Claude Paquin, a man from Quebec who was wrongly convicted of a double murder and later acquitted after 41 years, has agreed to a multimillion-dollar settlement with Montreal and the provincial government.
In a joint statement on Friday, the City of Montreal and the Attorney General of Quebec announced the settlement. The statement expressed the hope that this agreement, which avoids a lengthy trial scheduled for this fall, will assist Mr. Paquin in moving forward from this challenging period in his life.
In 1983, Paquin was convicted of two first-degree murder charges related to the deaths of Ronald Bourgouin and Sylvie Revah, a couple who was killed in the Laurentians in 1978.
After spending 18 years in prison, Paquin was granted full parole in 2001 under strict conditions, which were in place for the next 23 years.
In 2024, the federal justice minister ordered a new trial, stating that new information suggested a potential miscarriage of justice in the case.
Paquin, now 83 years old, was acquitted on November 6, 2024.
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Paquin credited his lawyers from Projet Innocence Québec for his acquittal, emphasizing the crucial role they played.
The case against Paquin relied heavily on the testimony of Bernard Provençal, a prominent police informant. However, Projet Innocence Québec uncovered evidence over time that raised doubts about his credibility.
‘A Life Wrongfully Taken’
Represented by lawyers at Woods LLP, Paquin filed a multimillion-dollar civil lawsuit in Quebec Superior Court in May 2025 against the City of Montreal and the Attorney General of Quebec, alleging failures on the part of their agents, including Montreal police, the Sûreté du Québec, and the Quebec Crown prosecutor’s office.
The lawsuit claimed that the police and prosecution were aware as early as 1983 that the informant’s testimony was false and that any physical evidence linking Paquin to the crime had been tampered with or fabricated.
Paquin’s legal team argued in the lawsuit that this case was not just a miscarriage of justice but a narrative of a life unjustly taken away, a sentence that extended well beyond the confines of prison.
The legal team also highlighted that Paquin endured the longest documented period of unjustified deprivation of liberty in