. He will find out which team he will be joining in the WHL at the bantam draft in May, but will likely start next season with the major midget hockey next season with the local Vancouver North East Chiefs.
In the meantime, he will be representing the Fraser Valley at the B.C. Winter Games in February, and enjoying the fleeting days and months of his childhood as he grows up, perhaps, a little before his time.

A Place to Belong

March 26, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

Some people spend their entire lives looking for where they belong and still don’t find it. But in the dusty town of Ruhengeri, in Northern Rwanda, Cathy Emmerson found her place.
High in the jungle-covered hills, she runs a preschool for the village children, teaching them to read, feeding them and helping in any way she can to better the lives of a people decimated by war and genocide.
It was not long ago Rwanda’s dusty red soil was drenched with the blood of more than 800,000 people, systematically killed during the civil war between the ruling Tutsi minority and the Hutu majority.
It’s pretty much the furthest place you could get from Maple Ridge, but for the former real estate agent, it’s home, and she couldn’t be happier.
“My friends thought I was going through a middle-aged crisis, but they understand now,” Emmerson says. “This is where I belong.”
She first came to Africa four years ago on vacation with friends and travelled to Rwanda to visit the wild mountain gorillas.
She wanted to get off the beaten track, but fell in love with the country and its people.
“I couldn’t get Rwanda out of my mind.”
Within six months, she was back, for good.
For the first year in what was to become her adopted home, Emmerson volunteered with the Imbabazi Orphanage, run by American humanitarian Rosamond Carr.
“Her intention was to retire and then I could take over the orphanage,” says Emerson. “But then she said one day, ‘I’m only 94, I’m just not ready to retire yet.’”
Emmerson then went to Ruhengeri, where she had friends, and opened up a small gift shop to support the local craftspeople and artisans.
However, within a span of weeks, five parents in the town committed suicide after discovering they had AIDS. Close to 40 children were left without parents.
Emmerson brought the remaining parents and children together and asked them what they needed.
The answer was help with the children.
“If a single mother has to go into market to sell produce, the kids would be left alone wandering the streets,” she said. “So that’s kind of how the school got started.”
While primary school is free in Rwanda, there is no preschool available.
Emmerson currently looks after more than 120 children, ages two to six. She teaches them English and French.
They gather daily on plywood benches outdoors, under a tarp if it rains. She is simultaneously a mother, a teacher, a nurse and a cook.
Emmerson hopes to have a permanent preschool facility built by the end of the year, and is planning on building a trade school within the next five to seven years.
“Most children in Rwanda don’t even get a childhood,” she says. “If they get a chance to learn and play, they get a fabulous start to life.”
Emmerson married local businessman, Uwayo Rachid, about 18 months ago. Last year they gave out more than 500 goats to impoverished families.
Goats are a source of income for poor families. They can breed them and within a few years have a herd, which they can then sell.
Emmerson and her husband also built two houses and repaired seven more.
“You can really make a difference here,” Emmerson says. “Give a kid $3 worth of school supplies, and they think you’ve given them the moon.”
To say her time in the Land of 1,000 Hills has put her life into perspective would be an understatement.
Things that once seemed so essential to our survival don’t seem to matter any more, she says. Emmerson has no television, no fridge, she cooks her meals over charcoal in the backyard and if she wants to send an email, she walks into town to use one of Ruhengeri’s two internet cafés.
Thanks to a close relationship with North Province governor Boniface Racugu, Emmerson has been able to identify who needs help the most.
“Everybody looks poor, but the local government knows their community very well,” she says. “There is really good government in Rwanda right now and there are a lot of opportunities to make things better.”

