A fraud-related trial for former Quebec deputy premier Nathalie Normandeau and her five co-accused has been delayed indefinitely.
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No new date has been set for the trial, which was to begin Monday.
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Quebec Superior Court Justice Louis Dionne ordered the proceedings suspended Friday.
Dionne ruled that the case could not be heard before a final decision is made on whether Radio-Canada journalist Marie-Maude Denis should testify to a motion presented by the lawyer for Normandeau’s co-accused, former Liberal Health Minister and party fundraiser Marc-Yvan Côté.
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Côté’s lawyer, Jacques Larochelle, argued that leaks to the media have tarnished his client’s reputation and impeded his ability to have a fair trial.
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Quebec Superior Court previously overturned a decision by Judge André Perreault that Denis should not testify — Radio-Canada said it would appeal the Superior Court decision, but Perreault ruled the trial would proceed as scheduled anyway on April 9.
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Larochelle insisted the Crown agreed that a final ruling on Denis’ testimony should be made before the trial begins.
“The good news is that everybody agrees with us – the Crown agrees with us, the Superior Court judge agrees with us,” Larochelle said.
It could take months before a ruling is made; Larochelle said he doesn’t think the trial will begin before September.
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Larochelle has also made a second motion to have Perreault removed as the presiding judge for the trial.
“(Côté) felt…that he was not the kind of judge that could be fair-handed between him and the journalists and the public,” Larochelle said.
“According to us, he indicated by his conduct that he was about to reject the motion for abuse of process without having heard all the evidence since the journalist has not been heard yet.”
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The Crown is not in favour of the motion to remove the judge.
On March 26, Perreault ruled against a motion presented by Normandeau’s lawyers for a stay of proceedings because of unreasonable delays according to the Jordan ruling.
Larochelle said he doesn’t know if this new delay will be taken into consideration when determining if the trial has surpassed the delays set out by Jordan.
Maxime Roy, Normandeau’s lawyer, has said his client has been waiting for two years to get the chance to give her side of the story.
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Normandeau and the others were arrested in March 2016 by Quebec’s anti-corruption unit following an investigation authorities said involved political financing and gifts allegedly being exchanged for public contracts.
The charges include fraud and breach of trust.
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Normandeau, 49, was an influential minister who served as a Liberal member of the legislature from 1998 to 2011 and held key cabinet positions including municipal affairs, natural resources and Canadian intergovernmental affairs.
She served as deputy premier under Jean Charest between 2007 and 2011.
— with files from The Canadian Press.
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