By Canadian Press

Police testify at coroner’s inquiry into murder of sergeant by mentally ill man

Mar 11, 2024 | 9:59 AM

MONTREAL — A Quebec coroner’s inquiry is hearing today from police officers who had interacted with a mentally ill man in the months before he murdered a provincial police sergeant.

Provincial police officer Charles Côté says he encountered 35-year-old Isaac Brouillard Lessard on Dec. 30, 2022, days after the man moved to an apartment in Louiseville, Que., about 100 kilometres northeast of Montreal.

Côté says police were called to the apartment building after a search for a lost cat turned into an altercation between Brouillard Lessard and a neighbour.

The incident ended without charge, but Côté says he filed an internal bulletin after learning that Brouillard Lessard was being followed by the province’s mental health board.

Côté says he urged other officers to “act with caution” around the man, adding that he had a history of violence against health-care workers. 

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On March 27, 2023, Brouillard Lessard stabbed Sgt. Maureen Breau to death and seriously injured her partner before he was shot dead by police in his apartment building.

After hearing from psychiatrists and mental health experts during the first two weeks of hearings last month, several officers are scheduled to testify this week, including Breau’s three colleagues who arrived with her to his apartment to arrest him on March 27, 2023.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 11, 2024.

The Canadian Press