The teenager who was arrested on Friday after three of his family members were stabbed to death in Montreal's Rosemont neighbourhood was charged with three counts of second-degree murder on Saturday.
Arthur Galarneau, 19, appeared in the Montreal courthouse by videoconference and was charged with killing Mylene Gingras, 53, Francine Gingras-Boucher, 75, and Richard Galarneau, 53.
Montreal police (SPVM) confirmed that all three victims were related to the accused, but would not confirm their relationship.
CTV News spoke with a neighbour who came to leave flowers outside the home where the victims died.
Phil Parisi says she was friends with Gingras-Boucher and had been her neighbour for 50 years.
She says the victims are the mother, father and grandmother of the accused.
“Beautiful family,” she says. “It’s a terrible tragedy.”
Gingras-Boucher owned the duplex but was planning to sell it and move to a condo to “start a new life, a new chapter in her life,” says Parisi, describing her friend as generous and kind.
The teenager's parents were divorced, and the father did not live in the duplex, according to Parisi.
She says Gingras-Boucher often spoke of her grandson, who she said suffered from depression, which worsened when the COVID-19 pandemic began.
“He was isolated. He wouldn’t go out,” she says. “He was keeping to himself, from what the grandmother was telling me.”
The accused was hospitalized in the past for mental health issues, according to Noovo sources.
“He was getting some help. Was it enough? I don’t know,” says Parisi.
The three deaths were the third, fourth, and fifth homicides on the Island of Montreal in 2023.
Galarneau will return to court on April 11.
-With files from CTV's Angela Mackenzie
