Sûreté du Québec | A year marked by the murders of women

Both on the territory of the Sûreté du Québec and that of the Police Department of the City of Montreal, the murders of women marked the year that is ending.

Daniel Renaud
Press

Even if the Sûreté du Québec (SQ) has fewer homicides than last year this year on its territory with 39 victims (as of December 13), 17 of them are women, or 43.5%.

Eight of these women were murdered in a conjugal context, describes the police, it is twice as many as in 2020. Three of these eight women were murdered in the Far North.

Six of those eight murders occurred earlier this year, including five in February and March alone.

Among these eight victims, let us quote in particular the names of Myriam Dallaire, 28 years old, and of her mother, Sylvie Bisson, 60 years old, killed on 1^er March in Sainte-Sophie, in the Laurentians. M’s ex-spouse^me Dallaire was arrested and charged with these crimes.

“Of course there is a link with the pandemic. We had four murders of women committed in a conjugal context last year, compared to eight this year, ”said Sergeant Mathieu Boulianne, of Crimes Against the Person of the SQ.

“Specialists say that conflicts can arise when people are always together in confinement, teleworking, or limited by other constraints”, adds his superior, Captain Marc Lépine.

Two women were also victims of murders that the police describe as free: Manon Savoie, 54, stabbed at random in a jewelry store in a shopping center in Saint-Hyacinthe on August 11, and Patricia Sirois, 35, shot dead while she was driving in Saint-Raymond-de-Portneuf on September 10.

Another woman, Jeannine Perron-Ruel, 80, was murdered in the context of an argument between neighbors in Coaticook at the beginning of December.

As of December 13, the SQ also had two murders of children, two less than in 2020.

In contrast, 9 of the 39 victims – a quarter – are indigenous. “It’s huge compared to the total population of Quebec,” said Captain Lépine, according to whom his investigators even had to return twice, for two murders, to Puvirnituq, a locality of 1,700 inhabitants, in 2021.

Falling gun murders

It should be noted that while gunfire events are rife in Montreal, gun murders have decreased in SQ territory in 2021, from 16 in 2020 to 9 this year (as of December 13).

Sign of a certain calm in this environment, murders linked to organized crime were few in 2021.

Note, however, the assassination of gang leader Arsène Mompoint, committed under the eyes of several individuals seated with him in a cannabis store in the indigenous territory of Kanesatake on 1^er July.

“Organized crime hasn’t stopped during the pandemic, but it’s calmer. We must also take into account the means we are taking to curb organized crime, which is always worked in a mixed team. The problem right now is really with street gangs. We consider ourselves lucky: the gangs are in urban areas, and we have no shootings linked to these groups in our territory, ”said Captain Lépine.

“Except that today, murders are committed in front of everyone, anywhere, anytime, anytime. See the young man shot in Laval while he was in a library recently, ”he continues.

The SQ’s Crimes Against the Person investigators also deal with other types of crimes, including kidnappings, AMBER alerts and Net operations, aimed at reasoning with people who have barricaded themselves in their homes and pose a danger to themselves. or others.

In addition to the murders of two women in Sainte-Sophie and of the gang leader Mompoint, the manhunt that has long kept the police in suspense in the Sainte-Paule sector, in the Bas-du-Fleuve, following the triggering of an AMBER alert in September, is another of the highlights of the year in Crimes against the Person of the SQ.

“We had 250 police officers in a town of 200 inhabitants,” said Captain Lépine.

“It was another big year. The investigators worked very hard, ”concludes his assistant, Sergeant Boulianne, also underlining the triggering of four AMBER alerts in 2021.

To reach Daniel Renaud, dial 514 285-7000, extension 4918, write to [email protected] or write to the postal address of Press.