A hitman provided C$100,000 ($71,400; £56,000) for the assassination of a criminal offense reporter at Montreal newspaper La Presse, the outlet has reported.
Convicted killer Frédérick Silva confessed to La Presse that he had provided the contract to anybody prepared to hold out the hit on Daniel Renaud, who was overlaying his trial for 3 murders and an tried homicide in 2021.
Silva was convicted in 2022 and have become a police informant.
Quebec Premier François Legault condemned the plot. “It is not sensible that in Quebec – we aren’t in a film – there’s a contract positioned on the pinnacle of a journalist as a result of he does his job,” he stated.
“This isn’t the Quebec we would like,” he stated, including that the province’s police should proceed to focus on organised crime.
With the intention to develop into an informant for the authorities, Silva needed to confess his whole prison historical past, La Presse reported. The outlet stated it had realized of the plot towards Mr Renaud after reviewing the confession Silva had made to police.
Silva admitted to contacting two influential organised crime figures about assassinating Mr Renaud whereas being held on trial in 2021.
In response to Silva, the figures have been hesitant, saying it was a foul thought to focus on a journalist.
The “contract” was in place for roughly two months, however was by no means carried out, La Presse reported. Silva finally cancelled the order, he stated, as a result of he had “extra vital points to cope with”.
Silva is now serving a life sentence in jail.
Mr Renaud informed La Presse he was “shaken” by the revelations.
“I do not censor myself, however I at all times train restraint so I don’t reveal particulars in regards to the non-public lives of criminals and keep away from placing lives in peril. So I by no means thought that I may have ended up the topic of a contract like this,” he stated.
Vincent Marissal, a former colleague of Mr Renaud’s who’s now an elected provincial politician with the left-wing Québec Solidaire, known as the journalist a “very rigorous particular person – not the kind of man who makes a variety of noise within the newsroom however apparently he could cause a variety of trouble.
“Meaning he is doing his job, however that is definitely no motive to see a worth placed on his head.”
