Canada is perceived to be, and generally is, a very peaceful place to live.
However, for a period in the 1960’s to the 1970’s, it was a scary place in the mostly Francophone province of Quebec, and especially in the biggest city, Montreal.
During that time a group of radical marxist Francophones began agitating for the separation of Quebec from Canada. They were involved in a series of over 200 violent crimes including some 100 bombings. These acts resulted in a number of maimings and six deaths including an elderly security guard and a cleaning lady.
They terrorists called themselves the Front de libération du Québec (Front for the Liberation of Quebec) (FLQ)
The violence culminated in 1970 with the kidnapping of British Trade Commissioner James Cross on October 5 by members of the “Liberation Cell” of the FLQ.
This was followed by demands for release of some two dozen detained separatists and convicted terrorists, and the broadcast of the FLQ manifesto on public radio.
Assassination of Laporte
On October 10, members of the “Chenier Cell” approached the home of Pierre Laporte while he played football with his nephew. Laporte, the Minister of Labour and Vice-Premier of Quebec was then grabbed from his yard and hustled away in a car.
This led to the so-called “October Crisis” on October 15 when –at the request of the provincial government, the Canadian army was deployed in Quebec to help the civil authorities maintain order.
The move to deploy the army under The War Measures Act, was supported by all parties in the Quebec provincial legislature, including the separatist Parti Quebecois, something the separatist party has never mentioned since.
On October 17, 1970, the FLQ announced they had executed Laporte, indicating where his body could be found in the trunk of parked car. He had been strangled to death by the chain of a religious medal around his neck.
The so-called “liberation cell” announced they would also kill James Cross if the “fascist” police discovered them and tried a rescue. He would eventually be released in December following negotiations which granted the five terrorists safe passage to Cuba.
On December 27, the three remaining Chenier cell members, Paul and Jacques Rose and Francis Simard are arrested and charged with kdinapping and murder.
Convicted in 1971, he was paroled in 1982, and would remain active in the separatist movement, saying he regretted nothing about his role. He died on March14, 2013 of a stroke.
Simard was also parolled in 1982, and described the murder as a gesture “to show what we were saying was not just words”. He has since written several books on the October Crisis
Jacques Rose was released in 1978, later running unsuccessfully for provincial political office in 1994 with the Socialist-Democratic Party (PDS) which has since become the leftist separatist party Quebec Solidaire.
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