Preliminary hearing begins for Quebec man charged with murder in daycare bus crash

SAINT-JÉRÔME, Que. — A preliminary hearing began Monday for a Quebec man accused of killing two young children by allegedly driving a city bus into a Montreal-area daycare last year.

Pierre Ny St-Amand was arrested after a transit bus crashed into the front of a daycare in the Ste-Rose neighbourhood of Laval, Que., on Feb. 8, 2023, killing two young children, aged five and four, and injuring six others.

The 52-year-old former city bus driver faces two counts of first-degree murder as well as seven other charges, including attempted murder and aggravated assault.

A publication ban requested by the Crown covers the names of the young victims and any evidence that will be presented this week.

Quebec court Judge François Landry is presiding over the hearing, after which he will decide whether there is sufficient evidence for the case to be sent to trial. 

“Essentially, we are talking about several witnesses, police officers, witnesses that acted on Feb. 8, 2023,” prosecutor Simon Blais told reporters outside the courtroom on Monday.

“There is a publication ban to ensure that at the trial, the jury members that will be selected are not biased by what they could hear in the media.”

The hearing is taking place in St. Jérôme, Que., north of Montreal, due to a lack of courthouse space in Laval. 

St-Amand was impassive as he listened to testimony Monday morning from the first of 13 witnesses the Crown intends to call in the coming days.

Among the scheduled witnesses are parents whose children were at the daycare and who intervened after the bus crash, police officers and members of the accused’s family. A psychiatrist is also scheduled to testify.

The court heard from a half dozen of those scheduled witnesses on Monday, including four fathers who were dropping off children and a neighbour of the daycare. A woman who worked with St-Amand also testified.

Wearing a grey sweatshirt with short-cropped salt-and-pepper hair, St-Amand took notes on a clipboard while he sat in the prisoner’s dock, occasionally conferring with his lawyers. He entered the courtroom in chains, which his lawyers requested be removed so that he could take notes. Instead, guards fitted him with looser handcuffs because the courthouse constable manager considered the accused to be “unpredictable.”

The hearing is set to continue Tuesday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 25, 2024.

Sidhartha Banerjee, The Canadian Press

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version said St-Amand was 51 years old.