Nearly 15 years ago, in the mid summer of 1999, another elderly man who lived alone at M’Chigeeng was beaten unconscious by thugs who were seeking money from him.
Now Johnny Panamick, likewise an elderly man who lived alone in his community, has been much more severely beaten to the extent that his recovery will take much longer than the incident 15 years ago.
In the most recent case, according to police there are so far no witnesses but the community has responded by coming together in a public meeting which was to have taken place earlier this week.
It’s hard in this situation not also to think of the sad fate of Clarence Lewis who died after he was shot in the head at his Wikwemikong residence just over five years ago at the hands of three individuals, each of whom was convicted of varying charges relating to this crime. Again, Mr. Lewis was an elderly man living alone and, again, the motive for the invasion of his home was money and also the drugs he was thought to have had relating to a surgical procedure he had undergone not long before.
While three examples over a 15 year span hardly represents an epidemic, still elderly people (particularly men) who live on their own in our communities must naturally be concerned about their own safety.
M’Chigeeng and Wikwemikong have been referenced in this commentary because that’s where these unfortunate and tragic events took place. What is also of significant importance is that these same two communities have chosen to deal head-on with drug dependencies within their memberships and that each has established unique drug maintenance and counselling clinics that reflect the local norms.
We know that at least one of these occurrences (the fatality in Wikwemikong) was related to drugs and also that the earlier event in M’Chigeeng was drug related. It’s a fair guess that this same social scourge was a contributing factor in Mr. Panamick’s recent beating.
M’Chigeeng and now Wikwemikong have both adopted “no carry home” policies for community members using their home clinics with respect to the controlled clinical use of methadone and other products designed to replace dependencies on both prescription and street drugs. That is a prudent decision as it means there is no possibility of the substitute treatment drugs being stolen or otherwise misused as the people using them as a part of their treatments are required to make daily trips to their local clinics for their medication.
This is an important step in making these products less available.
But (and we are still assuming that drugs played a big part in the recent beating) it’s important that all of our communities work with police authorities to do our best to make Manitoulin Island a drug-free zone and to encourage penalties for those convicted of trafficking in these anti-social products to be at the same time punitive and instructive.
Punitive because, for some people, removing them from society is the only practical solution.
Instructive because, hopefully for the majority of people involved in this social abuse, they can be taught to see the enormous harm to their communities and themselves their activities result in.
Doubtless, the community meeting at M’Chigeeng that was to take place earlier this week (on Tuesday) will show tremendous support for Mr. Panamick and his family.
But such an event will, in every likelihood, demonstrate the community’s anger towards the perpetrators of this vile action.
What we can also hope will be an outcome will be support for the political will needed to rid the community of drugs and to deal appropriately with those who chose to make a livelihood by helping to create and foster drug dependencies.
This is one of Manitoulin Island’s worst problems just now, just as it is in communities large and small, particularly in Northern Ontario.
It can only be hoped that a terrible incident such as the beating of Mr. Panamick, added to other occurrences of this nature over the years, will result in a tipping point where citizens will be moved to join police and community leaders in a united message of ‘No More!’.