A Lesson in Empathy

March 22, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

Rwanda. Cambodia. Darfur. Armenia. Bosnia. The Holocaust.
In the past 100 years, genocide has left a scar on the face of human history. Man’s inhumanity to man, the willingness to murder those who are different, it would seem, is a uniquely human trait, inherent in all races and cultures.
The cycle of violence has small beginnings. Like ripples in a pond, hatred can spread quickly, and in all directions. But its nature, the stone that causes the ripples, is always the same.
“The second we dehumanize [a group of people], this sort of behaviour becomes acceptable,” says Danielle Zagar.
She is a teacher at Samuel Robertson Technical Secondary and has developed a first-of-its-kind conference for students that deals with the nature of genocide – how it happens, the forms it takes and how it can prevented from ever happening again.
Man’s Inhumanity to Man: An Exploration of Genocide in the 20th Century takes place April 8 to 10 at various locations around Maple Ridge.
Two hundred high school students will take part in the conference. It will feature workshops on online hate groups and child soldiers, on the struggle for reconciliation, as well as film and book studies.
“The main question we ask ourselves us is, why does this happen?” Zagar says. “How can everyday common people do this killing?”
While genocide might not be of interest to all, the importance of the subject cannot be overstated.
As soon as someone becomes alien, she says, or foreign, even different, that can lead to inhumane behaviour. The Jews were insects, as were the Rwandan Tutsis.
Often this behaviour can take root on the playground, in the form of bullying. Children single out those who are different and then torment them.
Empathy is key overcoming this, Zagar says, as is an understanding how their words and actions affect other people.
“I’m hoping kids come away [from the conference] with compassion and understanding, and highly motivated to do something about this,” says Zagar.
Zagar was inspired to organize the conference after attending one on genocide in Toronto this past July, when she met Leo Kabalisa, a school teacher who escaped the Rwandan genocide and shared his story with her.
“He really made an impact on me,” says Zagar. “I could barely look him in the eye knowing what he’d been through.”
The Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre has assisted Zagar in setting up the program and hopes to make it annual event. She has also received a letter of support from retired Canadian Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire, commander of the ill-fated UN peacekeeping mission in Rwanda.
All students participating in the conference will receive a copy of the book Sunflowers, by Holocaust survivor Simon Wiesenthal, which deals a prisoner in a concentration camp who is asked for forgiveness by a dying Nazi soldier.
Among the guest speakers at the conference will be Michael Ettedgui of the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Toronto. He will be giving a presentation on internet-based attempts to deny the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were killed during the Second World War, close to 70 per cent of the European Jewish population.
The conference dove tails with a Global Studies course Zagar has developed. It combines World Religion 12, Comparative Civilizations 12, Sociology 12, and English 11 and 12 into a full-time, semester-long program.
Among the many subjects covered in the program is genocide.
“If we don’t know what has happened in our past, how can we raise citizens to prevent it,” says Zagar.
Diondra Doak, a Grade 12 student in Zagar’s class, says the unit focussing on genocide is terrifying, but necessary.
“You can get numb when you see so much of it,” she says. “Seeing all those bodies, for that minute you think there’s nothing you can do, and you feel powerless.
“But then we talk about it, and we realize that there is something we can do.”
What really frightens Doak, though, is the lack of action being taken to prevent further genocide.
“I think we are a group of students who want to make a difference,” she says. “We’re the next generation, and if anything changes, we’ll be the ones to change it.”
Keaton Riach signed up for the Global Studies program because he wanted to learn more about what his Opa (grandfather) went through in a Nazi concentration camp in Poland.
“He lucked out,” says Riach. “One of the Nazi soldiers helped him escape, and he immigrated to Canada.”
Years later, his Opa, then a successful businessman in Abbotsford, tracked down the Nazi soldier who help him avoid the gas chambers and helped him out financially until his death.
Sometimes Riach imagines what it would be like to go through a similar ordeal.
“I try to, but it’s hard,” he says. “It’s so shocking what happened.”
• Parents and educators are invited to take part in a free workshop on cyber-terror, called Internet Safety for Parents and Teachers: Taking Back Your Computer, April 8 at SRT, 7:30 p.m. To register, call 604-463-4200.

