Suspicious envelopes not dangerous, Montreal police say
By Monique Muise, The Gazette
June 6, 2012 4:16 PM
MONTREAL - Police in Montreal, Sherbrooke, Laval and Quebec City are now on the hunt for whoever is responsible for sending a series of envelopes containing white powder to more than a dozen locations early Wednesday, including the Sherbrooke riding office of Quebec Premier Jean Charest.
The envelopes began landing in mailboxes just after 9 a.m., prompting a flurry of calls to police from nine locations in Montreal, two in Sherbrooke, one in Laval and at least one more in Quebec City.
Montreal police quickly determined that none of the envelopes that turned up within their jurisdiction posed a legitimate threat.
As of 2:30 p.m., it was unclear if any of the other envelopes were dangerous.
All of the envelopes bore the signature of a mysterious group styling itself “Forces armées révolutionaires du Québec,” which can be roughly translated as “the revolutionary armed forces of Quebec.”
Among the offices targeted were those of Loto-Québec, Quebecor Media, La Presse and TVA Nouvelles. Several government offices, including those of newly appointed Education Minister Michelle Courchesne, Culture Minister Christine St-Pierre, Environment Minister Pierre Arcand, Justice Minister Jean-Marc Fournier, and International Relations Minister Monique Gagnon-Tremblay also received the white powder. The local riding office of Quebec Premier Jean Charest in Sherbrooke was evacuated after a similar package was delivered. Charest was not present at the time.
In Quebec City, the white powder turned up at local radio station Radio Pirate.
None of the packages appear to have been delivered to personal residences.
Urgences Santé official Bob Lamle said about a dozen people at the various sites in Montreal were initially kept under observation but showed no signs of medical problems that would suggest that the envelopes contained a dangerous substance like anthrax. He added that nobody was transported to hospital.
“Nobody has any sign or symptom to indicate that whatever product in there is dangerous,” Lamle told reporters standing outside the Loto-Québec office. “For us, there is no medical problem.”
La Presse reported that at least one of the envelopes in Quebec City contained a note along with the powder, warning that the person opening the package would start to experience headache or nausea and should seek medical help.
Laval police spokesperson Nathalie Laurin said there did not appear to be a note inside the envelope received at Courchesne’s offices, located in Sainte-Dorothée in the city’s west end. She added that there were two employees inside at the time, but neither appeared to be experiencing any health problems.
The shadowy group behind Wednesday’s mayhem does not appear to have any online presence, but the name on the envelopes is strikingly similar to that of the Armée révolutionnaire du Québec (ARQ). The ARQ served as the militant arm of the former Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) in the 1960s, and was best known for supplying ammunition and other weaponry to the FLQ through a series of daring daytime raids of various ammunition caches in Montreal.
The name “Forces armées révolutionaires du Québec” also bears some resemblance to the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC), known in French as Les Forces armées révolutionaires de Colombie, a group of guerrillas based in Colombia.
[Above link includes a map to mailing locations]
