68 inmates died in Canadian prisons during 2024

Last year, I combed through media releases from the Government of Canada to collect data on inmate deaths announced by Correctional Services Canada in 2023.

I was curious to see how many deaths occurred in Canadian prisons during 2024, so I browsed through them all again, and here’s what I found.

In total, 68 inmates died in custody in 2024.

Of those, 22 died of what CSC called “apparent natural causes”, one of which was specifically from an illness. There was also 1 inmate who died after being assaulted.

The majority of the deaths, however, didn’t have a cause listed. A total of 45 inmates fell under this category.

At the bottom of virtually every media release was the following statement:

As in all cases involving the death of an inmate, Correctional Service Canada (CSC) will review the circumstances. CSC policy requires that the police and the coroner be notified.

Ontario had the highest number of inmate deaths, at a total of 27. followed by Québec at 14, British Columbia at 12, and Alberta at 6. New Brunswick had the lowest number of inmate deaths of all provinces that had inmates die in custody, with just 1 death.

The deaths occurred at 24 institutions, 7 of which saw only 1 death. Millhaven Institution in Bath, Ontario, saw the highest number of deaths: 9.

Archambault Institution in Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines, Quebec, had the second highest number of deaths, at 8, with the following institutions all having the third highest number of deaths, 6:

• Collins Bay Institution (Kingston, ON)
• Bath Institution (Bath, ON)

May and June saw the highest number of deaths in a single month, with each of them seeing 9 deaths. The lowest deaths seen in a single month was 3, which occurred in November.

Nearly all of the inmates who died were in custody because of pretty serious crimes, including murder, assault, arson, robbery, sexual assault, and kidnapping. Only 3 were in prison on drug charges.

Oddly, however, starting in October, Corrections Services Canada stopped including the actually charges people were incarcerated for, so there are a dozen inmates we don’t have charges listed for.

The inmate who had been imprisoned the longest before dying was Wilson Stairs, who had been convicted of multiple charges, including robbery, possession of unauthorized firearm, forcible confinement, assault causing bodily harm, and impersonating a cop. He had been sentenced to life in prison in July 1968 and was imprisoned at the Bath Institution when he died of unspecified causes.

The shortest serving inmate was Tyrone Hunter, who died of unspecified causes only 29 days after beginning his sentence of 4 years, 5 months, and 28 days. He was in the Drumheller Institution in Alberta for robbery and other firearm offences, beginning his sentence on 16 February of last year. He left behind his two sons, his parents, and several siblings.

There were 63 deaths of inmates reported by CSC in 2021, 3 of which were specifically classified as COVID-19 deaths. In 2022, there were 54 reported deaths, followed by 69 in 2023.

You can find a list of all the inmates who died in 2022, 2023, and 2024, including sentencing and the crimes they were convicted on, here.