(Amqui) Pauline Desmarais and Jean Lafrenière were walking on the boulevard Saint-Benoît in Amqui on Monday when a man driving a van hit 11 innocent bystanders. The seriously injured woman is now in a Quebec hospital while her husband is one of the two pedestrians who lost their lives.
Posted at 5:00 am
Gabriel Beland The press
The drama hit like a bombshell in several circles where Jean and Pauline were loved. In the small village of Albertville, where Pauline was mayor and also ran the supermarket with her husband, the news hit “hard”. The dance club they went to twice a week is appalled.
“We had a meeting on Monday evening. Pauline was always on time. She didn’t get there and we didn’t understand. When the phone rang, we understood,” says her friend Jacqueline Dion, treasurer of the dance club Amitié d’Amqui.
Pauline and Jean were regulars at the dance club, which they attended religiously twice a week. Pauline was even her secretary.
PHOTO FROM FACEBOOK
Pauline Desmarais
PHOTO FROM FACEBOOK
Jean Lafreniere
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The club vice president arrived at the scene of the tragedy ahead of first responders on Monday. Real Gonthier left as usual. Then suddenly the horror.
“I saw a gentleman on the ground and it was my cousin’s husband. I saw a lot more than I wanted to see, he said. Then I saw people massaging Mr. Lafrenière. Then they put the blanket over him. »
The death of 73-year-old Jean Lafrenière and Pauline Desmarais’ struggle in hospital have left the dance club in dismay.
There we nervously await news. We hope she pulls through. It affects everyone in the club enormously.
True Gonthier
The dance club must decide what to do with their next activities on the calendar. Should we cancel them? One thing is for sure, the next meeting will be an opportunity to stick together. “It will be a reunion, an opportunity to speak about the missing,” says Mr. Gonthier.
Meanwhile, these friends remember very nice people who talked to everyone, or even a “beautiful united couple”.
“They had a community spirit, the idea of having fun together,” recalls Bertrand Dubé, also a member of the club. What is happening, we have no words to understand. »
Albertville in shock
Monday’s truck attack also had the effect of a bomb in the village of Albertville. Pauline was mayor in the early 1990s and ran a supermarket with Jean in the center of the village.
The small commune of 226 people was also struck by the death of Gérald Charest, 65, the other pedestrian who lost his life alongside Jean Lafrenière. That’s because, like Pauline, Mr. Charest was from the village.
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Gerald Charest
“The two dead are people from their homeland. It’s like falling on our house, notes Albertville Mayor Martin Landry. It spanked, in good Quebec. This comes as a shock to many people. Why him? Why she ? »
The mayor admits that the village has been shaken. “It’s more impersonal if you don’t know the people when it happens somewhere else. It’s no less dramatic, but more impersonal, he says. If it’s people you know well, it’s more noticeable. »
“It hits hard there,” he interjects.
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, THE PRESS
Martin Landry, Mayor of Albertville
The mayor is now trying to find out about Pauline Desmarais’ condition through family members. In the latest news, the Sûreté du Québec was still talking about three people fighting for their lives.
Remember Steve Gagnon, 38, has been charged with dangerous driving resulting in death. The Crown is not ruling out the possibility of a murder charge if the investigation allows.
The motives of the man who, according to the police, intentionally drove into the pedestrians, are still unknown. Steve Gagnon didn’t have a long criminal record. However, he was arrested in September 2006 for driving under the influence and police found cocaine in his car, according to court documents seen by La Presse.
Mayor asks pedestrians to turn back
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, THE PRESS
The Sûreté du Québec on Wednesday completed its analysis of the scene of the tragedy.
The mayor of Amqui on Wednesday appealed to pedestrians to get close to the scene of the tragedy and bring life back to this city center, which looked haunted after Monday’s attack.
” We have to go. It’s normal to feel pain. But we have to go back there, to go back there, to encourage our businesses and to ease the pain, ”launched the mayor of Amqui, Sylvie Blanchette, in an interview.
This call comes just before the arrival in the city of Prime Minister François Legault, who will visit Amqui this Thursday with the three leaders of the opposition parties.
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, THE PRESS
The mayor of Amqui, Sylvie Blanchette
Boulevard Saint-Benoît was closed from Monday afternoon to Tuesday evening after a madman drove his truck into innocent pedestrians, leaving two dead and nine injured. The mayor decided to visit it on foot as soon as it opens on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, people were busy cleaning up the last traces of the attack. A worker was busy repairing steel railings at La Captive microbrewery that had buckled in the accident.
Madeleine Trottier, 76, was there. The lady had no reason to take a walk on Boulevard Saint-Benoît on Wednesday, pacing up and down the narrow, slush-eaten sidewalk. She had no errands to run. But she decided to come to honor the victims.
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, THE PRESS
Madeleine Trottier, on Boulevard Saint-Benoît Ouest
My heart is heavy even though I didn’t know her.
Madeleine Trotier
“It comes inside and looks for us. It takes up all the space in my head. I wanted to come to give the victims a little thought. »
The same goes for Gérard Couture, who still can’t understand what happened. “We heard about Laval and said to ourselves: It’s big Laval, it’s far Laval. But then it happened here, in Amqui. »
In addition to the Prime Minister’s visit this Thursday, Amqui will receive the Bishop of Rimouski on Friday. Bishop Denis Grondin will celebrate an evening mass in the Saint-Benoît-Joseph-Labre church.
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, THE PRESS
Kinde Cosme Arouko
“We must give hope so that we do not lose hope,” said Benin priest Kindé Cosme Arouko, who arrived in the region in 2018.
He hopes the Amquians will pray for the victims, the injured and their families. “We also have power to pray for those who have done this, that they will change their hearts, enter into repentance and into the way of good. »