A work in progress.

What happened?

Here is the information we have to the best of our knowledge: Back in late September, 2009, Dustin was first taken to the hospital in Calgary for what we were eventually told were “workplace-related injuries.” We were finally told of his hospitalization in November and that a freezer had fallen on him, which would be in line with the type of work he was in; moving. There were many attempts made to communicate with him but he kept brushing off the injuries as “no big deal.” An attempt to speak to him via Skype was turned down because he “wasn’t allowed” to download the program onto his roomate’s computer. The family lost contact with Dustin in early February 2010. There were many attempts to find him and get into contact with him at various times, to no avail. We tried to file Missing Persons reports but were told it didn’t yet have merit. Finally, once Dustin didn’t show up for his best friend/cousin Marcel’s wedding in April, we filed again, including online reporting. On April 14th, we were passed a message that Dustin was supposed to be working at a remote farm in LeDuc, Alberta that didn’t have cell or phone access and that attempts were in progress to get him to a phone. On April 16th, 2010, he was dropped off at the Regina hospital near death.

Who is responsible?

The only person who maintained he was with Dustin the whole time – and who was the person who dropped him off at the hospital – was his roomate, Dustin ward Paxton. If nothing else, Paxton will have information very valuable to the case and needs to be found ASAP.

Does he have a large family?

Depends on what you call large ;) . Dustin has three brothers, a daughter, a mom, several loving step-fathers, best friends and close cousins. And of course, 40,000+ people pulling for him on Facebook!

Is it true you’re denying he is a father and keeping his little girl from him?

Absolutely not.

Dustin has been through a horrifying ordeal that not only changed his appearance drastically, it has changed how he sounds (talks), his memory and some behaviours. Dustin’s daughter simply cannot “show up” unprepared. Working closely with a Social Worker, a plan for re-introduction was drawn up that includes the necessity of her visiting a trauma counselor both before and after her visit. Once his daughter’s mother shows proof of the pre-counseling having taken place as well as a confirmed post-visit appointment set up, arrangements for getting Dustin’s daughter to the hospital are in place. Understandably, any dates or times of his daughter’s visit will NOT be advertised online as we are not only trying to keep her out of the media but also don’t want to let the perpetrator of this crime know of the plans since he is still at large.

What about donating?

An arms-length trust fund has been established to help support Dustin’s immediate and future needs. This is the ONLY fund with which the LaFortune family is associated. Once this is set up it will be announced on this site and any other venues through which people have asked us to communicate.

Any other funds established by third parties are outside the LaFortune family’s purview. The family has no knowledge of said funds’ status, trusteeship, safeguards against misuse, etc., and the LaFortune family cannot provide any assurance whatsoever that donated funds to those accounts will be used for the purpose intended by the donor. People who choose to donate to these other funds are of course welcome to do so.

You can learn more about donating here.

How should I pray for Dustin? What religion does he want us to acknowledge?

Support and love are non-denominational: you are more than welcome to express your feelings through your own spirituality and beliefs.

But… Dustin’s face is all full in the original pictures – how could he only weigh 90lbs??

What you are seeing is the swelling from all the injuries.

Why did this happen? For what purpose?? What did he do to deserve this? He must have done something…

We really, really don’t know why this happened. To suggest that anyone deserves such treatment, or did something to make someone mad enough to dole out such treatment really is an abusive mindset. No one ever deserves to go through that nightmare.

Where is the iPad; since he can talk now, what’s going to happen?

It’s still around. It was in the hospital briefly at the beginning, however, since Dustin wasn’t able to provide adequate care of it on his own and since the hospital staff couldn’t watch it around the clock, they asked that it be removed from his room until he was able to take 100% responsibility for it on his own. So, the iPad was removed because of Hospital Liability Policies concerning the loss and/or theft of valuables.

Also, while he can talk *now*, he still has many surgeries to his face and mouth to come – he will need it to communicate then, too. In the meantime, as he improves, it will help keep him entertained through games, reading (and once we get wifi access, his Facebook page!), memory exercises and cognitive function exercises etc while he’s in the hospital for the months/years it is going to take to get him better.

What happened to the discussion board?

It needed to be taken down, and we’re very sorry it came to that. There seem to be a few people out there who have made it their mission to make the LaFortune’s lives as miserable as possible, even on top of what has happened. We can only speculate as to why; we are hoping that it isn’t the work of the perpetrator of this heinous crime because then everyone involved in the harassment would then be deemed to have taken part in the terror, and that would mean it would all become part of the investigation.

All the well-wishes for Dustin were kept and will be passed on to him. Once things seem to be running smoothly, there is a possibility of the discussion board being reopened.

How can we get messages to Dustin?

You can get a message to Dustin one of three ways. First, you can use the contact form on this site as all those messages are being kept to be given to him. Second, you can leave a message on the wall of his Facebook group since once he gets internet access, he’ll no doubt be going through the whole thing! On top of that, the wonderful people at PostEgram are sponsoring newsletters made up of all the Facebook wall well-wishes, so he will get them to read! Third, he is allowed to receive postcards (no envelopes), those can be sent to:

Dustin LaFortune
c/o REGINA GENERAL HOSPITAL
1440 – 14th Avenue
REGINA SK  S4P 0W5
CANADA

Where do we find medical updates?

We have a category set up on this site for his medical updates. Those can be found here.

Will Dustin eventually be transferred to the Victoria General Hospital for treatment, so that he will be closer to his family, or is it too soon to make any kind of plans like this?

It will be up to the medical staff to determine if Dustin is well enough to travel to another city; this could be a while. However, if he is to be moved, it would more than likely be to Winnipeg where not only does he have a large family and friend support circle already in place, this is where his daughter lives.