On Oct. 1, 2009, around 8 pm, 37-year-old Natasha Cournoyer walked out of an office tower in Laval, Que.
She arrived at a parking lot, and came face to face with Claude Larouche.
She was abducted, raped, and strangled to death.
Her body was dumped in Pointe-aux-Trembles.
For two years, Cournoyer’s best friend waited for justice.
On Thursday, she got it.
“[I’m] relieved that the jury made that decision,” Kristine Laflamme said.
Natasha was ‘one of us’
It took the eight-man, four-woman jury a little over one day to reach their verdict.
The evidence presented by the crown was substantial.
The victim’s blood was found inside Larouche’s minivan.
Her blood was also found inside a motel room Larouche admitted being in the night of her death.
“Natasha Cournoyer is any woman in Montreal, it’s not somebody who was in the criminal world, not somebody who was at risk…she’s one of us,” said crown prosecutor Elianne Perreault.
Justice Fraser Martin sentenced Larouche to life in prison, with no chance of parole for 25 years.
Before leaving the courtroom, the judge had some final remarks.
“You have committed one of the worst crimes imaginable. You have the rest of your life to think about it,” he said.
During the trial, Larouche presented what many legal experts considered a strange defence.
He told the jury Cournoyer approached him the night she was killed and offered him sexual services.
Laflamme calls that story ridiculous.
“She was a wonderful person, and I just want everyone to remember that,” she said.
Thursday wasn’t Larouche’s final day in court.
Further charges?
Later this year he will stand trial for attempting to murder another woman inside a motel in Montreal.
That alleged attack took place about two weeks after he killed Cournoyer.
Larouche is on the police’s radar for other unsolved crimes.
A source told Global News Larouche is being investigated for other murders in the Montreal area.
But for Cournoyer’s friend, what’s important is that Larouche is locked up for life.
“Nobody is going to be hurt by him anymore,” she said.
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