Straight to the point | Should a voyeur’s diploma influence justice?

For three years, Simon Lamarre slipped his phone under the skirts of teenage girls. He followed some of them to the pool to film their crotch.

But today, it is in the “public interest” that this man is free from a criminal record, Judge Jean-Jacques Gagné tells us without laughing. You see, Mr. Lamarre has a doctorate. He’s doing research. We should not “neutralize the knowledge of the accused” and deprive society of it. The judge therefore granted him absolution.

This decision is as astonishing as it is shocking.

It is normal that we take into account the impact of a criminal record on the life of an accused when determining a sentence. But to say that it is society that benefits from this absolution and not Simon Lamarre himself, is to push the plug very far. The Minister of Education somehow reversed the decision by withdrawing Simon Lamarre’s teaching license.

The judge’s words give the unpleasant impression that Mr. Lamarre obtained the virginity of his criminal record with his doctorate. And they open the door to justice based on the social status of an accused, while his “usefulness” to society is subjectively assessed by a judge. The most ironic? Simon Lamarre’s research focuses on the presence of men in teaching. Let’s say that the ex-teacher will not have done anything to promote it.