“My life was the patrol”: the SQ agent victim of an attempted murder in Beauce will no longer be able to be a police officer due to the injuries she suffered in the attack

“I wanted to testify in uniform, but I was unable to wear it, since I will never be able to return to service.” The policewoman victim of an attempted murder in Beauce recounted on Wednesday how Marco Rodrigue stole her career by shooting her in August 2021.

• Also read: Marco Rodrigue guilty of attempted murder of a policewoman

• Also read: Attempted murder of a Sûreté du Québec police officer: “I didn’t want to die that day”

Catherine Giroux courageously appeared before Judge Louis Dionne on Wednesday as part of observations on the sentence to be imposed on the man who tried to kill her.

The policewoman is clear. On August 18, 2021, Marco Rodrigue took everything from him.

“He took away my career, my passion. He took away part of my daughter’s adolescence and gave my partner and my loved ones a nightmare,” testified M.^me Giroux, insisting that “the Catherine before” unfortunately no longer existed.

“My life is destroyed by these events.”

• Also read: Up to 18 years requested against Marco Rodrigue for attempted murder of a policewoman

Numerous after-effects

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She knows nothing about it, and this uncertainty eats away at her, three years after the tragedy from which she miraculously emerged alive. Without her reflex to lean to the left when the shot went off, she recalled that she would have received the bullet “in the face.”

From “the girl who sometimes had to sit down to slow her down”, she became the one “who has difficulty getting through her days”. The physical consequences are very numerous.

In particular, she has had to go to the physiotherapist or occupational therapist 243 times since the attempted murder. She also underwent three surgeries to reconstruct her left hand, in addition to another to remove projectile fragments lodged in her eyes. She is not safe from further surgeries or complications in the future.

“Every month, my fingers become more and more crooked. I suffer from traumatic osteoarthritis, and the doctors told me that I have the hand of a 90-year-old person,” said Officer Giroux.

Then, in addition to the physical pain that is always present, there is great psychological distress. All accompanied by dark thoughts, she confessed.

“Living with me every day has become difficult.”

“I loved my job”

Catherine Giroux has taken over certain administrative tasks, but at the station, nothing is the same, she said with emotion.

Even today, she struggles to accept the fact that doctors told her that she would have to “find a plan B,” unable to return to patrol or even work on criminal investigations.

“My life was patrol. I loved my job,” recalled Agent Giroux, in tears, adding in a heartbreaking way that she could not yet “fully love” the Catherine she has become since Marco Rodrigue placed the sights of his rifle on her.

“In my heart, I am a police force.”