Ottawa·NewFourteen years after a Gatineau teenager was found brutally killed in woods behind her school in Hull, a man has appeared in court via videolink to be charged with first-degree murder.Stéphane Rivard, 51, was known to police for ‘non-criminal activities’CBC News · Posted: Oct 01, 2025 3:03 PM EDT | Last Updated: 10 minutes agoStéphane Rivard, 51, was impassive as he appeared via videolink in court in Gatineau, Que., on Wednesday to be charged with the first-degree murder of Valérie Leblanc in August 2011. (Lauren Foster-MacLeod/CBC)A man arrested on Tuesday in a 14-year-old cold case has appeared remotely at the Gatineau, Que., courthouse to be charged with the first-degree murder of Valérie Leblanc.Gatineau resident Stéphane Rivard, 51, remained impassive during a brief video appearance from the Gatineau police station on Wednesday. He will remain in custody and is not to contact relatives of Leblanc. A court-appointed lawyer will defend Rivard against the charge, which carries a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment with a minimum non-parole period of 25 years. “I will take the time to review the disclosure of evidence. Mr. Rivard is presumed innocent,” Catherine Gravel told CBC.Relatives of Leblanc who were present at the courthouse did not speak to media. Police and the prosecutors are also tight-lipped about the case.”In order not to interfere with the ongoing legal process, we will not be able to answer questions from journalists at this time,” Crown prosecutor Antoine Désaulniers told media at the courthouse.Rivard’s arrest on Tuesday was the first publicly announced progress in an investigation of a killing that shocked Quebec.On Aug. 23, 2011, the 18-year-old’s badly beaten and burned body was found near a path in the woods behind the Gabrielle-Roy campus of Cégep de l’Outaouais where Leblanc was a student. She had gone missing a few days earlier on her first day of school. Police released a composite sketch of an unidentified “key witness” in the case, but despite a $10,000 reward offered for information, years passed without a breakthrough.But investigators never gave up hope of bringing Leblanc’s killer to justice, Chief Insp. Mathieu Guilbault told CBC on Wednesday. Chief Insp. Mathieu Guilbault said Stéphane Rivard, the man charged with the first-degree murder of Valérie Leblanc, 18, was known to Gatineau Police for ‘non-criminal activities,’ but did not elaborate. (Felix Desroches/CBC)”Throughout the years this investigation has been ongoing and we put a lot of effort into it … especially in the past few weeks,” he said. Guilbault declined to say more about the “new investigative techniques,” that Gatineau Police (SPVG) credited in a release on Tuesday with cracking the case.”We as an organization decided that we won’t comment or interfere with the legal process,” he said.He did say that Gatineau Police had received more than 2,300 tips from the public during the course of the 14-year investigation.Rivard was already known to Gatineau Police for “non-criminal activities,” Guilbault said, declining to say more or specify how long he had been a suspect. But his arrest brings hopes of justice in a case that shook the community, Guilbault said. “This homicide shocked the whole Gatineau region and honestly the whole province of Quebec.”Rivard is next due to appear in court Oct. 21.With files from Joseph Tunney and Radio-Canada
Suspect charged with Valérie Leblanc’s murder appears in court
