NEW HELP FOR CRIME VICTIMS
Financial assistance to attend trials
The families and parents of murder victims will get some financial assistance from the province to attend the trials of the accused.
Quebec Justice Minister Stéphanie Vallée announced the $480,000 program at the Palais de Justice on Tuesday to a room filled with the mothers of slain children who said they were satisfied with the news and thanked her for her support.
“Access to the trial of a family member is an important moment. It’s a crucial phase in the grieving process,” Vallée said. “It allows families to better understand what happened to their loved one.”
For the family of a murder victim, attending a trial is expensive: parking fees, meals, the cost of a hotel nearby, in addition to the psychological distress of knowing a child, a parent or a spouse was brutally killed.
Nathalie Beaulieu, mother of Clémence Beaulieu-Patry, a 20-year-old stabbed to death in April 2016 while working at a St- Leonard grocery store, was ever present in the courtroom for the trial of her daughter’s killer. She said the long weeks spent as an audience member in court took a terrible toll on her, not just emotionally but also financially.
“It accumulates. Travel, transport, restaurants,” she said. “When you see the murderer and you know that he’s being fed but you yourself have to pay out of your pocket and you lost your child, that’s difficult to accept.”
For Beaulieu, the announcement of money to help loved ones attend trials is an important step to help future families who will live through a trauma. She said that too often the justice system ignores the victim of a crime.
“The victim has no place in a criminal trial. We didn’t speak about Clémence at the trial. It was about the murderer,” she said. “This is a step towards justice.”
The fund was Vallée’s last formal announcement as justice minister. She’s not running in the Oct. 1 election, but insisted that the announcement wasn’t political. It was just the right thing to do, she said.
The program will begin operating later this year. Families will be able to claim up to $4,000 of expenses for things like hotel rooms, meals and transportation.
The money will be handled by the Crime Victims Assistance Centre (CAVAC), a governmentfunded organization that provides resources to victims of violent acts.
Darlene Ryan, stepmother to Brigitte Serre, a 17-year-old who was stabbed to death during a robbery at a Montreal North gas station in 2006, said the announcement was a big step forward.
Ryan works with the Association of Families of Persons Assassinated or Disappeared (AFPAD), a nonprofit organization that helps support the families of homicide victims. She became involved with the organization after Serre’s murder.
“People have to realize the importance of what victims go through and that they have to participate in court and, yes, we do need help just like anybody else,” she said.