The second morning of a coroner’s inquest into the deaths of a Prince Rupert family in 2023 has heard that the father, Christopher Duong, may have suffered a mental health crisis just days before the family of four was found dead.
Former RCMP Const. Matt Jones testified that he apprehended Duong under the Mental Health Act during a traffic stop in the early morning of June. 10, 2023. Duong had been driving around with his wife, Janet Nguyen, and their two children, Alexander and Harlan Duong, because he believed a ‘hit’ had been placed on him.
“They were driving around all night and felt that they could not stop driving—one in the morning, two in the morning—with their two- and four-year-old in the backseat,” Jones recalled. “That’s not something that I felt police could be allowed to continue to happen.”
Jones took Duong out of the vehicle and patted him down after noticing multiple knives and a bear banger in the centre console of the vehicle. After interviewing Duong about the alleged hit, it became clear to Jones that Duong’s concerns were not based on reality.
Jones recalled Duong being fidgety and simply having a “feeling” that someone was following him and something bad would happen to him and his family.
When Jones attempted to interview Nguyen, she was speaking to Duong’s sister on speaker phone, who kept screaming, “Chris isn’t crazy,” the officer testified.
“It became clear to me that Janet was a bit conflicted herself,” he said. “I told her that I had a lot of questions, and she said, ‘I know, but what am I supposed to do? He’s my husband—I have to believe him’.”
Jones then took Duong to Prince Rupert Regional Hospital, while Nguyen took the children to her parents’ home on Silverside Drive.
Duong, Nguyen, and their two children were found dead at the home three days later.
It was revealed on day one of the inquest that Duong had suffered a serious brain injury from a car crash about one year prior.
While Dr. Jennifer Yao testified that there was no indication of any underlying mental health issues with Duong when he was released from the hospital after recovering from the crash, and undergoing multiple tests, she mentioned that he did have brain injury-related cognitive changes and was a little impulsive during some of the tests.
Nguyen’s sister, Joanne Nguyen, also spoke during the first day and shared her “profound sadness.”
“Janet was the youngest of four, baby of the family, but the spicy [one] of the bunch, who brought laughter and tenderness wherever she went,” Joanne said.
“She was a loving daughter, a cherished sister, a fun-loving auntie, and a supportive friend, but above all, she was an amazing wife and a beautiful mother.”
Joanne added that Janet and Duong both built a home filled with “love, resilience, and joy,” and their marriage was a partnership, with Alexander and Harlan being the centre of their universe.
“Energetic, curious, and full of light—the boys carried the best of both their parents,” she said.
”The silence of their absence is immeasurable—to lose one is unbearable, to lose all four is beyond words, yet, even as we grieve, we carry them forward in every memory shared, every story told, every act of kindness done in their honour.”