Family of Cédrika Provencher Attends Preliminary Hearing in Civil Lawsuit

The family of Cédrika Provencher made a rare public appearance on Wednesday as they attended the preliminary hearings of the civil lawsuit filed by Jonathan Bettez against the Québec government and the Sûreté du Québec. Throughout the day, discussions continued between the parties involved.

Arriving at the Montreal courthouse in the mid-morning, Martin and Henri Provencher, Cédrika’s father and grandfather respectively, were briefly in the same room as Jonathan Bettez, who remains the prime suspect for the police in their investigations. The Provencher family declined to give any interviews.

The disappearance of 9-year-old Cédrika in July 2007 in Trois-Rivières had deeply shocked Québec at the time. Her remains were eventually found in 2015 in a wooded area about ten kilometers from where she went missing. No one has been charged in relation to this case.

However, the police still consider Jonathan Bettez as the main suspect in the murder. Yet, an unprecedented undercover operation, similar to a “Mister big” sting, failed to obtain any confession from Bettez. Furthermore, a judge criticized the police for their investigative techniques in a child pornography case, for which Bettez was acquitted on all charges.

It is due to this alleged “harassment” that Jonathan Bettez and members of his family are suing the government and the Sûreté du Québec for $10 million.

The ongoing hearings this week are not the actual trial. Judge Gregory Moore is presiding over preliminary motions regarding document disclosure. The proceedings often remain cryptic as the content of some of these documents is unknown. However, on Tuesday, Bettez’s lawyer revealed that DNA had been found on “evidence” located at the site where the remains were discovered, according to a report.

The lawyers representing the Attorney General of Québec requested that the majority of these debates be held behind closed doors, excluding journalists. However, following the intervention of a media lawyer, Judge Moore allowed journalists to attend closed-door testimonies. This decision appeared to unsettle the government’s lawyers, who even suggested having the journalists sign “confidentiality agreements.” Judge Moore dismissed this proposal, referring to it as opening a “Pandora’s box.”

This decision seemed to bring the two parties closer together, as negotiations have been ongoing since Tuesday afternoon in order to significantly shorten the preliminary debates. As a result, the courtroom hearings on Wednesday lasted only a few minutes. A brief debate on the issue of sealed electronic surveillance evidence in the child pornography criminal case is expected to take place on Thursday morning.