Myriam Bédard Case in Canada

There is an interesting case in Canada with a former Olympic gold medalist who has been acting strange lately, and who is now charged with an abduction related to violating her ex-husband's visiting arrangements, a story which has pretty much gone under the radar in the US, while it's front page news here in Canada.

The whole story is a little convoluted, but I will try to summarize. Myriam Bédard came back a Canadian Hero after winning two gold medals in the 1994 Winter Olympics, and has been in the Canadian media off and on ever since. She had one daughter with her ex-husband, Jean Paquet. They divorced and she married a man from Iran. About two years ago, she was involved in a government scandal: last summer, her new husband, an artist, was accused of theft of paintings. There had been lots of reports in French media particularly (see http://www.radio-canada.ca/nouvelles/ and do a search for "BEDARD", if you can speak French), that she had been acting strangely, and wrote to all kinds of people (our prime minister, the US Ambassador to Canada, and to Kofi Annan and all the people of Earth) about suffering from "political terrorism", and threatened to go to the States to defend herself. Her parents and most of her family are now estranged, including her ex-husband. Her mother has said that her new husband has "destroyed" her daughter.

She left Quebec for the States in October 2006 with her husband and 12-year-old daughther. The girl's father only had 2 or 3 phone calls with her, which lasted less than 1 minute each, and which were mysteriously cut short. Myriam's family had said that the situation was clearly "not normal". The father filed charges on the basis that she violated visitation agreements, having not had any contact with his daughter in three weeks, and Myriam Bédard was arrested near Baltimore shortly before Christmas, around December 23rd.

What is strange, in my opinion, is that her lawyers are saying that the girl's father has not been consistent with visitation agreements, and never said that he wanted a visit with his daughter during the holidays and that the mother let everyone know that she was going to the States, even advising the prime-minister. He may be referring to her strange letter that was also addressed to Kofi Annan and all the citizens of Earth. It was also suggested that the father is often out of the country for work reasons.

The father, on the other hand, says that he has had virtually no contact with his daughter since October, he was not told where she was, and that he was concerned that his daughter had been pulled out of school since October, and that he had not seen her in two and a half momths. He waited a few weeks to see if the situation would resolve itself. The daughter stayed with her maternal grandmother, who is still on good terms with the father, and moved back with her father shortly around Christmas.

Myriam Bédard's American lawyers have said that she urgently had to see her daughter, as her daughter was not eating or bathing, in a show of solidarity with her mother, by imposing similar jail conditions onto herself; but, the mother's own sister and mother have said that this was not true, and that Maude, the daughter, was doing fine.

I think that the toughest thing that will have to be dealt with is taking her daughter out of school for two and a half months... how do you explain that? Who knows how long it would have been before she came back of her own free will?

Anyway, a REALLY strange case all-around with many elements: seemingly disturbed mother, hints of a manipulative new husband, political overtones, father being excluded from picture, etc... Myriam Bédard is supposed to appear in Court in Quebec City on Friday. Much more to come I'm sure!

Here is a link to the latest article, which also links to earlier reports and video.