A man allegedly shot his wife in her sleep before lying down next to her and taking his own life early Wednesday morning in a residence in Lac-Superieur. The murder took place just hours after meeting with a lawyer to begin the divorce process.
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According to our information, Mario Nadon, 67, killed his wife Louise Houle, 70, on Wednesday night using a gun.
He then allegedly ingested a large quantity of medication, before lying down next to his wife and breathing his last.
It was members of the victim’s family who made the horrible discovery Wednesday morning, around 9:15 a.m.
MAXIME DELAND/AGENCE QMI
According to M’s brotherme Houle, it was the meeting with the lawyer that would have changed everything. “I think that’s the trigger,” says Pierre Houle.
News of the tragedy spread like wildfire in the village of barely 2,000 inhabitants.
“Louise was there, to make this request. Common life no longer worked much. But she never said she felt threatened. We think it was the meeting with the lawyer that made everything unravel,” adds the victim’s brother, visibly shaken.
The couple’s immediate neighbor also knew that things had not been going well for quite some time.
“Things haven’t been going too well between the two for a while now. But at this point? I could never have believed, says Vianney Ladouceur, the victims’ immediate neighbor. He lived in the basement. She lived upstairs.”
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Mr. Ladouceur understood that something had happened to his neighbors when he saw numerous Sûreté du Québec patrol cars pass in front of his house in the morning.
“At the time, I thought that Louise might have had a heart attack. Never in my life would I have thought that Mario could do something like this. We hear of similar cases in Montreal, but not here,” he continues.
“But you know, us guys don’t talk too much about our emotions or our relationship problems. If he had told me about what he planned to do to Louise, I would definitely have said to him: Mario, calisse! You have a child, you are retired, you have everything to be happy!”
MAXIME DELAND/AGENCE QMI
By mid-afternoon, the couple’s residence was protected by security tape. Personal crimes investigators had just arrived on scene, as had forensic identification technicians.
This would be the eighth woman murdered in the province since the start of the year and the fifth in a domestic context.
–With Camille Payant and Frédérique Giguère