The three men in their 30s listened silently in the courtroom, their bodies scarred by bullets fired from the gun of an RCMP officer bent on killing his ex-girlfriend.
Pierre Mainville sat in a wheelchair, revisiting the night in 2001 that ended with a single bullet that pierced his shoulder blade and crushed his spinal cord.
"My life was never the same," the 36-year-old said afterward. "Every time I hear a balloon pop, it brings back bad memories."
Mr. Mainville and the two others - Hugues Ducharme and David Savard - are suing the Laval police. Eight years after RCMP officer Jocelyn Hotte killed ex-girlfriend Lucie Gélinas, injuring the three men in the crossfire, a civil trial has begun. The three are seeking damages of about $2-million.
The lawsuit claims that police failed to act when Ms. Gélinas contacted them days before she was killed, complaining that she felt her life was at risk.
"It's simple. A woman told police she was in danger. But they did nothing," lawyer Jacques Larochelle said in an interview.
The Laval police have countered in court documents that Mr. Hotte, who is serving a life sentence for murder, is responsible for the shooting and that the RCMP failed to acknowledge his history of depression and stalking and let him carry a gun.
Ms. Gélinas and Mr. Hotte had a six-year relationship with frequent breakups and at least two complaints to police.
Mr. Ducharme was a neighbour and friend to Ms. Gélinas. In June, 2001, he was drawn into a threesome with Ms. Gélinas and Mr. Hotte, who was humiliated by the encounter, according to testimony. He apparently kept falling asleep.
Ms. Gélinas complained afterward to co-workers that Mr. Hotte was stalking her.
On June 17, after another fight, Ms. Gélinas called 911, saying Mr. Hotte had threatened her by suggesting she could meet the same fate as her father, who died of gunshots some years earlier.
"He's a sick man," she cried in the call to police. "I'm really scared."
Two Laval police officers interviewed her but filed no report, telling their dispatcher: "Over. Unfounded."
The officers, Constable Joël Sirois and Constable Nathalie Rufer, testified that Ms. Gélinas didn't want to file a complaint because she didn't want to make trouble for Mr. Hotte.
Less than a week later, Ms. Gélinas was driving her Hyundai down a Montreal freeway with the three men. Mr. Hotte, who was following to join them in a bar, started shooting with his service handgun.
The wild chase stretched over 13 kilometres of Montreal freeway, leaving Ms. Gélinas dead and her friends wounded.
Mr. Hotte was a highly trained driver and marksman. He had served as a bodyguard to former prime minister Jean Chrétien.
Mr. Larochelle, who subjected Constable Rufer to a withering cross-examination yesterday, says the Laval cops blew it.
"They could have contacted Mr. Hotte's employer, the RCMP," he said. "They could have contacted his family to see whether it was true he was depressed or not, they could have arrested him, they could have seized his weapons."
Mr. Mainville, despite his injuries, worked hard to rebuild his life. An athlete before he was shot, he underwent rigorous rehabilitation and turned his skills to fencing. He travelled to Beijing with the Canadian wheelchair fencing team last year, and has accumulated medals in international competitions.
He has a 20-month-old daughter and is to marry his long-time girlfriend next month.
"I don't believe in God, but I believe a lot in the strength of the human spirit," Mr. Mainville said during a break in proceedings at the Laval courthouse.
"You can never prepare yourself for not walking again. But you can adapt. After it happened I gave myself a kick in the butt and said, 'This is my new life, I've got to look forward.' "
Still, he says, the wounds from the shooting in 2001 forced him to drop his job as an automobile test technician. His life as he knew it was over.
"I am doing it," he said about the lawsuit, "because I don't want something like this to happen again."
Les Perreaux