Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah... it's time for Gravy's Quebec Weird Crime Round-up
The Montreal Mirror
The year in weird crime
by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR
Those who threaten our peaceful ways with their lewd, deviant behaviour get their comeuppance not only in front of the judge's gavel, but also in this paper. For in the people's court of these pages, the miscreant actions are also unmasked, revealed and scrutinized. Those who dare read the Mirror's annual round-up of crime in Quebec be warned: this is not recommended for the easily outraged or those trying to digest a meal.
Celebrity poops on rug!
Ageing vedette Michèle Richard has launched no shortage of outrageous controversy and this year found her at her most inspired. Richard's annual episode took place in September, when she was informed that her dogs were forbidden in her hotel room. She howled in protest, police came and she was handcuffed and taken to a cell - but not before leaving a steamy piece of excrement on the floor of the hotel room. Her lawyer later explained: "Stress caused a physical reaction of a sort that a material didn't reach its destination and her panties suffered a trauma." She denied speculation that the brouhaha was a carefully staged event to promote her new CD.
They seduce horses don't they?
Denis Audette, 70, was caught having intercourse with a horse in March 2001. "I'm doing nothing wrong," he told the animal's owner when caught pants-down. The owner caught him doing it again and again, a dozen times in total over the next couple of years. Audette's pièce-de-résistance was possibly the moment he was caught performing cunnilingus on one horse while manually stimulating another. On July 19 cops decided they had enough evidence to try Audette. He was found guilty and given a suspended sentence.
Growl for the camera
An American F-1 fan snappin' tourist pix on Crescent inadvertently shot a pic with Jeffrey Sénat, 24, and Mitch Pierre-Louis, 18, in the background. The duo allegedly pulled their car over and beat the shutterbug savagely before stabbing him in the neck twice. Usually unreliable drunken onlookers shucked their traditional ways and jumped the transgressors, holding them until cops came. The baddies were charged with attempted murder.
Apache Trudeau scores the murderer, pedophile and informant trifecta
Yves "Apache" Trudeau, 58, apparently unsatisfied with the mere title of being the most prolific hit man in Canadian history with 43 notches in his belt, added "homosexual pedophile" to his résumé after repeatedly having sex with a teenage boy unaware of his villainous past. Trudeau had served a mere seven years in prison from 1986 to 1993, a result of having turned informant. He has been on welfare since 2002, around the time he took to being anally serviced by the lad. Trudeau pled mercy to the court, noting that fellow inmates aren't crazy about either informants or pedophiles, of which he is now officially both, as well as a mass murderer, of course. He was given four years.
Slipped her mind
Men don't usually complain of being raped by women, with one exception - the addict being treated at a special therapy centre in Sherbrooke who ended up snuggling with a fellow addict named Chantal Blanchette, 35. After coupling, Blanchette mentioned to him that she's had AIDS for 10 years. According to law you've got to disclose such a fact prior to copulation. The plaintiff, named Alain, also later learned that Blanchette is a transsexual. Blanchette pled guilty to aggravated assault and will be sentenced in January.
Another bum-pinching menace to society
Léo Pelletier, 54, caressed the backsides of four women on Cartier Avenue in Quebec City, a deed that merited six months in the cooler. A judge deemed the Agriculture Ministry economist's misdeed more serious because he made the mistake of including a minor among the recipients of the Benny Hill handshake and was also caught drunk driving while awaiting trial. The judge speculated that Pelletier was suffering from "toucherisme" as a result of psychological trauma caused by his prostate cancer.
Prison rape is nothing compared to fights over the remote
When convicted cocaine dealer Gregory Papadakis tried changing the channel in a Gatineau prison, fellow inmate Denis Philion disagreed with the choice of station. He pushed Papadakis down, injuring him. This all happened on Dec. 31, 1991, but after years bouncing around courts, a judge finally decided that Philion would have to pony up $60,000 to the victim of the TV remote fracas.
