Supreme Court Rules On Giant Mine Murders

VANCOUVER — Another chapter in the bitter Giant Mine labour dispute has come to a close. The Supreme Court of Canada ruled the mine owners, the national level of the mine’s union, the mine’s security firm, and Northwest Territories’ government do not have to pay damages in relation to the murder of the nine replacement workers at the Yellowknife gold mine in 1992.

The nine had crossed a picket line to work at Giant and were killed when a striking worker set off a bomb in the mine. Roger Warren, who planted the bomb, was convicted of murder and is still in jail in B.C. But a civil suit also tried to place partial blame for the incident on mine owner Royal Oak Mines, the miners’ labour union, the security firm Pinkerton’s of Canada, and the government of the Northwest Territories.

In 2004 a lower court ruled the four defendants were partially responsible for not preventing the lethal blast and awarded $10.7 million to the miners’ widows and James O’Neil, the first person on the scene. The lower court ruling was then reversed by the N.W.T. Court of Appeal and that reversal has now been upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada.

Part of the final ruling read: “While the trial judge was correct in finding that both Pinkerton’s and the territorial government owed the murdered miners a duty of care, he erred in finding that they did not meet the requisite standard of care.”

The Supreme Court also ruled that the national union, now the Canadian Auto Workers union, was not responsible for the actions of the local union, as it was an independent legal entity.

The dispute between Royal Oak and the Canadian Smelter & Allied Workers local 4 took place in 1992 at Giant Mine.

Royal Oak had bought the mine in late 1990 and began instituting cost-cutting measures. As part of those measures, the union and the company reached a tentative new labour agreement but union members rejected it in a vote. The miners planned to go on strike on May 23, 1992, but the company locked them out the day before.

Royal Oak brought in replacement workers, and some original mine workers also crossed the picket line.

Tensions escalated, bringing violence. The original security firm quit after a guard was injured and Pinkerton’s was brought in to replace it.

On Sept. 18, after almost five months of conflict, a purposefully set blast inside the mine killed nine workers. Warren was convicted in 1995 of nine counts of second-degree murder for planting the bomb.

Unsatisfied, the miners’ widows and O’Neil filed their civil suit.

Royal Oak filed for bankruptcy in 1999 and changed its name to Royal Oak Ventures, while the Giant Mine closed in 2004.