VANCOUVER \u2014 One of the Vancouver officers who responded to the scene after a man was beaten by police in 2015 faced questioned of discrepancies between notes he took that day and how he describes the situation more than 10 years later.<\/p>\n
Const. Chris Bowater told a public hearing Friday that he saw Myles Gray in the “recovery position” on his side, unconscious but breathing. <\/p>\n
Under questioning from hearing counsel Brock Martland, Bowater said there were no officers on Gray’s back, however his notes include a reference to Gray regaining consciousness and “lifting members off back”<\/p>\n
Martland asked Bowater to explain how Gray could be lifting police off his back if he was in the recovery position on his side. <\/p>\n
“At this time, after ten and a half years, I don’t remember why I wrote what I did, but nobody was on his back,” the officer said.<\/p>\n
The inquiry, held by the Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner, is looking into the actions of several Vancouver police officers who had a violent encounter with Gray before he died. Police were originally called to a complaint of a man who sprayed a woman with water from a garden hose.<\/p>\n
Bowater, who has experience as a paramedic, told the inquiry that if he had seen anyone on Gray’s back in such a way that it would have interfered with his breathing, he would have moved them.<\/p>\n
“I did not tell anybody to get off his back because nobody was on his back.”<\/p>\n
Bowater told the inquiry on Thursday that Gray began grunting, swearing and spitting, as two officers restrained him.<\/p>\n
He said Gray made a “fast twist” out of the officer’s grip and “put himself face down into the grass”<\/p>\n
When Gray stopped breathing, Bowater testified that he began chest compressions until he was relieved by a Burnaby firefighter.<\/p>\n
Const. Kyle Dent testified Friday that he arrived in the area about two minutes before Gray stopped breathing and that he held his left elbow.<\/p>\n
Dent said Gray was on his stomach with two sets of handcuffs and was rocking back and forth and breathing heavily.<\/p>\n
He described Gray as “incredibly strong,” and said he had enough strength to lift up even as the officer applied downward pressure. <\/p>\n
That went on until it “just abruptly stopped,” he said. <\/p>\n
Dent said he couldn’t say with confidence whether any of the other officers on scene were putting pressure on Gray’s head, neck, or upper back.<\/p>\n
“I can say when I was looking at his upper body that nobody was on it. But after I left and then held the elbow I didn’t focus on any other body parts until the time that he had to be moved,” he said.<\/p>\n
Dent told the inquiry he is familiar with “positional asphyxiation,” where someone can be put in a position where they struggle to breath. <\/p>\n
He said if he saw something concerning that day he would have said so or made note of it, but nothing he saw suggested that problem.<\/p>\n
A coroner’s inquest in 2023 heard that Gray was left with injuries including a fractured eye socket, a crushed voice box and ruptured testicles.<\/p>\n
Other testimony heard on Friday included that of Const. Brian London, who said he arrived on the scene after ambulances were already there.<\/p>\n
He said from what he heard broadcast over the police radio on his way, the situation sounded “chaotic” and like “nothing was under control.”<\/p>\n
London said when he arrived he saw Const. Kory Folkestad standing by an ambulance appearing to be in a daze and that Folkestad told him he had been punched. He said Const. Nick Thompson was holding a piece of gauze to the top of his head.<\/p>\n
London said he walked to where Gray was being held and saw him on his belly on the grass while one officer had a knee “across his bum or thighs.”<\/p>\n
He said Gray was “grumbling, growling. I could see he was kicking his feet.” <\/p>\n
He told the hearing that he also spent time in an ambulance with Const. Hardeep Sahota and she appeared “quite scared.”<\/p>\n
“I believe she either almost started crying or crying a couple of times and she did make a couple statements that she felt like she was going to die,” he said.<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 27, 2026<\/p>\n
Ashley Joannou, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"VANCOUVER \u2014 One of the Vancouver officers who responded to the scene after a man was beaten by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":504089,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194298],"tags":[49,48,55],"class_list":["post-504837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vancouver","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-vancouver"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=504837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504837\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/504089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=504837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=504837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=504837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}