Véronique Manceaux calls for a new trial. She is appealing her guilty verdict for the first degree murder of Jimmy Méthot. The defense accuses the judge of having made several errors during the trial, including the presentation of the testimony of the other murderer.
Jimmy Méthot was kidnapped, stabbed and tortured by his executioners, one night in September 2021 in the residence of Véronique Manceaux in the LaSalle borough of Montreal. According to a jury, the 28-year-old woman actively participated in the murder of the young man, killed in front of several witnesses and accomplices. Everyone would then clean up the scene for days.
At the beginning of May, Judge Daniel Royer sentenced Véronique Manceaux to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 25 years, as prescribed by law. But in an unusual intervention, Judge Royer undermined the quality of the Crown’s evidence. He highlighted the unconvincing evidence of premeditation and witnesses of “questionable morality.”
The Crown’s case relied primarily on two very flawed witnesses. First, the victim’s girlfriend and friend of the accused, a woman awaiting trial for her crimes. His testimony was confusing at trial. The second witness: a 17-year-old teenager who pleaded guilty to first degree murder in the Youth Chamber. He caused the commotion at the trial by refusing to testify. He said he didn’t even know the name of his victim.
It was therefore his testimony prior to the preliminary investigation which was presented to the jury. A decisive testimony, since the witness placed almost all the blame on Véronique Manceaux. In the notice of appeal filed Monday at the Quebec Court of Appeal, Mr.e Fanie Lacroix criticizes Judge Royer for allowing this testimony to be filed as evidence.
” The judge […] erred in law in its instructions by allowing the jury to conclude a conviction based on non-credible testimony not supported by the physical evidence, causing an unreasonable verdict,” the appellant writes.
Moreover, when imposing the sentence, Judge Royer said that the Crown’s evidence was “unconfirmed” and came from witnesses who participated in the crime or who were testifying while awaiting trial.
The defense also criticizes the judge for having allowed evidence of bad character and for having summarized “mostly exculpatory evidence” in his instructions to the jury. Another reason for appeal: the partial exclusion of the evidence obtained in the context of the arrest of Véronique Manceaux.
At first instance, Me Carl Devost teamed up with Me Fanie Lacroix. Me Marie-Claude Bourassa and Me Jasmine Guillaume represented the Director of Criminal and Penal Prosecutions (DPCP).