Cardiologist Guy Turcotte lacked the chemical serotonin, which regulates emotions in our brain, when he stabbed his two young children to death, according to the psychiatrist testifying for the defence.
Roch-Hugo Bouchard said although the chemical was never measured in Turcotte, he was displaying all the symptoms of a serotonin deficit: fatigue, sadness, lack of judgment.
Turcotte, 39, is being tried for the first-degree murder of Olivier, 5, and Anne-Sophie, 3, whom he stabbed several times Feb. 20, 2009, shortly after the breakup of his marriage. The cardiologist drank windshield wiper fluid in a failed attempt to kill himself and the defence contends the liquid, as well as Turcotte’s severely depressed state, rendered him incapable of knowing what he was doing.
Bouchard said he tasted windshield wiper fluid himself, just to see what Turcotte would have tasted.
"It’s horrible," he said. "It’s not something you’d drink like tea."
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