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 News from Around the Americas | May 2007 
Family Rejects Police Report
 Alexandra Zabjek - The Edmonton Journal
| | Murray Toews, left, comforts his brother Gregg during a news conference at the University Hospital on Thursday to discuss their brother, Jeff, who is on life support at the hospital as a result of injuries suffered in Cancun, Mexico. (Greg Southam/The Journal) |
Edmonton - The family of Jeff Toews rejected on Thursday a report by Mexican authorities claiming the Grande Prairie man fell from a second-floor balcony at a Cancun resort after a night of heavy drinking.
"We don't believe that at all," Murray Toews told a news conference at the University of Alberta Hospital. "The details are so very sketchy at this time."
His brother had been on vacation in Cancun with his wife and several other couples when he suffered serious injuries early Monday morning. His family initially claimed he was attacked, while Mexican authorities have contended that he was intoxicated when he fell off the balcony at the Moon Palace Resort.
Murray Toews admitted the family has no clear answers about what happened between 3 a.m. and 3:30 a.m. that morning, but he claimed Mexican authorities are trying to protect their tourism industry in releasing the report.
"Tourism is a big part of Mexico. For these guys to sweep something like this so it will go away, that's what they want is they want mass confusion," he said.
The report, prepared by the attorney general in the state of Quintana Roo, states that Jeff Toews had been asked to leave a hotel disco at about 1:30 a.m. on Monday because he was intoxicated. Afterwards, he went back and forth between his room and the bar several times, the report states.
According to the report, a hotel security guard saw a man running along the second storey of the hotel around 3:00 a.m. When he went up the stairs to investigate, he saw no one, then heard a thud in the distance. The guard went down the stairs and found Toews on the ground.
Twin brother Gregg Toews was at the resort at the time and was called to the scene, where he administered CPR until an ambulance arrived.
"All I know is, at three o'clock on the seventh I held my brother and I saw how his skull had been crushed, and I just lost my best friend," he said. "Something really wrong, in my heart (I know) that something wrong happened. If you looked to see the look in his eyes, he was scared."
He said the Mexican authorities changed their story several times about the incident and showed no caring or compassion while he waited at his brother's bedside at a Cancun hospital. "At this point, we don't know what happened and I truly believe that (the Mexican authorities) don't know," he said.
The Toews brothers are now pinning their hopes on Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay to provide some answers.
The brothers called for "different procedures" to be put in place so that incidents involving Canadians in Mexico are properly investigated.
Liberal foreign affairs critic Dan McTeague told The Journal this week the RCMP liaison in Mexico City should have more authority to get involved in investigations involving Canadians in that country. Currently, the liaison officer can only get involved in a case if asked to do so by the Mexican government, he said.
Jeff Toews, 34, was airlifted to the University Hospital early Thursday morning and was being kept on life support.
Doctors expected to use his organs for transplant purposes this morning. His family said that would have been his wish.
"Whoever gets that heart will be full of love and joy," said Gregg Toews.
The family was headed back to Grande Prairie on Thursday night for a birthday party for Jeff's son, Dawson, who was turning two.
azabjek@thejournal.canwest.com |
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