Drug use a legal defense

[viper37]

I wonder if it will be successful this time.  It's been used previously, with success, to condemn someone to 60 days of community work instead of 3-5 years in jail after driving stoned and killing someone.  The poor guy was addicted to marijuana, so it was only fair he didn't get any punishment...   Had he been drunk, he would have done jail.  But it was pot, so it's ok to engage in reckless behavior.

Now, Claude Larouche, stands accused of raping and killing a woman.  Premeditated murder.  His lawyer argues that because he used crack and cocaine before the murder and simply dumped the body near an highway, it was the act of an irrational drug user, not a murderer.  Hence his client should be guilty of involuntary manslaughter.

The defense

The case so far

[dps]

 

[HVC]

never heard of a pot defense. Had heard of the drug one working, but more of a "did bad stuff, freaked out and thought i was killing the devil" type defense.

[viper37]

never heard of a pot defense.

Probably just a Quebec thing.  It's been used on more than one occasion, but I know for sure only one time it worked.

Had heard of the drug one working, but more of a "did bad stuff, freaked out and thought i was killing the devil" type defense.

that's Larouche's defense, that he never realized he killed her.  He remembers kidnapping her, he says the sex was consensual, but he doesn't remember killing her because he was too intoxicated.

It's a trial by jury, I am really curious to see if they'll buy this.

[Barrister]

Sounds like a "well we have nothing to lose" kind of defense to be honest.

[viper37]

Sounds like a "well we have nothing to lose" kind of defense to be honest.

There were facts unknown to the general public and the jurys, it would seem, about priors in sexual agression.  The judge had decided the jury shouldn't hear about this.

Anyway, he's been found guilty of premeditated murder now.
Good riddance.

Before assaulting the deceased, he tried to attack another woman, not far from there.
2 weeks after killing this woman, he tried to kill a prostitute, that's when the police caught him for Miss Cournoyer's murder.

French text