One of the individuals accused of assaulting Pietro Poletti at his home in June 2020 denies having wanted to kill the former SPVM investigator.
Posted at 6:00 a.m.
This individual, Yadley Deutz-St-Jean, and an alleged accomplice, Mitchaino Bruno, have been facing trial since Monday for assault with a weapon, assault with bodily harm, death threats, forcible confinement and mischief. Deutz-St-Jean is also charged with possession of a firearm.
On Tuesday, Pietro Poletti testified and recounted the attack he had suffered. He said that during the altercation he heard one of the suspects shouting, “Kill him!” »
On Wednesday, the prosecutor, Mr.e Philippe Vallières-Roland, filed a one-minute video taken from the interrogation of Deutz-St-Jean, conducted the night following his arrest, the same day of the attack, June 12, 2020.
“I’m asking you a simple question: did you intend to kill him?” “, asks an investigator from the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM) in Deutz-St-Jean, who wears a medical mask and who is lying on a chair, his eyes closed.
After a silence of a few seconds, Deutz-St-Jean replies, a little nonchalantly: “I think the photos speak for themselves. If we had wanted to kill him, he would have died. »
During the arrest of the four suspects, the afternoon of the day of the aggression, the police officers notably found in their car a shoulder bag containing a firearm.
The expertise carried out on the weapon did not reveal the presence of any fingerprints or traces of DNA.
One of the four suspects, the one driving the car, Louis-Simon Jacques, testified against his two former alleged accomplices on Wednesday and formally identified them.
In particular, he stated that the shoulder bag containing the weapon had remained in the car while the three other suspects assaulted Mr. Poletti.
Paid in crack and gasoline
Louis-Simon Jacques testified behind a screen, hidden from view of the defendants.
He said he knew Deutz-St-Jean in November 2019, when the latter provided him with crack.
One day, Jacques found himself short of money and Deutz-St-Jean made him his driver; he paid him $120 a day, an amount that was used to pay for his drugs and gas for the vehicle.
“On the morning of June 12, 2020, around 10 a.m., he asked me to pick them up from accommodation in Plateau Mont-Royal. They then asked me to go to a place and the passenger behind me [qu’il a identifié comme étant Bruno] directed me with the help of his phone’s GPS,” the witness described.
Once on rue Laplante, the passengers asked Jacques to park, open the trunk of his car and wait for them.
The three men got out of the car and returned at least five minutes later, running and shouting at Jacques to drive off immediately.
Subsequently, the quartet returned to the apartment, where Bruno stayed. They then shopped in Montreal-North and went to Varennes, then to Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu.
It was while returning near Montreal, on Route 116, that they were spotted by patrollers from the Longueuil agglomeration police department and were arrested.
“Might as well die”
The witness says he knew nothing of the crime while he was waiting in his car, until investigators questioned him after his arrest.
When Me Philippe Vallières-Roland asked him what he knew about this crime, Louis-Simon Jacques became very emotional.
I am mixed. I’m not good in there. You see in my face that it’s not going well. I’m hot and I shake. Might as well die.
Louis-Simon Jacques during his testimony against his two former alleged accomplices
Louis-Simon Jacques, however, kept his composure. He placed each of the attackers on each of the seats in his car.
He identified his former alleged accomplices on surveillance camera videos. A special constable briefly folded the screen and the witness identified Yadley Deutz-St-Jean and Mitchaino Bruno in the dock.
The key: the identification of the accused
In cross-examination, the lawyer for Deutz-St-Jean, Ms.e Alexie Galarneau, argued that Jacques was still impaired during his interrogation during the night following the assault on Mr. Poletti, that he said he had not slept for six days and that he sometimes lent his car . She also questioned him about the shoulder bag that contained the gun.
Bruno’s lawyer, Mr.e Noémie Tellier, tried to raise contradictions between the testimony of Jacques and the remarks he made during his interrogation, relating to the identification of his client.
Louis-Simon Jacques pleaded guilty to charges of aggravated assault and break and enter and was sentenced to 32 months in prison. He is currently on parole.
The fourth individual, Sandel Pierre, also pleaded guilty, but his sentence has not yet been pronounced.
To reach Daniel Renaud, dial 514 285-7000, ext. 4918, write to [email protected] or write to the postal address of The Press.