A Miracle in Mexico

June 6, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

Who the hell was calling this early, Stan Smith wondered as he lumbered towards the ringing telephone in the living room.
It wasn’t even eight in the morning, and he had another long-haul job next week. His cup of tea was getting cold in the kitchen, while his wife, Monica, slept soundly in bed.
He picked up the phone.
“Mr. Smith, it’s Sean Nosek, Landon’s principal. How are you?”
“Fine,” Stan answered. “Why?”
“I hate to inform you, but your son has been in an accident.”
Just a week ago they saw Landon off at Vancouver International Airport as he left for an eight-day school trip to Guadalajara, Mexico.
Now he was 3,600 kilometres away, in the Angels of Carmen Hospital, barely alive.
“Moni, get up,” Stan called out. “We have a problem.”
•••
Fourteen boys from Westview secondary’s soccer team, as well as two of their coaches and Nosek, had come to Guadalajara as part of a cultural exchange between the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows School District and the Colegio Once Mexico, a private school for Guadalajara’s elite.
Westview would be offering a soccer academy next year, giving students a chance to play while earning credits towards graduation. Nosek hoped a close relationship with the school could bring an international flavour to the program.
For seven days they had been treated like visiting royalty.
They trained with former Mexican national team member Alberto Coyote, wandered the market squares, were awed by the Guadalajara Cathedral, ate tortas and tacos from street vendors, lounged in the pale violet shade of the jacaranda trees, and fell in love with the city known as the Pearl of the West.
They were billeted with families from the school, and felt like they were part of the community. It was coming up to Holy Week in Guadalajara, so there were plenty of festivities planned.
Just the day before, they were feted at a going away party at Colegio Once. With much of the school collected on the field to bid them farewell, a group of girls came out from the crowd, took them each by the hand and led them in an impromptu salsa dance lesson.
Nosek had never seen smiles as big as the ones he saw that day.
•••
Just shy of 6’3”, Landon was a force on the school’s senior boys’ team, despite only being in the 10th grade. Even though he played centre defence, he scored the Wildcat’s only goal during their exhibition games with the soccer-mad Mexicans.
Now he lay shattered and unconscious in a hospital bed.
He was bleeding internally, and breathing via a respirator. His brain was swollen, and more than 100 stitches pieced his face together.
Early that morning, Nosek had been told that one of his charges had nearly died in a car accident. After rushing to the hospital he prepared to make one of the most difficult phone calls of his life.
The rest of the students and coaches would travel home without him. The family Nosek had stayed with had left on a planned vacation. He was alone in a foreign land, surrounded by strangers, standing vigil over a boy he hardly knew.
•••
Landon struck up an instant friendship with Paul Bojorquez during the time he spent with his family in Mexico. The two were months apart in age; Landon, 15, and Paul, 16, and they shared the common teenage love of soccer and señoritas.
Paul spoke perfect English, and was teaching Landon some Spanish – mainly curse words, but it was a start.
In a few weeks, Paul and his classmates would be coming to Maple Ridge and staying with the Smith family, and Landon looked forward to returning the warm hospitality he received in Guadalajara.
Two nights before Landon was to head home, the pair went to the home of a friend of Paul’s. Oscar was having an impromptu farewell party, with Landon a guest of honour.
At around two in the morning, the pair drove back to Paul’s house, down Guadalajara’s broad, tree-lined streets.
