A Special Message from Norway

Communications Security Establishment The Sir Leonard Tilley Building in Ottawa, Canada. CSE, Communications Security Establishment, is the most secretive of Canada’s special services. Secretive for a very good reason. It…

DEFLQ – the foreign delegation

Genesis Ottawa, the 24th of April, 1970. In Wing ” B” of RCMP Headquarters, a security service officer opens a recently-created file, number 98-A-00219.[i] Recently created for ” B” Branch,…

Basil Honeytrap

In the spring, I think it was June, he asked for a telephone. One day Richard came with a phone, and I connected it. The cable was on the phone…

London Departure

It had been an exceptional autumn, with day after day of blue sky, bright sun, and temperatures that warmed the hearts of workers in Whitehall, who walked along the paths…

The Trap is Set

Basel, Switzerland, the first week of May 1969. A Renault car heads east along Elsässerstrasse towards St. Louis, where it crosses France and takes the N66. Destination London, with a…

Passport to Heaven

As introduced in Blood Simple – the Last Known Address, and Sky with Diamonds, the travels of two DEFLQ members, Normand Roy and Denyse Leduc, are of particular interest. The…

The blond assassin

The Blond Assassin My inquiries into the death of Mario Bachand had begun with a moment of serendipity, late one evening in the reading room of Library and Archives Canada….

The Deputy Minister Speaks

Two rules of investigation The first rule of investigation, Anything can happen. The second rule, Anything includes the gifts of Serendipity, a gift that, however small and insignificant it might…

Map of the Problem Situation

  Map of the Problem Situation The assassination of Mario Bachand was one event in a large collection of events, a system. Identifying the killers – those who shot Mario…

Sky with Diamonds

On the 22nd of December, 1970, a letter and a package, sent by a Canadian diplomat in Algers, the capital of Algeria, arrived at External Affairs headquarters in Ottawa. The…

The RCMP knows everything

Several months after beginning my enquiries into the murder of Mario Bachand, I was living in Vancouver, returning to Ottawa from time to time to submit requests, at National Archives,…

The Foreign Delegation in Jordon

In early 1970, Jordon was home to several thousand Palestinian refugees, and therefore to the Palestinian guerrilla movements. The most important of these was the Popular Front for the Liberation…

Hide the Dagger with a Smile

A cover story It is not enough to kill someone, one must conceal the fact, if possible. If not possible, one must construct a narrative to lead investigators astray. An…

Trouvé mort (Found dead)

The following document, which we will closely examine in subsequent posts, provides rare insight into how the cover story for an assassination, like that of Mario Bachand, is constructed and…

Mario Bachand the Activist

In the afternoon of October 16, 1968, ten thousand students from McGill University, CEGEP Vieux-Montréal and the School of Fine Arts demonstrated their support for the striking students of CEGEP…

The intoxicating Anne Legaré

Robert Comeau and the assassination of Mario Bachand – a matter of deception Des doutes sur deux étudiants québécois Dans son récit, McLoughlin sème le doute quant à une possiblecomplicité,…

Interview of Mario Bachand

In 1966, Mario Bachand was interview for the program Ni Ange, ni Bête of Radio Canada, Montreal. The interviewer was the well-known and excellent journalist Judith Jasmin. Bachand remarks reveal…

The Isdal Woman and Mario Bachand

While conducting research on the Mario Bachand assassination, which lead up with the publication of “Last Stop, Paris”, I conducted many interviews, in Canada and abroad. Many were of retired…

Into the Labyrinth

I awoke with a start, the first light of the morning seeping through the curtains. My first thought, “How did I end up in Paris, investigating a 25 year-old unsolved…