A Life Shaped by Trauma and Resilience
In the early hours of a cold Sunday morning in December 1979, my mother, Clara Lamirande, sprinted across B.C.’s Highway 1, just outside Vancouver. She ran headlong into a speeding car; the driver failed to see the dark shape of her body until it was too late. My family lived in Winnipeg, but we were visiting my mom’s relatives in Vancouver for Christmas. Two days before the accident, my mom—who was 28 at the time—left me and my siblings with her parents so she could visit the city with her brother, Lester. He came home early, but Mom stayed out. That was the last time a relative saw her. Late Sunday, the police visited the house where we were staying to ask if someone could identify her body.
The circumstances of my mother’s death were suspicious: she simply disappeared, leaving her five young children behind; she was killed on a lonely stretch of highway; she was running. Still, the police said she was hitchhiking and claimed it was an accident. They never investigated her death, never asked questions. That wasn’t surprising: she was Saulteaux, part of the Ojibwe tribe, and police rarely concerned themselves with the suspicious deaths of Indigenous women.
My father, Harry Samuel Pranteau, who was Cree, wasn’t with us in Vancouver when we lost Mom. He was in Winnipeg attending his brother’s funeral. Six months after Mom died, Dad died, too. He was diabetic and in poor health, and he succumbed to severe hypoglycemia. But I think he really died of a broken heart.
That’s how I began. Born into a shattered family, I was raised in a community struggling with alcoholism, drug addiction, poverty and extreme violence—a legacy of colonialism. As a child, I assimilated the trauma of my family and community. I became a product of my environment—always fighting, living in a kind of defensive crouch—and much of my youth was spent in and out of custody.
Now, I’m serving a life sentence for manslaughter, armed robbery and firearms charges, but I’ve been living outside prison in Montreal for the past 15 years. Like you, I wake up and make breakfast with my family and do dishes and clean the house and go to my job at a restaurant (and, for three days a week, at an emergency shelter). I care for my 13-year-old son, Neville. My partner, who’s a chef, often makes dinner. But, probably unlike you, I have to follow strict rules about where I can travel, where I can work, what I can consume and who I can see. I’m also required to ask anyone I spend time with if they have a criminal record; if I don’t ask, I could be returned to prison.
Bound by strict laws and restrictions, constantly surveilled by parole officers and the Correctional Service of Canada until the day I die, I spend my life in a sort of purgatory between incarceration and freedom. While my story might be exceptional, it’s not unique. Less than five percent of women in Canada are Indigenous, but we make up almost half of the women serving life sentences in this country. To understand me—and other Indigenous women like me serving life sentences or living in and out of Canada’s prisons—is to see crime as a branch on a large tree whose roots plunge into the wet, dark earth of history.
The Legacy of Loss and Violence
When my mom died, I was 18 months old. My maternal grandparents raised me and my four older siblings in the north end of Winnipeg. For a long time, I thought my grandparents were my mom and dad because my family never talked about painful things—unless they were drinking. Only when my grandmother drank would she tell me about the horrors of the residential school where she was forced to survive from ages seven to 19. And only when my relatives drank would they talk about my parents. I listened and, over time, pieced their stories together. Yet when I asked my eldest brother, Jeffrey, about our mom, he would angrily shush me. “We don’t talk about her,” he’d say.
Despite their alcoholism, my grandparents loved us. They kept a roof over our heads, kept us in school and ensured we were clothed and fed. But they were struggling, and home wasn’t always safe. When there were parties, which happened often, my older sister, Wendi, and I would drag blankets into a large walk-in closet, climb to the top shelves and curl up to sleep, hidden from marauding drunks and their violent, angry desires. Now and then, Jeffrey would emerge from his room in the basement and check on us, keeping an eye out for threats.
Sometimes, I’d wake up the morning after the adults had been partying and find no food in the house. Jeffrey and my other older siblings would take us little kids to the store to steal food, which often attracted the attention of the police and Child and Family Services. Shoplifting eventually escalated into other crimes. When I was young, I got into a lot of trouble: possessing stolen property, car theft, breaking and entering. Sometimes I served time; other times I was let go. In a neighbourhood where the adults were traumatized residential school survivors and the kids were often fending for themselves, crime was normalized.
I idolized Jeffrey, who was 10 years older than me. A skilled fighter and self-taught martial artist, he had the strength and grace of Bruce Lee, and he could jump a six-foot fence from a standstill. He was our protector. That mattered because, growing up, the kids in our neighbourhood were suffering like our family, and that suffering often bloomed into violence.