Landon had an upset stomach, so he unbuckled his seatbelt and laid down on the subcompact’s fully-reclined passenger seat to ease the discomfort.
In Guadalajara, where the white road lines are mere suggestions and turn signals are nearly unheard of, late night traffic can be dangerous.
Suddenly, a car swerved into Paul’s lane. The driver either didn’t see him, or didn’t care. Paul swerved to the right to avoid a collision, but over-corrected, jumping the curb and hitting a light standard head-on. The car was totalled.
Paul, who was wearing his seatbelt, suffered little more other than a sore neck.
But Landon wasn’t as fortunate. His unrestrained body was flung into the windshield of the car.
Bloody and broken, he was rushed to the hospital.
Upon hearing of the accident, one of the parents at Colegio Once had him transferred from the over-worked and under-staffed public facility to the state-of-the-art Angels of Carmen private hospital.
Meanwhile, due to Mexico’s justice system which assumes guilt rather than innocence, Paul was taken to jail.
•••
Some time later, outside Landon’s room, sat Paul and his mother Azucena. He had been released from jail on a bond and the promise that the Smiths wouldn’t press charges. The accident wasn’t his fault – he had swerved to avoid another car. No alcohol. No drugs. Just terrible luck.
The Smith family had yet to arrive from Canada, and Azucena prayed quietly, clutching a rosary, just as she had so many years before when her husband had died. He had been murdered, his throat slit for the money in his pocket, and she was left a widow with two young children to raise.
Azucena mourned him. She prayed for strength and guidance, and found it when she directed her prayers to the Virgen de Talpa de Allende.
The centuries-old statue of the Virgin Mary resides in a modest cathedral in a dusty little town not far from Guadalajara. The small, doll-like figure, whose origins are unknown, is believed to grant miracles to those who pray to her.
Azucena had appealed to her those many years ago, and credited the Virgen with her current station in life. Though widowed, her family was happy, healthy, and successful. She worked 14 hours a day as the owner of a laser hair removal clinic to support Paul and his sister Amy. They attended one of the best private schools in the city, and lived in a good neighbourhood.
Now she prayed to the Virgen once more, for this poor boy who was so much like her own son.
It was the next day when the Virgen de Talpa de Allende paid Landon a visit. She came to the hospital on a small wooden cart being pushed by an old man, stooped by age, his brown leathery skin creased with untold stories. On top of the cart sat the 30-inch statue of the Virgen, encased in glass.
Azucena was stunned.
“What are you doing here?” she stammered in Spanish.
“The Virgen told me to come here,” replied the old man. “She tells me where to go and who to look after.”
He explained that during Holy Week, he brings the Virgen to the hospitals of Guadalajara, so that she may perform miracles on the sick.
Azucena explained what had happened to Landon, and how she had prayed to the Virgen. The old man smiled and placed a hand on her shoulder.
“Don’t fear,” he said. “She has never lost a patient.”
The old man wheeled the figure into Landon’s hermetically-sealed room in the intensive care unit.
No one protested. Not the doctors, or the nurses.
The old man prayed.
They all prayed.
•••
It had been 24 agonizing hours since the phone rang at the Smith residence in Maple Ridge.
Their former neighbour, Dan Vargas, who was born and raised in Guadalajara, acted as translator, and they were able to speak with the doctors and quickly organize a flight to Mexico.
Morgan, Landon’s sister, had raced in from Whistler to fly down with the family.
