Reporter ‘troubled’ by arrest for doing job
A day after Gatineau police announced they would not be charging him, Radio-Canada reporter Antoine Trépanier said Friday it’s too early to say whether he will be taking legal action against the force.
“It’s too soon. It’s too early in the process,” Trépanier told CBC Radio. “I’m not a lawyer, I want to take time. I want to just digest what happened. It was shocking for me, it was shocking for my family.”
Police arrested the Radio-Canada journalist earlier this month after receiving harassment allegations from Yvonne Dubé, head of Big Brothers Big Sister of the Outaouais. The reporter had reached out to her following reported revelations that Dubé had once been admonished in Ontario for practising law without a licence.
During a CBC Radio interview Friday, Trépanier’s first public statement since he was arrested, he said he felt “troubled” by the situation and remained puzzled as to why someone felt the need to report him to authorities.
“My sources and the people that I interview are pretty much my bread and butter,” said Trépanier. “It’s why I’m a reporter. I need to have a good relationship with these people. They need to have confidence in me. Never in my life have I threatened anybody.”
At a Thursday news conference, Gatineau police Chief Mario Harel deemed the arrest a mistake and said “clearly, the officer did not properly assess the situation.” He also said “freedom of the press is fundamental, as is the public’s right to quality, accurate, rigorous and complete information.”
On Friday, Trépanier told this newspaper that Radio-Canada had “said what we had to say” regarding the situation and declined further comment.
On the evening of March 13, Trépanier told CBC, he was in his basement watching television when he received a phone call from a Gatineau police officer.
When he answered, he said, he thought it was just a prank. Then reality set in.
“At the beginning, I was kind of laughing because I thought it was a joke, but afterward I saw all the seriousness of this situation,” Trépanier said.
The officer had told him he had been accused of criminal harassment and that he was under arrest. Trépanier was then given two choices: Either turn himself in or let officers come and get him. He went with Option A.
Yvan Cloutier, director of french services at Radio-Canada Ottawa-Gatineau, said he “couldn’t believe it” when he got word of the situation, thinking it must have been a misunderstanding.
“I knew that every step had been followed, and I was assured of this really quickly by my team,” Cloutier told CBC. “I had no doubt, I had total faith.”