WARNING: This story incorporates graphic particulars of a violent occasion.
A paramedic’s account of arriving at a deadly taking pictures that he assumed was protected when the truth is the shooter remained on scene will likely be cross-examined this week within the trial of a man who killed a police officer and wounded two others throughout a wellness verify in Bourget, Ont.
It is not in dispute that Alain Bellefeuille killed OPP Sgt. Eric Mueller and wounded constables Marc Lauzon and François Gamache-Asselin earlier than daybreak on Could 11, 2023.
In query is whether or not he knew he was taking pictures at police and whether or not he was appearing in self-defence when he repeatedly opened hearth on them.
Bellefeuille is on trial in Superior Courtroom in L’Orignal for first-degree homicide and two counts of tried homicide, and has pleaded not responsible. He is anticipated to testify in his personal defence after the Crown closes its case.
One of many first 4 paramedics to reach at Bellefeuille’s home — Christian Larochelle, who was accompanied that evening by Stéphane Huppé, Yan Bellefeuille and Jean-François Fillion — testified on Friday about strolling as much as the home, pondering the scene had been made protected.
As a substitute, Larochelle discovered Bellefeuille standing on the deck together with his arms up. Mueller was bleeding out within the mudroom with Bellefeuille’s loaded lengthy gun positioned throughout his chest. Lauzon was on his knees on the garden, and Gamache-Asselin was hiding within the woods, thinking someone was trying to follow and kill him, the trial earlier heard.
Lauzon did not reply Larochelle’s questions on whether or not the scene was protected. His eyes had been open however his arm was torn open. Larochelle then approached the deck.
‘He broke into my home’
Extra video from Mueller’s body-worn camera was performed in courtroom. It was coated by one thing, however Bellefeuille is heard saying, “A police officer is down. A police officer’s down proper right here. He is respiration. A police officer is down proper right here inside, are available, are available. He is inside the home, he is respiration nonetheless. He is nonetheless respiration.”
“Are you alone right here?” Larochelle asks Bellefeuille.
“I’m alone.”
“Is there one other officer?”
“He broke into my home. He got here in, that is it. He is nonetheless respiration,” Bellefeuille says.
“Do not transfer, do not transfer. Is there anybody else in the home? I need you to step again, please. Please step again.”
Larochelle testified that Mueller had misplaced a extreme quantity of blood, and that he knew the outlook for him wasn’t good. He additionally knew he and the opposite paramedics weren’t protected, however “at that time, it was too late.”
They loaded Mueller into an ambulance, and as Larochelle was about to start out driving, his accomplice shouted that Mueller’s coronary heart had stopped. They began CPR and continued with it for the 40-minute drive to The Ottawa Hospital’s Civic campus trauma centre. However not lengthy after they arrived, Mueller was pronounced lifeless.
Nonetheless extra video from Mueller’s digital camera confirmed it being thrown onto the garden.
Trial resumed final week after pause
The trial resumed April 22 after being adjourned for every week.
Final week, OPP Const. Justin Boyd testified about heading to Bellefeuille’s home in Bourget after listening to over the radio that pictures had been fired at officers, and concerning the function he performed in looking the world and transporting Bellefeuille to an OPP detachment and Ottawa’s Montfort Hospital.
When Boyd arrived, it was unclear the place Lauzon was.
Mueller was within the care of paramedics, and unknown to Boyd and different officers on the scene, so was Lauzon.
Confused, ‘chaotic’ scene
As Boyd and others began to speak about how you can discover them, the state of affairs turned “fairly chaotic,” Boyd testified. The officers finally lined up shoulder to shoulder and pushed into the woods to look earlier than deciding the terrain was too troublesome for a harm individual to cover in.
As they got here again out, Boyd discovered Mueller’s body-worn digital camera mendacity within the grass, nonetheless recording.
A video clip from the digital camera was performed in courtroom of Boyd discovering it, during which a gunshot can also be heard.
Const. Ionut Mihuta — who had arrested Bellefeuille — is heard asking, “You fired your gun?”
“Misfire! Misfire, misfire,” says Boyd, talking for his colleague Const. Pierre Dubois, who had unintentionally fired his lengthy gun into the bottom as soon as in sight of Boyd.
“Examine that manner,” Mihuta says. “Go in a straight line! Shooter prepared, OK? Security off. Watch your taking pictures, OK? Watch your fingers,” Mihuta says earlier than the clip ends.
Bellefeuille repeatedly punched by arresting officer
Extra officers flooded the scene, and Lauzon was discovered, Boyd mentioned. He was then requested to assist take Bellefeuille to the Rockland OPP detachment.
In a cell, paramedics checked Bellefeuille for accidents and took a very long time inspecting a contusion on his head. Courtroom heard on April 14 that Mihuta had violated police protocol by repeatedly punching Bellefeuille whereas Bellefeuille was mendacity on the bottom being arrested and saying he did not know he had shot a cop.
Audio of the dramatic change was captured on Mihuta’s body-worn digital camera.
Mihuta screamed at Bellefeuille: “I received this shotgun at your f–king head! Simply f–king do one thing so I can f–king shoot you, you piece of s–t!”
Requested about punching Bellefeuille in cross-examination, Mihuta testified that his feelings received one of the best of him, and that he did not imply his menace to shoot Bellefeuille.
“I knew that Sergeant Mueller might not reside. I knew at that time that inside the subsequent couple hours, a spouse will get the worst information of her life, that her husband just isn’t coming again residence. Two children will likely be orphans with no dad,” he testified.
“We do not shoot individuals in our jobs. We don’t. It is not, I would not shoot anybody that’s unarmed or one thing like that.”
Emotional experience to hospital
Paramedics finally determined to take Bellefeuille to hospital for examination and therapy.
Throughout cross-examination of Boyd, defence lawyer Leonardo Russomanno performed video footage from Boyd’s body-worn digital camera depicting about 20 minutes of the ambulance experience to Montfort Hospital. It reveals Bellefeuille from behind as he is sitting up hunched ahead on a gurney in solely his underwear (his clothes had been eliminated by paramedics), with his palms cuffed behind his again. A paramedic tries asking questions, however no discernable responses are heard.
Bellefeuille seems to cry a number of occasions, his shoulders coming up and down, and sometimes the paramedic locations a hand on his shoulder.
Justice Robert Pelletier instructed the jury to solely contemplate Bellefeuille’s bodily and emotional state within the video, which may develop into related in Pelletier’s ultimate directions for the jury earlier than deliberations.
The Crown’s subsequent witness was OPP forensic identification officer Brittany Falls, who helped doc and catalogue the scene and the proof discovered. On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday the jury was proven images of the mudroom with the blood-soaked ground the place Mueller was discovered.
Additionally proven was Bellefeuille’s bed room wall with 9 bullet holes in it (he fired at Mueller and Lauzon from contained in the bed room), a field of ammunition in his closet, his lounge window with bullet holes in it, two OPP cruisers outdoors with bullet holes in them, spent casings from Bellefeuille’s lengthy gun inside and out of doors the home, and three spent casings from an OPP handgun in the home.
Lauzon’s sidearm was discovered to be lacking three rounds, Falls testified.
Underneath cross-examination by co-defence counsel Biagio Del Greco, Falls testified the “stinger”-type siren that blared from the cruisers of each Lauzon and Mueller as they parked — about 4 minutes earlier than pictures rang out — is measured at wherever from 114 to 120 decibels.
Falls mentioned no testing was achieved on the scene to find out what that will have seemed like from inside Bellefeuille’s bed room.
The trial continues Tuesday with cross-examination of the paramedic who testified Friday.
Source link