Distraught Innu leader issues poignant plea for troubled youth after son’s death
ST. JOHN’S, N.L. — One of Labrador’s most outspoken aboriginal leaders buried his 16-year-old son last week.
Simeon Tshakapesh, deputy grand chief of the Innu Nation, says his boy, Thunderheart, took his own life May 24 after two years of treatment for solvent abuse — much of which took place far from his home in Natuashish.
“He was in the system and he took his life,” Tshakapesh said in an interview Wednesday. “He was damaged physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally. He wasn’t the same. He couldn’t recover.”
Despite his deep sorrow and anger, Tshakapesh is now calling on the federal and provincial governments to dramatically alter the way they treat aboriginal youth with substance abuse problems.