One night, when he was in his mid-20s, Jeffrey was volunteering for the Bear Clan Patrol, an Indigenous-run community safety organization, and he learned that someone needed help, maybe protection, at a house in Winnipeg’s north end. He hurried there, and sometime later, neighbours reported hearing cries for help. The police found Jeffrey’s body, slashed and perforated with multiple stab wounds, a block away from the house. He’d bled out on the street alone.
When I heard that Jeffrey had been murdered, I was 13 years old, locked up in the Manitoba Youth Centre for one of many petty crimes I’d committed as a scared and angry kid. His death changed me. From that moment on, I was different—uncaring, cold. In youth custody, impervious to punishment, I fought everyone. I’d be released only to return months later, more volatile than ever. Eventually, when I was 16, the courts sentenced me as an adult for two aggravated assaults after a violent fight, and I went to federal prison in 1995.
The Prison System and the Weight of History
In the Canadian prison system—which handles those serving more than a two-year sentence—prisoners often find themselves shipped across the country. I was initially held in the Winnipeg Remand Centre, but I was later sent to a provincial jail at Portage La Prairie, Man., before being bussed to Saskatchewan’s Regional Psychiatric Centre in Saskatoon.
At the time, women imprisoned at Kingston, Ont.’s notorious Prison for Women (P4W) were being transferred to new institutions across Canada as part of a national initiative to shutter P4W and reform women’s facilities. Some of those sisters, battle-hardened from P4W’s brutal conditions, arrived at the Regional Psychiatric Centre, where they found me in its maximum-security wing: terrified, wearing a heavy anti-suicide blanket, crouched in the corner of a segregation cell. Those women advocated for me, understood me, saw me. They knew that I was losing my shit for a reason. I was a pure and direct product of the residential school system. By comparison, most criminal justice system officials saw only the effects of my family’s history on me, not the underlying causes.
While I was in prison when I was 17, for instance, a psychologist interviewed me and asked about my background. For a long time, she poked at the sensitive regions of my personal history—my upbringing, my family’s relationship with alcohol, the loved ones I’d lost—and invited me to explore painful feelings that I’d tried to ignore. Eventually, with more prodding, I told her about the deaths in my family. Forty-five minutes into our conversation, she stopped writing, looked me in the eyes, and said, “I don’t believe you.” There was nothing in my file that supported what I was telling her. Rather than question the accuracy of the file—or consider why I hadn’t allowed myself to be emotionally vulnerable before, in a system where vulnerability was incredibly risky—she dismissed the formative experiences of loss and pain that were fundamental to my identity. Feeling betrayed, I flipped her desk.
When I was 19, I was finally released from prison. But four months later, a violent and tragic incident would change my life forever. The specifics of the incident are contested. According to the police, I participated in an armed robbery where someone was killed. My co-accused admitted to and was convicted of second-degree murder, so I thought it was clear that I hadn’t killed anyone. Nevertheless, the prosecution argued that I was an accomplice to a robbery where someone died, which meant that my charges were much more serious. I pleaded not guilty, but they charged and convicted me of manslaughter, and I was given a life sentence with the possibility of parole after seven years.
The Supreme Court of Canada has repeatedly affirmed that during sentencing, judges must consider the causal effects of colonialism when assessing an Indigenous person’s crime. But at no point during my trial did anyone acknowledge the violent deaths of my parents, my family’s residential school experience or my traumatic upbringing—not the prosecution, the judge or even my own lawyer.
Let me be clear: I take full responsibility for what I did. But passing judgment in a criminal trial means making sense of a crime, which includes understanding the motivations of the accused—and that means acknowledging my history. Like the psychologist who dismissed my past, the judge chose to ignore the trauma that informed (but did not excuse) my actions.
Maybe it was easier to disregard what motivated my behaviour and see me instead as a violent person. It certainly was for the guards at Quebec’s Joliette Institution for Women, where they shipped me after my conviction in 1999. I was 21 years old. I’ll always remember how they shackled me before removing me from my cell in the maximum-security unit so I could have gym time. When I got outside, I noticed the blonde prisoner who was doing gym time with me wasn’t restrained. Then I recognized her: it was Karla Homolka. It dawned on me that they saw me as more dangerous than a serial killer.
Healing and the Struggle for Freedom
Over the decade and a half that I spent in prison, I changed. I started to heal. There was plenty that got me through: the letters from family and friends, the long phone calls from my cousins and brothers who were locked in different prisons, the wisdom of my Elders, the hours I spent reading and studying. But most importantly, there was the promise that I made to my grandfather.
