Friday september 12th, after one day of discussion, the jury just gave its verdict in the case of the protester accused of taking part to a riot during the Carnival against capitalism on april 20th, 2001: GUILTY.

september 12th, 2003

This mornig at 9h40, the maths teacher announced the unanimous verdict of the twelve jurors: guilty of participation to a riot. I didn t expect that, nor did my lawyer Poitras or the Crown prosecutor Quintin.
The Crown asked for 4 months of jail, and said that it was a serious crime, a defiance of the authority. He said that the fact of waving a red flag was worst than throwing one or two rocks to the police because it was encouraging others to do so (!). He said that I deserved a punishment that would have a dissuasive impact on violent protesters at international Summits and also for the St-Jean rioters.
The judge said that he didn t want to jail me, but he said that he agreed with the jury s decision and that he also though that it was a serious crime.He said that he doesn t agree with my ideas, but that I m free to believe what I want. Then he asked me if I would do community work, but he specify that he would oblige me to work with old people because he didn t want me to preach my ideas to the youth! He said that if I wanted to help the poor, he would give me an occasion to do so… I replied that I would probably do community work, then he ordered that they do a pre-sentecial repport. That means that I m going to meet with a probation agent in Montreal who will ask me tons of questions about my private life, the reasons why I committed this crime, if I have any remorse, my political opinions and affiliations, etc. In this report, the probation agent will suggest to the judge what would be a convenient punishment for me following his evaluation of my case. The date of my return in front of judge Grenier was set to… febuary 13th 2004! We may go into appeal, I will keep you up to date.
When I was about the exit the courtroom, two special constables told me that they had an arrest warrant against me for an unpaid ticket for postering in Verdun in November 2001. The detective Carl Pelletier, of the SQ Security Intelligence Service, had told my lawyer that he had made some verifications about this at the beginning of the trial… I signed a promise to appear for September 29th, then I had to face the journalist that jumped on me like vultures with their mics and their camera lights to ask me if I preferred going to jail than doing community work, what was my reaction to the verdict, etc. I answered that I didn t recognise any legitimacy of the judicial system and that I was surprised that the jury bought McLaren s theory. I also underlined the political aspect of this trial that was illustrated by Quintin s and the judge s words.
I went back to Montreal by hitchhiking and the first person who picked me up was a 23 years old soldier going to Kabul soon. I hope for him that they warned him about the guys with red flags…
in solidarity,
Francois