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Life After Death
The city’s homicide rate is soaring.
These parents—all of whom have lost a child to
acts of violence—are determined to do something
about it
By Jonathan Graham
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Grant De
Patie,
24, was working at a Maple Ridge gas station
in 2005 when he was dragged to death. The 16-year-old
driver was sentenced to nine years, reduced on
appeal to seven. Corinne and Doug pushed for
legislation to improve gas attendants’ safety.
Image
credit: Brian
Howell
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Corinne De Patie is
only now beginning to rediscover her voice. Three
years ago, after her
son Grant was killed at the age of 24, she lost control
of her life. For more than two months she couldn’t
even cook, depending on her local church to fill the
freezer. When the food ran out, she felt helpless and
overwhelmed. But she focused on her other three kids
and worked at putting her life back together. “It’s
a slow process,” she says, sitting on a couch
in the Surrey home she shares with her husband, Doug,
and Grant’s younger siblings. “You need
to teach yourself that, being the adult and being the
parent, you have to guide these young children along
and show them strength. It’s been hard. It is
hard.
“I used to be a very bubbly person, but my bubbles have
been popped. Grant’s death silenced me. On his
birthday, I make a fancy dinner, I set a place for
him. I buy six cupcakes, and we share the sixth one.
After dinner, we put love letters in balloons and release
them and then go for a bike ride. I ride his bike.
When we went by the skate park, some kid said, ‘Hey
lady, nice ride.’ ”
She thinks about Grant constantly. In the corner of
the small living room, in a display stand, is the Medal
of Gallantry awarded to Grant posthumously by the Vietnam
Veterans of Canada. He lived in the basement
of this house before moving to Maple Ridge in July
of 2004 and, a few months later, taking a job at a
nearby gas station. It was there, while he worked the
night shift, that he ran out, perhaps to try to stop
a gas-and-dasher or maybe just to get the plate number
of the stolen Chrysler LeBaron. The then 16-year-old
driver, who’s now serving a prison term, struck
and dragged Grant more than seven kilometres as he
sped away, later bragging to friends that he’d
heard Grant screaming from underneath the car. “The
pain is still immense,” says Corinne, “and
it’s heavy.”
The De Patie house is filled with the sound of kids
yelling and playing; 11-year-old twins, a boy and a
girl, run up and down the stairs, getting ready for
a BMX race. Grant introduced them to the sport, and
the twins are now two of the top young BMX bikers in
the country. Grant’s $7,500 bike sits upstairs
in Corinne’s bedroom.
Corinne gets up to shut the glass door of the living
room, blocking out the noise. Grant was more than 15
years older than his brother and sisters, but he’d
always wanted siblings and was a good mentor to them.
Since his death, says Corinne, she worries that she’s
become too strict with the other children and is thankful
that they’re patient with her. She recently took
her daughter aside to talk about drugs, and 12-year-old
Victoria interrupted her. “You know, Mom, if
Grant was alive, he would have already told me that.” “So
you see,” says Corinne, “we have a lot
to live up to.”
The De Paties admire the trailblazing role played by
the late Chuck Cadman, the ponytailed musician who
was a Member of Parliament from 1997 to 2005 (and whose
widow, Dona, is the Conservative candidate for Surrey
North in the upcoming federal election). Cadman, like
the De Paties, lived in Surrey, and had a young son—Jesse,
then a 16-year-old Grade 11 student—who was killed
senselessly by another teenager while he was on his
way home one night.
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