MONTREAL – Charges have been laid in the death of a 35-year-old Quebec woman who died last year following a spa treatment in Durham-Sud, northeast of Montreal.
The three individuals arrested at their homes early Thursday by the Sûreté du Québec in connection with the bizarre July 2011 death of Chantal Lavigne face charges of criminal negligence causing death and criminal negligence causing bodily harm.
Court appearances are expected in Drummondville, roughly midway between Montreal and Quebec City, later Thursday.
Lavigne, a 35-year-old mother of two from nearby St. Albert de Warwick, “was cooked to death,” according to Quebec coroner Gilles Sainton.
The three arrested are Gabrielle Fréchette, 53, of Victoriaville; Ginette Duclos, 61, of St. Germain de Grantham; and Gérald Fontaine, 39, of Danville.
Lavigne died in hospital after she and eight others in a personal-development seminar called Dying in Consciousness were covered with mud, wrapped in plastic, put under blankets and immobilized with their heads in cardboard boxes for about nine hours, under instructions to hyperventilate.
On July 29, 2011, Lavigne was removed – unconscious and with a body temperature of 40.5 degrees Celsius – from the Ferme Reine de la Paix in the Drummondville area, after Fréchette, a self-styled therapist operating the seminar, called for medical assistance.
A 49-year-old woman taken to a hospital at the same time survived.
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