And they called it puppy love
When chef Mehmet Yildrim, 42, saw a hot 83-year-old woman at the restaurant he worked at last March, he went into seduction mode. Yildrim flattered the old lady's appearance, put his hand on her thigh and got her phone number. The Turkish-born cook is said to have later visited the wrinkly octogenarian at her Thetford Mines home, where he felt up her apparently ageless body for about an hour. When he returned for more grandmotherly lovin' the next day, the woman complained and had him arrested on charges of sexual assault. He faces more court appearances next year.
Not enough pepper in the pepper spray
In April, Jeremiah Thomas, serving a murder sentence at Donnacona prison, stabbed fellow inmate Saalim Speede to death. Prison guards nearby had tried to stop the attack by dousing the aggressor with pepper spray, which they later acknowledge didn't even slow him down. Prison officials were left pondering their recipe for pepper spray.
I confess. I did it. What's the crime again?
Quebec City police were high-fiving each other for getting Simon Marshall to confess to a series of sexual assaults, for which he served 62 months, even though the victims failed to identify him as the attacker. In prison, he was thrice denied parole, as he was deemed a danger to the public. Authorities started feeling a little sheepish when he walked through the door this summer and confessed to demanding a BJ at knifepoint in Place Laurier - even after DNA evidence proved he didn't commit the act. Now authorities are wondering if the simpleminded man's real problem is confessing to crimes he hears about on TV.
Duelling vibrator cat fight
Sex shop owner Huguette Tremblay of La Clé du Plaisir in Beauport accepted a misdelivered packaged destined to a competitor containing 70 vibrators, costing $1,082. When she passed them on to their proper owner, Veronique Fuchs's Love Boutique, the package was 20 plastic penises short. Trémblay was convicted of fraud for nabbing the dildos but given an unconditional discharge.
No sickos here
Remember Daniel Cormier, 53, the anti-Gay Games preacher who ran for mayor in 2001? In March the proselytizing zealot was charged with sexing up an 11-year-old girl, whom he referred to as his "wife." It was one of a series of child-loving misdeeds he is alleged to have committed between 1993 and 2002. The former Wisdom Party mayoral candidate was accused of taking advantage of youth he met in his work with downtown homeless and street youth. His trial continues next year.
Babysitter must eat poo-poo
A 28-year-old mother in St-Anne-de-Beaupré was sentenced to two years less a day for visiting her babysitter with a friend and beating him and forcing him to eat his own excrement and drink his own urine. The mother was angry that the babysitting 18-year-old boy, considered slightly retarded, had allegedly sexually assaulted her seven- and three-year-olds. The duo detained the boy for over an hour and threatened to detach his penis. The boy faces charges of sexual assault on the minors.
Man-child court
A 34-year-old Terrebonne father of three was tried as a minor after a cold case squad linked him to the murder of Paul-Emile Bértrand, 56, in a botched robbery on Beaubien in October 1986. Investigators found DNA evidence that pointed to the textile worker, whose name is withheld as he was a minor at the time of the crime. The man is the first adult to be tried in Quebec youth court. He pled guilty to involuntary homicide and was sentenced to two years less a day, served in the community.
Home renovations cost more these days
Pierre Saintonge, 55 and Marc Denicolai, 47, were doing repairs on the house of an 81-year-old woman in Vieux Longueuil, who paid them in cash for their work. The men worked a gruelling two hours a day for seven months and charged her half-a-million for their labours, which started in March 2002. They were busted this year: Saintonge got five years in prison, Denicolai two years less a day. Both were ordered to pay back the dough.
Something to do in St-Eustache
In early October, Jonathan Bonneau, 20, of St-Eustache, was charged with building three bombs with butane, air purifier, propane, etc. and popping one in the dumpster behind the local Dollarama. Police say he then put one in a Saturn and then an SUV, leaving $60,000 of damage in his wake. Another bomb failed to blow and cops say they quickly lifted his fingerprints off the tape holding that one together.