The family arrived in Guadalajara at 6:30 in the morning. When they tried to catch a cab to the hospital, they found the language barrier almost insurmountable. Seeing their distress, a stranger who had been sitting next to them on the plane stepped in and smoothed the way.
Everyone had been so helpful.
But no one could prepare Stan, Monica, and Morgan Smith for what they saw now in the intensive care unit of the Angels of Carmen Hospital.
Their beloved son and brother was unrecognizable.
“Landon, if you can hear me, squeeze my hand,” Monica asked him.
His hand was cool to the touch, and motionless.
One of his lungs had collapsed and filled with fluid, and the doctors feared it could be pneumonia. He might have brain damage, they said, but it was too soon to know if it would be permanent. They had put him in an induced coma until the internal bleeding and swelling in the brain were under control.
Dozens of tubes ran from his body to the humming machines that kept him alive.
I just want him to live, thought Monica as she stared her son. We can work out anything else. Just let him live.
Not knowing what to expect of Mexican health care, the Smiths were relieved. The private hospital was more akin to a five-star hotel, and their son had a team of doctors and nurses working on him around the clock.
The Smiths were joined by Sean Nosek, who had missed them at the airport. He had made sure their son wouldn’t be left alone in a foreign country, and was their link to Landon during the chaos that had followed the accident. His presence was welcome and calming.
•••
As the hours slipped into days, the Smiths and the Bojorquezs continued to stay by Landon’s side, as did Nosek. The six people, former strangers, found themselves brought together by tragedy, and by hope.
The Bojorquez clan was not dissimilar from the Smiths. Both were hard-working middle class families, each had a son and daughter.
Azucena shared with them her prayers, and told them the Virgen could perform miracles.
Stan Smith wasn’t a religious man, but at this point they could use all the help they could get.
Every day that week, the old man came to visit Landon with the Virgen de Talpa de Allende in tow, and every day Landon got a little better.
Anxieties slowly lessened. The swelling was down, the bleeding had stopped and his condition had stabilized.
Monica put her hand to her son’s chest, and felt his heart pounding. His hands, once cold, were warm.
The doctors attributed the remarkable turnaround to Landon’s strong physical condition, but Azucena thought different.
By Good Friday, the doctors felt Landon was well enough to come out of the induced coma.
By Easter Sunday, Landon was awake and speaking.
•••
He doesn’t remember anything.
The ride home. The crash. The next week spent in an induced coma.
What he knows of the accident he has been told.
The last thing he recalls is taking off his seat belt to lie down in the passenger seat.
After that, there’s nothing but blackness and pain.
•••
Two and a half weeks ago, Landon returned to school at Westview secondary, where he is taking half-days until he recovers fully.
The brain damage he suffered proved to be largely non-permanent, and the soft pink scars on his face are barely visible. He is working with a physiotherapist twice a week to rehabilitate the left side of his body which was affected by the trauma to the right side of his brain. He is on medication to control seizures.
Doctors say he won’t be allowed to play competitive soccer for a least a year, but given the rate at which he’s recovering, that could change.
Paul came to Maple Ridge at the beginning of May with more than a dozen of his classmates. He stayed with the Smiths and wants to return soon to stay for a year, and attend school at Westview.
After coming so close to losing their son, the Smiths now find themselves gaining one instead.
Monica wonders, was it all some kind of miracle?
Perhaps.

