Anti-racism advocates want to know why a Longueuil woman who is accused of throwing boiling water at a 10-year-old Black boy earlier this month was released after her initial arrest and then again on bail this week.
Stéphanie Borel faces charges of aggravated assault for allegedly pouring boiling water on the child who was walking by her home. The Oct. 2 attack left the boy with serious burns to his head, face, torso and back.
The suspect was arrested and then released the same day on a promise to appear and under conditions, including not contacting the child and his family.
She was arrested again on Oct. 11, following the “acquisition of new investigative elements,” according to a news release sent by Longueuil police.
But Thursday, Borel was once again released — this time, under a number of conditions that include living with her son, and staying away from the home and school of the young victim as well as from a witness. The identities of the boy and the witness are protected by a publication ban.
Borel will be back in court on Jan. 23, 2025.
Stéphanie Borel said for many months she was being harassed by people ringing her doorbell and then leaving. On Oct. 31, a Quebec judge decided to release her, saying she is not a threat to public safety. The boy’s family was in the courtroom and said they were disappointed by the decision.
Joel DeBellefeuille, the executive director the Red Coalition, an anti-racism advocacy organization, said the decisions to release Borel on Oct. 2 and then again this week send a “strong, negative” message to Black Quebecers.
“What it said to the community is that your rights are not as equal as others,” he said.
“If the roles were reversed and this was a Black man that poured scalding hot water onto a 10-year-old white girl, we’d essentially be in a modern-day lynching of that Black person.”
DeBellefeuille said her release both times harm his group’s efforts to improve relations between police in the province and racialized people.
“This is a real slap in the face,” he said. “This is setting everything back, years and years of work. It’s going to make our work more difficult.”
On Oct. 10, DeBellefeuille sent a letter to police Chief Marc Leduc and Longueuil Mayor Catherine Fournier to express his group’s disappointment in the police response.
He believes the letter, as well as public outcry, were what led to the suspect’s second arrest.
In a statement to CBC News, Longueuil police said it “handles all cases impartially, based on information available at the time of the intervention.”
“The elements in question, brought to the attention of our patrol officers at the time, met the criteria for release,” read the statement.
Though DeBellefeuille saw “some form of relief” in Borel being re-arrested, he says the victim will never be the same.
“He is going to see every scar that he’s going to have…. and it’s going to put him right back to that fateful day,” he said.
Renzel Dashington, a comedian, producer and activist with a large following on social media, addressed the boy’s case in several live recordings and posts. He also took part in a walk in support of the young boy and his family in mid-October.
Dashington says people he’s spoken with are horrified by what happened to the victim.
“We all live in a world where we thought children, all children, were protected. This was an example that it’s not quite true,” he said.
Dashington has decried the police’s decision to release Borel the same day she was arrested.
“For some reason, these police officers were able to have sympathy for this lady,” he said. “I just know that as a person of colour who has young children in his life, I’m scared for many things. But now I’m also scared of what happens once something does happen.”
Why do police release suspects?
Immigration and criminal defence lawyer Marine Cournier with Hasa Avocats has worked with clients involved in cases where she says there was evidence they experienced a racial double standard by police.
“Freedom should always be the principle and the way to go unless there are reasons to believe that this person is a threat for security,” Cournier said, adding she couldn’t say whether there was a double standard in how Longueuil police handled the case.
In 2021, Borel was charged with assault in a separate case and was acquitted after agreeing to sign a peace bond. Cournier explained that police can use this type of information when arresting a person, but it can’t be used in court against a suspect if they were acquitted.
Every piece of information police have can be used to conclude that the person poses a threat, Cournier explained.
When police make an arrest, Cournier said, “they just need to have reasonable grounds to believe that she could be a threat to the same victim or another and she can continue to do so.”
DeBellefeuille argues Borel is a “danger to society.”
A publication ban has been issued in this case. As a result, CBC has blurred the faces of the boy and his mother and is withholding their names.
“I can’t even imagine the excruciating pain that [the boy] went through when he was tormented by this woman. So that alone has to be taken into consideration in the decisions of the investigators and the Crown,” he said.
Dashington wants more accountability from police when it comes to instances of anti-Black racism and believes Borel wouldn’t have been arrested again on Oct. 11 if it wasn’t for “the people’s outrage.”
“I’m impatient to live in a world where something like this happens and the first thing out of the responsible people’s mouths is: ‘I cannot believe this happened to these parents. We’re sorry for our part in this and here’s what we’re doing to change what happened. And let us make sure for all other parents that if this was to happen again, this won’t happen again because we fixed it,'” he said.
For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community — check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.