Cathy Merrick — the first female grand chief of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs — has died, a source confirmed.
Merrick collapsed suddenly while speaking with reporters outside the Winnipeg law courts after corrections officer Robert Jeffrey Morden was acquitted in the 2021 death of Headingley jail inmate William Ahmo on Friday.
A Winnipeg Police Service detective was among the people who tried to help Merrick after she collapsed. She was taken by ambulance to hospital and pronounced dead.
MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS
Cathy Merrick collapsed in front of the law courts on Friday.
Merrick was re-elected to a full three-year term as AMC grand chief in July. Merrick, a former chief of Pimicikamak Cree Nation who was then a Pimicikamak band councillor, was elected as grand chief in a byelection in 2022. The role of grand chief was vacant after an independent investigation concluded Arlen Dumas engaged in workplace sexual harassment.
Merrick told the Brandon Sun one of her major goals over the next three years would be to improve and develop the assembly’s relationship with the Manitoba government.
“We need to be at the table when decisions are made, not an afterthought,” she said.
Merrick said her first priority would be to address water issues that have affected First Nations across Manitoba.
fpcity@freepress.mb.ca
Before collapsing, Merrick was speaking with reporters outside the Winnipeg law courts after corrections officer Robert Jeffrey Morden was acquitted in the 2021 death of Headingley jail inmate William Ahmo.