Montreal law students convince federal justice minister to review two convictions

A lawyer walks past the courthouse in Montreal on July 12, 2023. (Christinne Muschi/The Canadian Press)

Over the past year, a Quebec non-profit that advocates for the wrongfully convicted has convinced the federal justice minister to take a second look at two cases in which people have been declared guilty.

Project Innocence Quebec says its work led Justice Minister Arif Virani in April to order a new trial in the case of Claude Paquin, a Quebec man convicted in 1983 on two counts of first-degree murder. And in October, the organization was able to have the case of M.R., an individual convicted of sex assault against a minor in 2002, returned to the Quebec Court of Appeal for a new hearing.

Nicholas Saint-Jacques, vice-president of Innocence Quebec and a lecturer at the department of judicial sciences at Université du Québec à Montréal, said it's no simple matter to have a case returned to court after a verdict has been issued.

"We are talking about one or two cases a year in Canada for which the minister of justice will grant a corrective action," Saint-Jacques said.

"For us to succeed in a case of this nature is indeed a very big victory."

Paquin's case dates back to events from 1978. He was convicted of murder in 1983 and lost his appeal in 1987. One year later, the Supreme Court of Canada refused to grant a request for leave to appeal.

Now on full parole, Paquin sought a criminal conviction review in January 2020. Project Innocence Quebec has been working on Paquin's file since that year.

On April 29, Virani's office said in a statement that the minister "has determined that there are reasonable grounds to conclude that a miscarriage of justice likely occurred" in Paquin's case. "This determination is a result of the identification of new and significant information that was not submitted to the courts at the time of Mr. Paquin’s trial or appeal, calling into question the overall fairness of the process."

Saint-Jacques said that gathering case details, tracking down witnesses and rebuilding the file can take several years.

"Just putting the file together, putting the puzzle together again, it's very complicated because there are documents that are lost, documents that are found and there are several lawyers who handled the case," he explained.

In Paquin's case, 40 years have passed and many witnesses are no longer alive. "The evidence was based on the testimony of an informant. So, if that informant no longer co-operates with the state, it will be quite difficult to continue with a trial," Saint-Jacques said.

Project Innocence Quebec is an initiative of Lida Sara Nouraie, who began the effort in 2002 as a student. She was named as a judge to the Quebec court last November, putting an end to her implication with the group.

Since 2006, Innocence Quebec has been part of a course at UQAM, where students work on real cases involving judicial errors, while being supervised by a lawyer.

Working on potential wrongful convictions is a tremendous learning opportunity, Saint-Jacques said.

"It makes them aware of criminal law and also of doing one's job well as a lawyer because they are future lawyers who will eventually practise and they can see errors that have been committed by lawyers, by judges, by police officers as well," he said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 18, 2024.

— With files from Sidhartha Banerjee in Montreal.