One more time, for the last time

July 22, 2008

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

Mike Heathfield has been down this road before.
The local fighter has come out of self-imposed retirement more times than Michael Jordan and Brent Favre combined, but this time, he swears, is the last time.
When former Olympic boxer Manny Sobral calls and gives you a chance to box in front of 80 million people in 40 countries around the world, you take it, Heathfield says.
Never mind that he has never boxed professionally before.
Or that he is 50 years old.
On September 5 at the Red Robinson Show Theatre in Coquitlam, Heathfield will fight Alberta boxer Joey Saskatchewan, a man nearly half his age, in a heavyweight undercard bout. The night will be televised around the world by Showtime Boxing.
“This one is for all the guys out there that are my age,” says Heathfield. “Just because we’re 50, doesn’t mean we’re dead.”
The 240-pound heavyweight is no stranger to the ring, however, and those who underestimate him have a tendency to end up on their backs.
Last year, at age 49, Heathfield won the Canadian Toughman Championship in Victoria, and then successfully defended his title last July in Cloverdale.
Prior to that, he had a long and successful career as a Muay Thai kickboxer, and has compiled an impressive 55-2 record in the various fighting disciplines he’s competed in.
“But I’m done after this,” he says.
He’s said that before.
He said in 2005, but a kickboxing loss to Andrew Peterson that saw him receive his first-ever 10-count didn’t sit right with him. A re-match was planned, but Peterson walked away from the sport, leaving Heathfield to fight Michael Dowsett instead.
Again, that fight didn’t live up to his expectations.
Heathfield beat Dowsett on a cut, and it wasn’t the full-tilt battle he was thirsting for.
In 2006, Heathfield again came out of retirement to fight at a charity tournament for good friend and promoter Gerry Gionco.
Gionco’s son Kyle was murdered in his New Westminster home on Dec. 23, 2004, after getting involved with the drug trade. Gionco founded the Kyle Demsey Gionco Foundation to help youth get out of the criminal lifestyle by helping them afford martial arts lessons.
Heathfield, whose own son Zach was barely a year old at the time, couldn’t refuse.
Then in 2007, Heathfield had a chance to fight in the Canadian Toughman Championship, held in Victoria.
“It was out of town so the embarrassment wouldn’t be as bad if I lost,” he says.
To the surprise of many at Bear Mountain Arena that night, he won.
“I was absolutely ecstatic,” he says of the win. “We didn’t know what we were getting into.”
But, once again, Heathfield couldn’t stay out of the ring for long. After being called out as a “paper champion” by fighter Jamie Walton, whom Heathfield was training with at the time, the two squared off last July in Cloverdale, with Heathfield successfully defending his title.
“I used that as fuel,” Heathfield says of Walton’s remarks. “He never really respected my abilities as a fighter, but I showed him.”
He went out on a high. Not only did he defend his title, he did it in front of his son Zach for the first time. It was a fitting end to a nearly 20-year fighting career.
Then the phone rang.
“I feel like I’ve lied to the public, and my fans,” Heathfield says of his many retirements, and subsequent comebacks.
But this time is different.
On Sept. 5, Heathfield has a chance to send a message to the world, that will and skill trump age; that being 50 years old doesn’t matter if you have the heart of a young man beating inside of you.
“I don’t want to fight someone I can walk through,” he says of his last fight. “I want to beat someone who can challenge me, or else it doesn’t mean anything.
“And if he’s better a fighter than me, that’s fine. But if it all goes according to plan, I’ll come out on top.”
It’s been said you can take the man out of the fight, but you can’t take the fight out of the man, and that rings true with Heathfield.
Overweight and awkward as a teenager, Heathfield began lifting weights and working out to escape the torment of the bullies he faced growing up in Montréal.
“I was a short little fat kid,” he said.
That difficult to imagine today.
Heathfield’s hulking frame resembles a comic-book character come to life, his massive muscles and large fists course with a barely contained power.
But this mountain of a man was once made to feel a mouse by the hurtful words of his peers, and he has never forgotten it.
“The bully wants to get you alone, to isolate you and torment you,” he says. “And if you let that happen, you’re going to be miserable.”
But Heathfield found camaraderie in the gyms of his home town, and before long the short little fat kid was six-foot-one, and playing for the Edmonton Eskimos of the CFL.
A trade sent Heathfield to the B.C. Lions, and he has been a Maple Ridge resident ever since.
Today Heathfield speaks to elementary school children about the pain he endured as a child at the hand of bullies.
“You can see in the crowd by the sad faces who is being bullied,” he says.
Stick with your friends, he tells them. They’ll give you strength when you are at your lowest.
Heathfield credits his friends in the martial arts community with helping him cope with the divorce of his wife and mother of his two children two years ago.
“If I didn’t have my boxing, it would have been been a real tough time for me in my life,” he says.
But he has two reasons why he won’t fight anymore, and their names are Zach and Shannon.
“My focus is going to be on my two beautiful children,” he says. “But I know I got that last fight in me.”
His daughter Shannon, 3, runs to his side, in tears. She fell while playing tag with her brother Zach on the gym’s large, padded sparring mat, and Heathfield takes her by the arm and kisses her boo-boo better.
Her blue eyes light up as she scampers away chasing after her brother, the game of tag back on.
“They’re my world,” he says, watching them play. “They’re my whole life.”

