Crown admits Mafia hit man was `not the perfect witness' at trial
Only one step remains in the first-degree murder trial of Marie-josée Viau and her husband Guy Dion before the jury, which began hearing evidence in May, starts its deliberations.
On Thursday, Superior Court Justice Éric Downs told the jury he plans to provide them with their final instructions beginning on Oct. 28.
He told them to expect their sequestered deliberation to begin the following day.
The judge made the announcement after Isabelle Poulin, one of the prosecutors in the trial, spent most of Thursday making the Crown's closing arguments. She began by acknowledging the prosecution's key witness has his faults.
Viau, 46, and Dion, 50, are charged with two counts of first-degree murder and one of conspiracy to commit murder. The charges relate to their alleged roles in the deaths of brothers Vincenzo and Giuseppe Falduto on June 30, 2016, inside a garage on the couple's farm in St-jude, a rural town near St-hyacinthe.
The Crown's theory is that the Faldutos were killed by a hit man hired by leaders in the Montreal Mafia and that the couple helped plan the ambush, made noise to cover up the sound of the gunfire and disposed of the bodies by burning them in barrels and dumping the remains in a river near their farm.
Poulin read the conspiracy charge aloud in the courtroom at the Gouin courthouse and reminded the jury the alleged plot included Salvatore Scoppa, a now-deceased leader in the Montreal Mafia, the hit man and an accomplice whose name cannot be published for the time being.
The hit man, the key witness in the trial, became an informant and began working for the Sûreté du Québec in 2019. A publication ban also protects his identity.
When he testified in August, the informant frequently became emotional and made several allegations about having been sexually assaulted by many people he knew. He also complained about how he felt he was treated by his police handlers.
“Do you remember, in my opening remarks (in May), I said (the informant) was far from being an irreproachable witness,” Poulin said. "If I used the term hit man to describe his role in the Italian Mafia it's because I called a cat a cat. The prosecution tried to give you the most accurate portrait of (the informant).
“He was not the perfect witness, nor was he easy, far from it. He has the personality that he has.”
Poulin also reminded the jury that the informant is not the one on trial.
“Yes, the Sûreté du Québec made a contract with a killer. Yes, the state made that choice,” Poulin said. “But I ask the question: If your brothers, if your sons were killed under such sinister circumstances as the Falduto brothers were, would you not be reassured that the state made the necessary efforts so that, at least, you would have answers to your questions?”
Both of the accused testified in their defence and said they had no idea the Faldutos would be killed inside their garage.
The couple also denied they burned the bodies. They testified they drove the bodies to the home of a man they barely knew and left them there in an Audi left in the garage when the Faldutos were killed.
Poulin asked the jury to consider several potentially incriminating comments Viau made, during the summer of 2019, while she was secretly recorded during conversations she had with the informant.
During one conversation she appeared to remark that the accomplice came to the farm several times to “set up” or prepare the ambush.
During another conversation, recorded on July 8, 2019, Viau told the informant she “was the brains” behind the disposal of the bodies. She made several comments about how the bodies were burned. That included how dirt was removed from their property to get rid of a liquid that leaked out while the bodies were on fire inside metal barrels.
She also appeared to boast about how it took six cords of wood and four gas containers to burn the bodies.
“That is effort,” Poulin said in reference to Viau's recorded comments. “That is the effort (required) to make the traces of a crime disappear.”