Case Summary
Photo Credit: The Toronto Star/Peter Edwards
Christopher Bates spent the afternoon of December 17, 1992, picking up a Christmas turkey at his parents' home in Dunham, Quebec, and visiting his grandfather. He then spent a quiet evening in front of the television with his common-law wife, Wendy Fuller, after having bathed the kids and tucked them into bed.1
But local police and, ultimately, the Crown prosecutors that tried him, argued a very different version of that December night’s events. Investigators claimed that Bates and three others, including Wendy Fuller, left a party, went to the Provi-Soir store in Cowansville, and fatally shot store-owner Remi Lariviere in the chest at about 10 p.m. after a failed robbery attempt.2
The jury believed the latter version of events, despite the Crown not having any physical evidence. No fingerprints and no murder weapon could be tied to Bates.3 Exactly one year after Lariviere was killed, Bates was convicted of second degree murder, robbery, and conspiracy to commit robbery.4 He was sentenced to life in prison.
Among Bates’ alleged co-conspirators, Cedric Fuller was acquitted,5 Wendy Fuller’s charges were dropped,6 and Lynwood Yates was found guilty of only conspiracy and armed robbery and sentenced to six years in prison.7 Yates, one of the main witnesses to Bates’ alleged involvement, had at different times stated that Bates was at the scene, and that he was not.8
Bates never stopped maintaining his innocence, even after his conviction. At his trial, the Crown case relied heavily on one witness who said that Bates was at a party and left with three friends, including Wendy Fuller, to go to Lariviere's Provi-Soir.9 However, while Bates served his sentence in prison, a team of investigators uncovered 185 additional witness statements that had not been included as evidence at trial. These statements included evidence that Bates never left the party with his alleged co-consipirators, and that he had not been at the crime scene. This evidence was not disclosed to Bates’ lawyer before trial. Of note, five witnesses, including a woman who lived across the street from the crime scene, saw two men in a brown Pontiac Grand Prix outside the Provi-Soir the night of the shooting and swore that neither was Bates.10 Further, the investigators uncovered evidence ssuggesting that police bullied witnesses into giving false statements that supported their theory of Bates’ guilt.11 One 16-year-old girl, who could have supported Bates' alibi, wrote: "They beat me up ... hit me with telephone books. They said I would go to Tanguay (prison) and would be raped. They only let me talk to my parents after I signed a false declaration.”12 Armed with this new information, Bates’ legal team appealed his conviction.
In 1998, it took the Quebec Court of Appeal only 39 minutes to order a new trial for Bates.13 In anticipation of this trial, a short time later, Bates was granted bail. He was finally free after nearly six years in prison.14
In the lead-up to Bates’ newest trial, Crown prosecutor Jacques Pothier opted not to bring charges of robbery and second degree murder, saying the Crown did not have enough evidence to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt of Bates' guilt on such charges.15 However, the charge of conspiracy to commit robbery would still be prosecuted.
Bates had a decision to make: he could fight the Crown in court to prove his innocence but risk more time in prison, or negotiate a deal with the Crown where he could plead guilty to the single charge and remain out of prison, allowing him to be near his children.16 He chose the latter, despite knowing he had nothing to do with the events of December 17, 1992. He had little confidence in a jury arriving at the conclusion of his innocence, given his previous trial. Addressing the court, Bates stated that he was “just tired of all this” and that for over five years, he was not able to see his children, and that he wanted to watch them grow up.17
Ultimately, Bates agreed to a conditional sentence of one year, followed by six months’ probation. This decision haunted Bates; he maintained his innocence long after he served this second sentence and desired to have his name totally cleared, so much so that he was willing to risk being prosecuted again for Lariviere’s murder.18
In October 2007, Bates filed a s. 696 application to the Minister of Justice in relation to the guilty plea. It was dismissed early in 2008 on the basis that he had not exhausted his appeals. In 2014, the Quebec Court of Appeal dismissed Bates’ motion to be permitted to bring an appeal after the official time limit with respect to his guilty plea for conspiracy to commit robbery, notwithstanding Bates' evidence that was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. The Court of Appeal stressed that the frailties that led to the murder and robbery charges being withdrawn were “irrelevant” to the guilty plea to conspiracy to commit robbery.19 It ruled that Bates had not produced evidence to support his allegation that his lawyer advised him to take the plea, and was not ready for trial, and also that the evidence of post-traumatic stress disorder did not excuse the delay in contesting the guilty plea.