In 2004, a teenage girl denounced sexual assault by the father of a DPJ foster family. She was not believed and Youth Protection continued to send vulnerable young people there until 2021. Result: not only did the man make other victims, but a culture of rape was established in the house, where minors were attacking each other and where two other adults are accused of having committed abuse.
It took the denunciation of another young resident, this time in 2021, for Youth Protection to act. An investigation of The Press reveals six victims and eight attackers and alleged attackers, including three adult men, over a period of 16 years, in this Quebec foster family where nearly 70 children and adolescents were housed.
“Where was the DPJ? Nobody saw anything? My daughter, she will be marked until the end of her days,” confided the mother of this victim in an interview.
An ignored victim
Catherine* was 12 years old when she moved in with Éric Jean and his partner in 2004. She was not a child of the DPJ. Her parents, neighbors of the couple in Val-Bélair, were separating and the young teenager wanted to continue attending her school. As they were already acting as a host family for several other young people, Mr. Jean and his partner agreed to take her in.
The story of the attacks she suffered passed the test of the courts. Éric Jean pleaded guilty in 2023 to several sex crimes against himself and that of another victim. The hearing made headlines. We had access to the joint account of the facts filed in court, signed by Éric Jean.
One evening, Mr. Jean gave her a French vanilla coffee to which he had added sleeping pills. When Catherine woke up in the middle of the night, she was naked on the basement sofa bed, stunned and confused.
PHOTO ARCHIVES THE SUN
Éric Jean at the Quebec courthouse on November 6, 2023
In the following weeks, Mr. Jean offered to accompany him to his partner’s brother. On the way, he stopped at Tim Hortons and ordered a French vanilla coffee. She drank it, then she lost the card. But flashes of what happened next still haunt him. The man who lifts his sweater while driving. Him who penetrates her and the brother-in-law who allegedly attacked her. The latter, David Hudon, was accused in 2023 for this event.
According to the summary of the facts, back in Val-Bélair, Catherine confided in Éric’s brother Jean. She doesn’t really understand what’s happening to her.
Rather than calling the police, he suggests that she no longer drink the coffees that Éric Jean offers her. What she does. It is therefore completely lucid that she will undergo a third assault, a complete sexual relationship in the basement of the house.
One morning, before leaving for school, the pre-teen girl summons up her courage. She goes to the kitchen and tells her host mother that Eric raped her. The latter does not believe her, court documents reveal.
Catherine remembers that three witnesses were present that day: Eric and two friends of the couple. His memory was confirmed at The Press by two people who were aware of the event at the time it occurred. None of the witnesses contacted the police.
“ [La conjointe de M. Jean] told me to go to school, that we would talk about it later,” said the victim, now an adult, in an interview with The Press.
She will never return to Éric Jean.
Rather, it was workers from the DPJ who went to pick her up from school. “I was in my French class. They searched my locker. Total humiliation,” says the victim.
According to her story, it was the mother of the host family who asked the DPJ to take her in. “She told them I had behavioral problems and was using drugs. »
Catherine remembers that she was taken to the Le Gouvernail youth center in Quebec. She claims to have told two DPJ workers that she had been raped by Éric Jean. This time again, she was not believed.
There is no written record of her time at the DPJ, but her denunciation was corroborated by several people around her to whom she spoke about it over the years. First by her father, who went to pick her up in 2004 from the youth center. “They called me to tell me that my daughter had done something serious. They didn’t want to tell me what she had done,” he recalls.
Then by her sister, to whom she spoke about it several times in the last 10 years, and to whom she always told the same story. Finally by her best friend, in whom she began to confide around the same time.
For Catherine, the attacks, but also the fact of not having been believed, were catastrophic. “It devastated me. It took me a long time to get over it. I had a very difficult adolescence. I dropped out of school. It ruined all my relationships. It gave me panic attacks. »
At least five other victims
What she didn’t know until recently was that she wasn’t the only victim. After his departure from the foster family, at least five other minors were allegedly subjected to sexual abuse, at the hands of Éric Jean, but also other alleged attackers, our investigation reveals.
In May 2021, a 15-year-old girl, whom we will call Jade, reported to the police multiple attacks committed by Éric Jean.
The attacks began when she was only 9 years old and lasted for almost six years (see other text).
Until its denunciation, the foster family was considered an “excellent” environment, where those involved were very inclined to send young people, in particular because of the very strong bond of attachment that they developed with their parents. welcome.
Catherine joined the complaint, and it was in this case that the man pleaded guilty, in November 2023, to having abused the two victims. From there, things took off.
Eric Jean’s son, Chrystopher Jean, was also accused of a sexual crime against Jade when he was just an adult. He is awaiting his trial.
Eric Jean’s brother-in-law, David Hudon, will also have a trial, this time for the alleged assault he allegedly committed on Catherine in 2004. All these years, he had continued to have access to vulnerable young people who lived with his sister.
The horror that was revealed to the court in these cases is only the tip of the iceberg.
Quebec City police officers have identified another alleged victim of Éric Jean: a young person who had also been placed in this house by Youth Protection and who is now an adult. His case is not currently before the court.
A fourth woman, who was around the family, also told The Press having been assaulted by Mr. Jean as a teenager. Her testimony was corroborated by one of her relatives, but she did not file a complaint with the police.
To these four alleged victims are added two others, boys, who were allegedly attacked by other young people placed in the resource, according to two sources from the health and social services network who are not authorized to speak to the media. . “The young people attacked each other,” summarizes one of these sources.
In total, five minors who lived in this house were identified as alleged attackers by the DPJ, according to our sources. One of these teenagers was accused of sex crimes against Jade in youth court. His identity is protected by law.
“The DPJ blames me for not trusting them, but they scrapped my daughter,” rages Jade’s mother. “What I’m wondering is why they didn’t close the resource [il y a 20 ans]. »
Catherine still lives with a lot of anger. And guilt. For not having continued to denounce. “But when I said it, I got locked up. So I didn’t talk about it anymore,” she says.
She requested, through the law of access to personal documents, her file from the DPJ to prove that she had denounced. He was told there was nothing. The file was probably destroyed after five years, as dictated by law. Youth Protection Act before 2022.
Questioned by The Pressthe CIUSSS de la Capitale-Nationale claims to have only been informed for the first time in May 2021 of “elements concerning sexual assaults which would have been committed in this reception environment”.
“A first report is then retained and a series of checks and actions are carried out, including an exhaustive investigation of children housed in this environment and who could also have been victims of sexual abuse,” indicates spokesperson Mélanie Otis. . She indicates that she cannot share the conclusions of this internal investigation.
“Due to ongoing and upcoming legal proceedings, it is not possible to provide further information regarding this situation. »
Lawyer Valérie Assouline, who represents Jade and Catherine, is preparing to file a lawsuit against the CIUSSS de la Capitale-Nationale “on behalf of young people who have been abused in this environment,” she says. “The DPJ is responsible. »
*The law prohibits us from identifying victims by their real name.
With the collaboration of Daniel Renaud and Gabriel Béland, The Press