The evidence portion of the Montreal mob murder trial closes in the fifth month

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The trial of a couple from a rural town accused of participating in the murder of two brothers from Montreal will move to its next stage in the next few days.

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The jury that heard the trial of Guy Dion, 50, and Marie-Josée Viau, 46, in the Gouin courthouse began hearing evidence on May 27. The trial was declared closed on Thursday after prosecutor Isabelle Poulin completed the cross-examination of Viau by the prosecution.

The couple is charged with first degree murder and conspiracy in the deaths of brothers Vincenzo and Giuseppe Falduto. The victims were killed on June 30, 2016, inside a garage on the couple’s farm in St-Jude, a small town near St-Hyacinthe.

The theory of the Crown case is that the brothers were killed by a hitman as part of a conflict between the Calabrian and Sicilian clans that make up the Montreal mafia and the couple helped plan the murder, made noise to hide the sound of the shots and eliminated the bodies by burning them.

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In 2019, the hitman became an informant and worked with the Sûreté du Québec in its investigation of the killings. The hit man, who cannot be identified due to the publication ban, testified during the trial.

Both defendants testified in their own defense and denied that they knew that the brothers would be killed. They also said that all they did with the bodies was take them in an Audi to the home of a man they barely knew and left the vehicle there after receiving a request to do so from an accessory to the murders.

“After the murders it was (the hitman and the accomplice) to come back to take charge of (disposing of the evidence). They shouldn’t have left us like this, ”Viau said on the last day of the interrogation.

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She repeated the couple’s claim that they thought the accomplice, whose name cannot be released at the moment, was going to show firearms, stored in his garage, to a potential buyer. Dion told the jury that, in the past, he has agreed to make noise with a chainsaw whenever the accomplice planned to let potential buyers test the firearms by unloading them.

“There was no one who said to us, ‘Hey, by the way, we’re going to kill someone in your garage.’ What happened was dramatic. It affected us deeply, ”Viau said. “We had no other agreement with (the accomplice). He was supposed to take care of selling the firearms, storing the firearms. It was up to him to take charge of displaying the firearms and letting people test them. It was all of him.

“You’re going to make me repeat it 85 times. We agree to hide firearms for a fucking liar and we are not proud. “

When the cross-examination was over, Superior Court Judge Eric Downs informed the jury that he and the attorneys in the case will take up legal matters next week. He asked the jury to return to court on Friday to find out when they will begin hearing final arguments.

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