Winnipeg police saw Tina Fontaine but let her go : family says

Tina Fontaine, the Manitoba girl whose murder sparked renewed calls for a national inquiry into missing and murdered aboriginal women, encountered multiple first responders the day before she disappeared.

Details continue to emerge about the 15-year-old’s last known hours on Aug. 8, nine days before her body was found in a bag pulled from Winnipeg’s Red River. According to police and Fontaine’s family, Fontaine had contact with police officers, paramedics, hospital staff and a children’s aid worker shortly before she was reported missing for the final time.

“And I just found out today that they’ve known for three weeks prior to them telling me (Wednesday),” said Thelma Favel, the great-aunt who raised Fontaine, in an interview Thursday with APTN National News.

Favel is also shocked that Fontaine was hospitalized later that same day after being found unconscious in a city alley. After spending about 4 hours in the Children’s Hospital, Fontaine was released into the custody of a child & family services worker. She then escaped from the worker.

But Favel had no idea about Fontaine’s hospitalization until a $500 ambulance bill arrived at her home on the Sagkeeng First Nation. Favel says the bill arrived shortly before the family buried Fontaine’s ashes on September 20.

“I got it on a Thursday and we buried her ashes on Saturday. And then I got this bill, “Favel said. “and it’s for $500 and it says where she was picked up and where she was taken.”

Agencies/APTN/Canadajournal