Growing up, my grandfather was one of the few men who never raised a hand against me. As my life spiraled out of control, and I was increasingly behind bars, he’d always tell me, “Stop running away and come home.”
Shortly before I was moved to Joliette, I learned that my grandfather was seriously ill in the ICU in Winnipeg. I was granted leave from prison to visit him—under guard, of course, and I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone that I was there. He was alert when I arrived, although he had a tube in his throat and couldn’t speak. When I moved aside the hospital curtain, he saw that I was handcuffed, and he started to cry. I’d never seen him cry before. I told him that I was sorry for not listening to him, for not coming home. But I said that he didn’t have to worry about me. I would make better choices and take better care of myself. Although I wasn’t allowed to attend his funeral, which was devastating, I made peace with him.
Years later, remembering the promise I made to my grandfather, I worked hard to make it come true. Yet no matter how much I changed, I was still viewed and treated the same way: as a menace. If I became upset for any reason, regardless how valid or tempered my feelings, prison officials said I needed to retake an anger management course because I hadn’t internalized the lessons. I’d take the course again and again.
When I expressed interest in parole, guards started to pull me aside to read out protected information reports—official, anonymous accusations levelled by other prisoners—about me. Sometimes, prisoners filed these reports to exact a kind of petty vengeance, or to get under someone’s skin. I suspect the guards knew that the prisoners’ reports filed against me weren’t true, but they would read them aloud and send me back to general population to see what I’d do. I wouldn’t react—by then, I was no longer the impulsive girl they’d arrested more than a decade ago—but, like a grotesque collage, the reports created a false, regressive picture of me.
Because of the protected information reports, my parole officer said she wouldn’t support my bid for release. But I was determined to go before the parole board anyway. I was granted a hearing on May 20, 2010. It was an Indigenous parole hearing, what’s officially called a Culturally Responsive Hearing (CRH). A CRH is similar to a typical parole hearing: the board was composed of the usual members, the decision-making process was the same and my parole officer was present. But those in attendance were seated in a circle, and I was accompanied by an Elder who advised me and advocated for me. The victim’s family was also there. During my initial trial, I never said a thing—never testified, never made a statement. But now, I told my story, and I told the board that they could leave me to die in prison, or they could let me live my life differently on the outside. Then, I left it in the hands of the Creator.
Unlike so many criminal justice system officials before them, the board listened. They believed me—and they gave me a chance.
I’d like to say that I was set free, but serving a life sentence outside of prison isn’t the same as freedom. My sentence ends when I die. So, until that happens, my life isn’t entirely my own. And it doesn’t matter what I’ve accomplished. I’ve worked as a victim services coordinator at First People’s Justice Centre of Montreal. I’ve worked on an Indigenous support workers project, advocating on behalf of imprisoned people with the Elizabeth Fry Society of Ottawa. I’ve raised my son in a loving environment where he has the support of Native Elders and knows nothing of the violence and pain I endured as a child. Despite my achievements, I could always be reincarcerated if I breach even minor conditions of my parole.
When someone learns that I’m serving a life sentence, they might feel apprehensive—until they get to know me. An Elder who was adopted during the Sixties Scoop and was raised to distrust people with criminal records said that getting to know me helped her realize that a criminal record doesn’t make someone inherently bad. In fact, my tough upbringing and my experiences with the criminal justice system have been an asset in my work with unhoused Indigenous people who recognize a kind of shared experience.
Even still, I fear reincarceration every day. Last July, my new parole officer received a tip that I’d lost weight and looked unwell, and the tipster thought I was using drugs. I suffer from Addison’s and Graves’ diseases, which cause sudden weight loss. Nevertheless, I spent almost a week in a halfway house, where I was poked and prodded. Predictably, the drug tests were negative, but I now have to meet my parole officer biweekly—a nerve-wracking experience since even a minor infraction could jeopardize my freedom.
But of all the restrictive conditions, the hardest is this: I can’t go home. The only time Correctional Services Canada allows me to leave Montreal and return to Winnipeg is after a tragedy. And there’s been so much tragedy. In the last six years, I’ve lost 19 family members. Since 2021, I’ve lost seven nieces and nephews to fentanyl overdoses. It’s like I can only visit them after they’re gone.
Article 10 of the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples states that “Indigenous peoples shall not be forcibly removed from their lands.” But because of my conviction, I can’t go home.
I can’t go home.