Mother accused of child abandonment denied bail
By Chelsey St-Pierre
The Suburban
A LaSalle mother accused of abandoning her three-year-old daughter, a case that triggered a major search operation spanning southwestern Quebec and eastern Ontario, was denied bail in Salaberry-de-Valleyfield.
The 34-year-old woman, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, will remain in custody and has been ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation at Montreal’s Philippe-Pinel Institute. She faces charges of child abandonment and criminal negligence causing bodily harm.
The mother’s two-day bail hearing last week was held under a strict publication ban. The substance of her testimony and details of the evidence presented cannot be reported. The Crown opposed her release, citing public safety and the seriousness of the charges. Judge Bertrand St-Arnaud ruled that the legal criteria for detention were met and ordered a psychiatric assessment. The mother’s lawyer, Olivier Béliveau, said he will review his client’s next steps.
The psychiatric evaluation is expected to take place within the next month. The next scheduled court appearance is August 8.
What began on June 15 as a missing child report at a fireworks and souvenir shop in Coteau-du-Lac, roughly 60 kilometres west of Montreal, quickly escalated into an intensive multi-day search. The mother told store staff she had lost track of her daughter and the family’s small dog. Quebec provincial police (SQ) set up a command post near the store and launched ground and air searches covering fields, ditches, and stretches of highway.
With no sign of the child as hours turned into days, the search area expanded across the Ontario border. Public tips and surveillance footage shaped the investigation, as police traced the path of the mother’s grey Ford Escape with a “Baby on Board” sticker.
On June 16, searchers found the family’s chihuahua dead along a highway not far from the area where the mother first reported her daughter missing. That same day, the mother was charged with child abandonment while her daughter was still unaccounted for. Meanwhile, the mother was uncooperative with authorities searching for the missing toddler.
The search grew to involve hundreds of officers, volunteers, drones, canine units, and helicopters. The summer heat and humid conditions made the search especially urgent. Authorities suspended garbage and recycling pickup in some municipalities to preserve possible evidence and repeatedly asked residents to check their properties and surveillance cameras.
Three days after the girl disappeared, on June 18, an Ontario Provincial Police drone operator spotted her sitting alone in tall grass near an on-ramp to Highway 417 by Casselman, Ontario — almost 150 kilometres from Montreal. When officers reached her, the child told them, “I’m waiting for my mom. She told me to wait.” She was taken to hospital for evaluation and was described as stable. No updates on the child’s condition were made public and the family requested privacy.
Editor’s note: In accordance with a court-ordered publication ban, The Suburban is not publishing any information that could identify those involved in this case. n
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