Outgoing Longueuil police chief Fady Dagher wrote a lengthy letter to his mayor explaining he had no choice but to leave his post, about an hour after being selected to lead Montreal police .
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“I can’t say ‘no’ when the police, who are dealing with 72% of crime in Quebec, ask me for help,” wrote Fady Dagher, in his letter of resignation which he addressed personally to Catherine Fournier. , Mayor of Longueuil, and of which we have obtained a copy.
In the missive, Fady Dagher gives the impression of a man who feels tormented, who needs to justify this sudden departure, when he had just renewed an eight-year contract with the police of Longueuil (SPAL) a few months earlier.
“So why quit, it doesn’t make any sense, do you have to think? You are right. […] I gained nothing from […]. When I am entrusted with an important mission, even risky, dangerous, I cannot say no. I would have the impression of lacking courage,” he says.
And he adds: “I know that I am risking my reputation, my career and my health […]. I am here to serve. Where I’m needed.”
Courted very early
Mr. Dagher personally submitted this letter to the general management of the City on November 23, around 4 p.m., after his selection interview with the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM), Raphaël Larocque told us in writing. Cyr, communications advisor at the City of Longueuil.
Moreover, the fact of having deposited the letter so quickly only increases the feeling that Mr. Dagher was chosen well before the interviews of November 23rd.
“Why did you do a public consultation to establish what you were looking for as a leader and do this bogus process? In the police community, everyone knew that if Fady applied, the position belonged to him, ”said André Durocher, the former inspector and head of the Media Relations Section at the SPVM.
To this end, a source at the City of Montreal, whose identity we cannot reveal, told us that “the selection of Fady was remotely guided by Martin Prud’homme, as was done with Sylvain Caron in 2018” .
However, Fady Dagher may have been courted by the Plante administration much earlier than what could have filtered through the media; maybe as early as the beginning of the year, depending on what transpires in his letter.
But he refused, because he felt that the Longueuil police (SPAL) were not yet ready to shine without him at the start of the year:
“That’s why I said ‘no’ repeatedly,” he wrote.
Not a goodbye
The outgoing head of SPAL ends his letter by seeking to reassure the mayor.
“So it’s not a farewell. […] And I have the feeling, no, the certainty that one way or another, and maybe sooner than expected, you and I will continue to work together.”