Breaking up is hard to do
Annie Simard, 31, a Boisbriand mother of two, was dumped by her boyfriend Gilles Ravel, 35. The couple had been lovers for 12 years. Police say she went to his house, knocked him out with a Mickey Finn and, as he was falling asleep from the spiked cocktail, strangled him with a rope. But Ravel didn't quite succumb, and indeed recovered enough to call 911. Simard was charged with attempted murder the next day.
The naughty schoolteacher
Former Lachute city council candidate Louis Laurin, a private school teacher, was sentenced to three years for turning a 14-year-old into his mistress. Although his wife was seen participating in some of the videos, the court let her off, mainly because of her "passive" role. The couple separated, and the once-praised schoolteacher declared bankruptcy.
A lame business plan
When Steve Parizeault lost a leg in a train mishap, he was compensated with enough cash to buy an apartment building for his mom and cars for his brothers. He also had enough loot to start his own business as a crack cocaine dealer. It wasn't a great career choice, as the Rough Riders Gang in LaSalle warned him repeatedly that he was encroaching on their turf. On January 17, the one-legged dealer was gunned down. Alleged gang member Daryl Griffith, 18, was charged with the murder.
Shopaholic mother turns fraud artist
Quebec City's Lise Giguère, scored a windfall with compensation cash when cop hubby Jacques was killed by a crooked colleague Serge Lefebvre in 1985. Giguère promptly became a spendaholic. After the cash ran out, she got a job at Robert Bury construction supplies, whom she bilked for $966,500 by manipulating the payroll before being nailed this year. Before getting two years, she told the judge that she blamed her employer for their poor surveillance of her work, and was trying to compensate for her children's lack of a father with heaps of consumer goods.
Some wet dream
At a trial in Hull, a 49-year-old man argued that he wasn't guilty of molesting a 14-year-old girl in March 2002 because he did it while sleepwalking. It didn't work. He was found guilty but is appealing.
I SAID I LIKE MY STEAK RARE!!!!
Sophie Lévesque and Christian Dussault of Val-Bélair invited Stéphane Laroche to dinner in August. Police say that Laroche, for reasons unclear, entered and committed the social faux pas of attempting to kill his hosts with a knife. Both survived the bad table manners and Laroche was charged with attempted murder.
Valentine's surprise
Tak Fu Deer bunked on the top and his sister Lai-Wah, 51, bunked on the bottom in their Rosemont apartment until the day she irritated him by accusing him of mooching food. He strangled her on Valentine's Day. Deer left her dead in bed until she was found by relatives several days later, her face apparently having been nibbled at by rats running rampant in the home. He was brought into the Pinel Institute for long-term psychiatric evaluation.
Finally a store that welcomes shoplifters!
Maria Milagros Pardes Pinedo, 33, and Kelly Aliago Castro, 24, were busted at 6442 St-Laurent for allegedly running a store that specialized in shoplifted clothing. They had 2,000 articles worth $250,000. Their thievin' suppliers weren't caught.
Love knows no bounds
A 14-year-old from Donnacona was found guilty in August of smacking her sleeping stepfather on the head with a skillet and then stabbing him to death. She was upset because he agreed with her mom that she shouldn't continue dating her 20-year-old boyfriend.
He could always try tunnelling out of prison
Celebrity criminal Marcel Talon, best known for his attempt to tunnel into the Bank of Montreal in 1993, believed he had won immunity for past crimes. This led him to confess to two bombing murders in his autobiography. It was such a hit that it was made into the movie Le Dernier tunnel. Unfortunately prosecutors didn't consider him as immune as he considered himself. His confessed crimes led them to formally charge him with murder this year.
A backside to be admired from a distance
MC Mario, who was recently found guilty of sexual assault after a February 2002 smoochfest in St-Jérôme, explained that he was only accused because one of the victims was offended when he mistakenly assumed she was a prostitute. In an interview with Photo Police prior to the verdict, Mario had expressed mixed feelings about his accuser. "She's got quite a personality, but she's also got an amazing bum."
posted by John Allore @ 12/24/2004 02:18:00 PM
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