REGINA — The aunt of a woman who died after falling down a hotel laundry chute says a report critical of the investigation raises questions about how Regina police have reviewed other sudden deaths.
Delores Stevenson also says she believes assumptions were made about her niece because she was an Indigenous woman.
Nadine Machiskinic was found severely injured in the laundry room of Regina's Delta hotel in 2015 and died in hospital.
Police said evidence did not point to someone being criminally responsible for her death.
The force recently released an RCMP review of the investigation.
The report said the investigation did not meet professional standards, and it made 14 recommendations to improve how officers deal with similar cases.
Police have said many of the recommendations have been implemented and a new approach to case management is to be in place later this year.
Stevenson says the report validates her concerns that the investigation into her niece's death was flawed.
She says the recommendations and changes are important, but they do not address concerns of other families who have had loved ones suddenly die.
An inquest heard it was more than 60 hours before police were called about Machiskinic's death and more than a year before police issued a public appeal for information about two men shown on surveillance video with someone who appeared to be Machiskinic.
Officers took four months to send for a toxicology report.
The coroner initially ruled the cause of Machiskinic's death could not be determined, but later changed it to accidental.
A jury at a coroner's inquest last year changed the ruling back to undetermined. That finding prompted the police chief to ask RCMP to review the Regina force's investigation.
