Biohazard team no job for squeamish

Biohazard team no job for squeamish
Widow was so impressed with work done after husband's suicide that she signed on to help

Elise Stolte
The Edmonton Journal

EDMONTON - When Marina Desjardins' husband shot himself to death on her front lawn, it fell to Brent Olynyk to clean up the mess.

The founder of Trauma Scene Bio Services keeps his cellphone on 24/7 for emergencies just like that across Alberta. He aims to be on the road within an hour and his 4x4 pickup is equipped with lights and sirens so his team can drive "Code 1" if they have to.

After police finished analyzing the scene at Desjardins' home, Marina was so impressed with Olynyk's work and the relief it brings to victims' families, she wanted to join him.

"I think I can do this," said Desjardins, who also works as a palliative care nurse, easing the physical pain of the dying. "You can't show me anything as bad as what I've seen." Consensus in the industry is that former victims wouldn't be able to handle continually seeing the trauma, but Desjardins was determined.

Less than six months after her husband died, she joined Olynyk's team and has now been working with him for almost a year. She has helped at nearly 50 scenes and doesn't try to distance herself from what she sees.

"I like to know what happened. That was someone's home, husband or child. To be honest, I find it very therapeutic that I can guarantee a widow I can erase the visual parts of that trauma from her life. Of course, you can never take the mental part away." Olynyk's background is with the RCMP and then Edmonton police. He started looking for something else after a highway accident put him behind a desk.

Starting Trauma Scene Bio Services was a chance to get back on the road. "I saw the need," he said. "There was no one specialized in this." Olynyk's biohazard team handles everything from crime and trauma scenes to outbreaks of Norwalk virus on cruise ships. Olynyk studied at several institutes across the United States to protect his team from hepatitis, HIV and other serious blood-borne diseases.

Olynyk started the company five years ago and now has seven part-time, on-call assistants. Now the medical examiner's office and sometimes detectives or members of the police identification unit will often refer victims' families to him when they are dealing with a messy scene.

"We don't leave until it's done," he said. "Basically, anything someone would consider gross or nasty, we get called out to." When she was five, Olynyk's daughter used to describe her daddy's job as cleaning carpets "real good." But you actually can't fully clean a carpet stained with body fluids, he said. It has to be removed or it will inevitably resurface, he says.

On an emotional level, the most difficult jobs for him are those involving kids.

His hardest job was cleaning up after a 15-year-old, who had been bullied at school, came home and shot himself. He even filmed his death.

"That's why bullying has to stop," Olynyk said angrily.

Team members will go out for a beer together after particularly tough jobs and Olynyk also makes counselling available.

The company also sponsors Homes for the Holidays, a fundraiser that supports the Kids Help Phone.

Olynyk said he doesn't want to know too much about what happened to the victims when he comes to a scene. He rarely talks with the families, acting instead through a victims' services go-between or an appointed family spokesperson.

In contrast, Desjardins wants to know, and in cases of suicide, will often seek out family members. It's nice for them to know they're not alone, she said. And that "things work out. There's a light at the end." The cases that hurt her the most are the elderly who die alone in their homes. The team is often called to cases where bodies are found days after death. In one case, the person was found five weeks after dying "It breaks my heart. I don't like that at all," Desjardins said. "How can anyone be that alone?" The team comes in, suits up in full-body cloth coveralls, dons respirators to deactivate the organic acids in the air, and pulls out every single thing the fluids have touched. Sometimes they even take out parts of the subfloor and lumber behind the drywall. When they are done, they seal off the house and fill it with ozone to kill the smell.

Desjardins' sons, 12, 14 and 19, ask a lot of questions about their mother's job.

"They think it's disgusting but they're also fascinated," she said.

"It's riveting for people. I don't know why." estolte@thejournal.canwest.com

© The Edmonton Journal 2008