Teen hockey player's death leads to four police officers being deemed negligent

September 2019 is when everything went horribly wrong for Ben Teague, as an Oakville Rangers team building weekend involving 13 of his teammates and coaches was supposed to have been fun filled with lots of activities, but instead turned to tragedy. The sad events took place at a YMCA centre. It's been recently reported that four police officers have been found negligent regarding this matter.

The parents of Ben have initiated a lawsuit against the Rangers, their coaches, the Ontario Minor Hockey Association, and the YMCA camp in 2022. That lawsuit still has no trial date. In 2023, the parents decided to file an official complaint with the Office of the Independent Police Review Director, claiming that the York police failed to properly investigate their son's death. The review was ultimately completed in October of that year, but the details have only been made public for the first time now. It has been confirmed that the four officers were negligent as they did not interview, nor isolate the witnesses of this tragedy.

Teague and a few teammates all aged 16 and 17 started drinking alcohol that night at the YMCA, and in the early hours of the morning, Ben ran to his coaches to tell them he had been engaging in drinking and was experiencing intolerable leg pain.

The coaches of the Oakville Rangers are adamant that the team has a strict zero-tolerance for alcohol policy and that all players were aware of this and should not have been drinking under any circumstances. The coaches also state that they were adequately supervising the players as best as they possibly could that day and night, but that seeing as the players are not little children, they were also allowed to have some alone time as well, which is normal. The coaches argued that they cannot be watching teenagers for every second of the day and night.

Detective sergeants Heather Bentham and Kenneth Golding, Det. John Loughry, and Sgt. Robert Worthman are the four officers that have been deemed negligent. There is no word as to whether they have faced or will face any discipline, and what that will entail.

Source: Blades of Steel
Police found negligent in investigation of death of teenaged hockey player