Sascha Pomerleau, a victim of a string of domestic-related homicides in Quebec, has been remembered at a “first light” vigil for victims of violence.
The 18-year-old got up from the coffin after her friends sang the national anthem and lit candles, which would then be sprayed onto the stage. She had not been wearing her seatbelt when she was shot in the head while watching the film Phantom Thread at a school cinema in Montreal’s south end on 13 December, killing one woman and critically injuring another.
Three male suspects had attacked her as she headed home, bashed her head on the sidewalk and tied her up. She begged for her life as they beat her again and the suspects took her cellphone and purse. The first officer to arrive found Pomerleau dead from a single gunshot wound to the head.
At the vigil on Thursday night, her friend Ariel Hulse said the vigil gave her a sense of control. “This gave me the time I needed to fall back into a normal routine after something tragic that had happened,” Hulse said.
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More than 1,000 people attended the vigil, which was organised by five local and student survivors of domestic violence who attended Polytechnique to discuss ways to curb violence against women in Quebec.
Psychologist and long-time local activist Louise Leblanc said she felt “pressure” to organise a vigil. “I want to keep the conversation going because violence is still happening and nobody knows why.”
More than 20 years ago, her father and sister were physically and sexually abused by a man who was allowed to attend school while he was in prison for child abuse. “That had a big impact on me and my sister. It affected us a lot,” she said.
Her father was also a student at Polytechnique.
“It’s hard to believe that this is happening. It shouldn’t,” she said.
Trinity Western University graduate Bronwyn Stevenson, who survived a stranger’s assault in 2004, said there are too many similar cases and too little awareness. “We were all very emotional tonight … This has been affecting us all that night,” she said.
The forum has now been sent to government and local leaders.
“It’s really important that the whole country is aware of what happened,” said fellow long-time activist, Tanya de Serres. “It’s important that we are asking officials to make sure it never happens again.”
Police and prosecutors in the area have faced increased scrutiny over the last week, after being accused of allowing a serial murderer to remain at large in the southern Montreal suburb of Laval for more than 20 years without any serious charges.
The RCMP and Quebec’s prosecution services are under increasing pressure to explain why they allowed Alexandre Bissonnette, a man linked to hate groups who investigators say was a neo-Nazi obsessed with mass killings, to remain at large in the Quebec city in 2015 and 2016.