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Still waiting for answers, family of Chantel Moore mark her 27th birthday

Tla-o-qui-aht woman was fatally shot by police during a wellness check in her New Brunswick apartment
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Family and friends lay flowers down on the First Street dock in Tofino in honour of Chantel Moore's birthday, on April 1, 2021. MELISSA RENWICK, HA-SHILTH-SA

On the evening of what would have been Chantel Moore’s 27th birthday, close family members in Tofino gathered on the First Street dock to celebrate her life.

It was a way to “keep her memory alive,” said Grace Frank, Moore’s grandmother.

Moore, of the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation, was fatally shot in her New Brunswick apartment during a wellness check by an Edmundston police officer on June 4, 2020. She would have turned 27 on April 1.

Quebec’s police watchdog, the Bureau des enquêtes indépendantes, has completed its investigation into the shooting, but her family says they have yet to receive any answers.

Alongside her husband, sister, three sons and nephew, Frank released red and yellow balloons into the air while singing Happy Birthday.

The yellow was meant to embody Moore’s signature phrase: “Stay golden, peeps,” Frank said. “Yellow was her colour.”

With Meares Island in the background, the family laid down yellow roses and candles on the dock.

Once home, they shared a meal of burgers and poutine — Moore’s meal of choice for her 25th birthday, which was the last birthday Frank got celebrate with her granddaughter before she moved to the East Coast.

Over cake, the family took turns sharing stories about Moore.

Martha Martin, Moore’s mother, said the day was “really, really hard.”

“It’s hard to want to do anything,” she said from her New Brunswick home. “It’s still so fresh. I spent most of the day in tears.”

With no answers about the death, “you can’t move forward,” she said. “It’s every parent’s nightmare.”