Back in the Hunt

Oct.6, 2007

By Robert Mangelsdorf
Maple Ridge News

When the Vancouver Giants poured off the bench to celebrate their first ever Memorial Cup win last May, there was one among them who may have appeared out of place.
There, in the pile of burgundy jerseys, was the number 24.
It was the first time in three months Giants fans had seen since that number in home colours on the ice at the Pacific Coliseum.
Though bedecked in a jersey, the player wore no pads or a helmet, and ran across the ice in his shoes, not skates.
But that Garet Hunt was able to run onto the ice at all was something of miracle.
In a WHL game against the Kamloops Blazers last February, Hunt missed a check on defenceman Jordan Rowley and went flying into the boards at full speed, shattering his femur.
As Hunt lay motionless on the ice, the crowd at the Pacific Coliseum fell silent. Hunt, known for never going down, did just that.
“The first thing I remember thinking about was, ‘Am I going to be OK for the playoffs?’” he says.
The answer was no.
Hunt required surgery to piece together his shattered leg. Where there was once bone now lies a 40 cm titanium rod.
For a player that lives to play hockey, having to sit out the rest of the season and watch his teammates soldier on without him hurt worse than any broken bone.
"It was really hard not to be playing," says Hunt, a Maple Ridge native. "I was shaking the whole time I watched the final."
Since his injury, Hunt has spent nearly every waking moment training to get back in playing form: acupuncture, physiotherapy, massage therapy, cardio training, dry-land training – anything to get himself back on the ice so he can once again hoist the Memorial Cup with his teammates, this time with his skates on.
“I just want to pick up where I left off,” he says. “I want to be the same player and bring the same intensity.”
Hunt credits his quick turnaround to Adam Francilia and the staff of Fitlife Sports Performance in Maple Ridge, who worked after-hours with him to get him back in shape.
“I would not be back this season without their help,” he says. “They really looked after me.”
Hunt is not the kind of player you want to underestimate. Those that do, quickly find themselves lying flat on the ice, asking themselves what just happened.
The 5’8”, 175-pound left winger plays the game of hockey at a speed and intensity rarely seen. No one was surprised when he was voted the Giants most inspirational player last season.
He has a well-earned reputation for being fearless. That much was evident when he went toe-to-toe with 6’5”, 245 pound Blazer Matt Kassian last season, standing his ground where dozens before him could not.
Perhaps it was not surprising that someone who only knows how to play on the edge should get injured so badly.
But the idea of life without hockey is unthinkable to Hunt.
“It’s all I want to do,” he says of playing professionally someday. “I’ll play anywhere.”
Hunt learned to skate at the age of two and was soon playing hockey with his brother Trevor, one year his senior.
There was no league for children that young so Hunt’s father Chris bought ice time for the boys and their friends at 8 Rinks in Burnaby so they could have a chance to play.
Their shared love for the game brought Trevor and Garet to the Chilliwack Chiefs in the BCHL in 2003, and in no time, Hunt’s inspired play caught the attention of Vancouver Giants scouting staff.
While most players would jump at the chance to play major junior hockey, for Hunt it wasn’t so simple.
“It was the hardest decision I’ve ever made,” he says of coming to the Giants. “Me and my brother are best friends and I didn’t want to leave, but it’s been a chance for me to become more independent.”
Hunt has fast become a fan favourite in Vancouver for his gutsy play and his never-say-die attitude.
“I try to play every shift like it’s my last shift,” he explains. “I know what it’s like to be benched, so I go out there and try to make sure that my next shift is always better than my last shift.”
It’s that attitude that’s helped motivate him through his arduous recovery process.
Hunt’s progress even caught the attention of the Vancouver Canucks, who invited him to their rookie prospects camp in September, despite the fact he hadn’t played a game in seven months.
Although he did not make the team, the experience strengthened his resolve to play professionally.
“Putting on that jersey,” he says. “Made me want it so much more.”
That being said, he’s more than happy to be back with his brothers-in-arms on the Giants.
“I feel like I’m part of something special here,” he says of his team. “There’s a real bond with these guys.”
Now in his final year of eligibility, Hunt remains undrafted, but undaunted, in his quest to play professional hockey.
As if to let the world know that he will again be a force to be reckoned with, Hunt dropped his gloves two seconds into the Giants season opener against the Everett Silvertips last month, and squared off against fellow Maple Ridge native and training partner Brennan Sonne.
Take notice, world.
Hunt is back.