As officers from an Alberta police force make their way to the Yukon to handle the investigation into the weekend death of a man staying at the Sarah Steele Building detox centre, the territory's chief coroner has released the man's name.

Robert Stone, 34, of Whitehorse, died Sunday morning, shortly after admitting himself into the drug and alcohol treatment centre on Sixth Avenue in Whitehorse.

Staff at the centre found the man unresponsive in his bed, according to coroner Sharon Hanley, and he was pronounced dead at 10:50 a.m.

The man had been picked up by paramedics at 7:24 Saturday evening (not Sunday evening, as reported yesterday) at the Petro-Canada station on Fourth Avenue, after the ambulance service was called to a complaint of an intoxicated person, Hanley told the Star Monday.

But by 7:50, the man was in RCMP custody.

"While we were travelling with him, just as we were coming up Hospital Drive, he became combative,” Terry Klassen, the manager of emergency medical services, said today.

"There just happened to be a (police) cruiser in the loading bay, and we asked them for assistance.”

Stone was arrested after being cleared medically by the paramedics, said Whitehorse RCMP Sgt. Don Rogers, and taken to cells at the RCMP detachment.

Just over six hours later, the detachment's watch commander called the ambulance once again because the man was complaining of chest pains and shortness of breath.

Since December 2008, when Raymond Silverfox died in police custody after being arrested for public intoxication, the Yukon's RCMP have tightened their policy on calling in medical assistance for prisoners, but Rogers said the ambulance would have been called in any event.

"I wouldn't necessarily relate it to the last year and a half,” he said. "... Any time a prisoner asks for medical assistance, we give it to them. That's policy. It's always been policy.”

The man was taken to Whitehorse General Hospital by ambulance, where he was examined and treated by emergency room staff, then released, Hanley said.

According to Rogers, the man admitted himself into the detox facility shortly after 4 a.m.; he was found dead a little over six hours later.

"As the Whitehorse RCMP had recent contact with the deceased, the commanding officer of M Division has requested an independent external police agency to investigate this matter,” Rogers said of the Alberta force's involvement.

This morning, Insp. Glen Motz of the Medicine Hat Police Service confirmed that two officers from the major crimes section are on their way to Whitehorse.

"Both the guys are very skilled investigators and they will be able to do a thorough and transparent job of this investigation,” Motz said.

".... You can't go up with any preconceived idea of what happened,” he said of what is expected to come out of the investigation.

"You just have to let the evidence speak for itself and go from there.”

Stone had bruises and cuts on his face, Hanley said, and also complained of pain in his collar bone when he was at the hospital.

She said more information on Stone's condition and the possible cause of his death will be available Wednesday afternoon, after a preliminary autopsy has been performed in Vancouver.

This is the first-ever death at the detox facility, according to a Department of Health and Social Services spokesperson.