(Quebec) The saber killer of Old Quebec has just been found criminally responsible for his murders by a jury on Wednesday at the Quebec City courthouse.
Posted at 2:55 p.m.
The 11 jurors rendered a unanimous judgment after five days of deliberation. They did not believe the defendant’s thesis that he was delirious when he attacked seven innocent passers-by on Halloween night 2020.
The jury therefore found him guilty of two first degree murders and five attempted murders. Girouard’s sentence will be known later.
The 26-year-old’s trial lasted four weeks. From the start, he admitted to having shot François Duchesne, 56, and Suzanne Clermont, 61, in addition to attacking five other passers-by.
But the defense tried unsuccessfully to convince the jury that the killer was not criminally responsible and suffered from schizophrenia. According to psychiatrist Gilles Chamberland, the young man had developed a delirium exacerbated by cannabis and video games, in which he had to kill innocent people with a katana to prove his courage. According to the defense expert, the young man could not have known that what he was doing was wrong.
The Crown has produced the expert opinions of neuropsychologist William Pothier and psychiatrist Sylvain Faucher. These experts told the court that Girouard was probably not schizophrenic or delirious at the time of the gestures.
This avoidant narcissist had rather developed a fantasy to give himself importance and to take revenge on this society in which he did not find his place.
It is ultimately the thesis of the prosecution that the jurors retained. Four verdicts were possible in this case: first degree murder, second degree murder, manslaughter and not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder.