Assault at the London Jack in Quebec: predator Alexandre Turcot sentenced to an indeterminate sentence

“I hope that never again in your life do you regret being a woman.”

Judge Frank D’Amours addressed these compassionate words on Tuesday to the victim of Alexandre Turcot after sentencing the predator to an indefinite detention sentence and dangerous offender status for the sordid attack committed in the toilet from a restaurant-bar in Quebec in July 2021.

During the observations on the sentence, the young woman, who was strangled gratuitously by Turcot, courageously testified about the traumatic memories she kept from this evening when her life turned upside down. Recounting the moment when the offender laid eyes on her, the victim said she regretted “putting on her beautiful blue dress”.

• Also read: Strangled in the toilets of a Quebec bar: heartbreaking testimony of a gratuitous attack

«[J’espère que] when the summer season returns, you will not hesitate to wear any dress whatsoever,” the magistrate wished her at the end of an unequivocal decision in which he deplored that the young woman had encountered “the darkest part of being human”.

Cowardly and wanton attack

Remember that Turcot was found guilty of the four charges brought against him, namely serious assault, assault causing harm, false imprisonment and of strangling his victim with the aim of committing sexual assault.

• Also read: ‘Women are not objects’: Guilty of strangling random woman in bar toilet

The 45-year-old man was at the London Jack restaurant-bar on the evening of July 10, 2021 to celebrate the fact that for the first time in his adult life, he had not been incarcerated for a few months. The party was short-lived when he cowardly attacked his victim in the establishment’s toilets.

“There’s no point in arguing, it’s just going to take longer,” Turcot told her before she lost consciousness under the hands of the man, who abandoned her to her fate.

Only solution

In front of a criminal who is at his 95^e criminal sentence, including a seven-year sentence for robbery in 2014, Judge Frank D’Amours concluded he had no choice but to declare the man a dangerous offender.

At the same time, he sentenced him to an indefinite sentence.

“The court finds that the accused presents an unacceptable risk and [qu’il s’agit de] the only way to ensure adequate protection of society,” he wrote in his decision.

The judge also rejected the conclusions of the expert psychiatrist who assessed the offender and who recommended long-term offender status rather than dangerous offender status.

“The position of the psychiatrist is surprising,” insisted the judge, recalling that the violent, impulsive, unpredictable and extremely worrying behavior of the accused “exposes anyone to finding themselves alone in the face of an individual who has never been able to control his emotions. and his delinquent behavior.

Possible life sentence

Turcot is therefore now likely to spend the rest of his days in the penitentiary, explained the representative of the public prosecutor in the file, Mr.^e Louis-Philippe Desjardins.

“Every seven years, there will be a reassessment of the risk of dangerousness of this individual, and to the extent that the risk remains unbearable for society, he will not leave prison,” explained the prosecutor, adding that “these individuals do not generally come out of detention”.

To arrive at this conclusion, Judge D’Amours underlined Turcot’s numerous antecedents, but also his repeated failings since his return to detention. “Never today nor in the past has the accused demonstrated a real desire to change,” insists the magistrate.

As for the victim, still marked by the violent passage of the predator in her life, she left the courthouse with a slightly lighter heart, knowing her attacker was in no condition to attack another prey again. .

“I hope that this chapter can put an end to this horrible story,” the judge wished him.

Excerpts from the decision of Judge Frank D’Amours

• “The behaviors adopted have in common a violence which has no limit other than the satisfaction of the immediate needs of the accused.”
• “The tragedy experienced by the victim can practically be described as a tragedy foretold, except that it was impossible to know where, when and how the accused was going to repeat his violent behavior.”
• “As the Supreme Court states, releasing a dangerous offender while he remains incapable of self-control is in the interest of neither the offender nor society.”