The descent into hell of a quebec physician

Photo courtesy
Dr. Jacques Roy

Éric Thibault

Saturday, 14 October, 2017 08:00

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Saturday, 14 October, 2017 08:00

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Of doctor well served to be a prisoner surrounded by violent criminals, the fall of Dr. Jacques Roy has been dizzying.

This doctor from quebec has been sentenced to 35 years in prison and a fine of 268 million $, in Texas, where the FBI has described as the mastermind of the largest fraud ever committed at the expense of the public system of health insurance in the United States. Discover the incredible story of Dr. Roy, who claims to still his innocence, and that the american dream has turned into a nightmare.

 

The white coat hypertension has turned into a costume prison orange

“Jacques wanted to become an American since his teenage years. He loved the United States, a powerful country and fertile in opportunities where anything can happen… “

Photo courtesy

Jacques Roy and Louise Lamarre began dating in the winter of 1978 while studying medicine at université Laval.

On the 9th of August last, Louise Lamarre took his courage in both hands and read a letter from a fifty paragraphs for the judge to impose a sentence to her husband, in a courtroom in Dallas.

Jacques Roy, 60 years old, dressed in an orange jumpsuit of a prisoner, heard him trying to hold back his tears.

“We did that 25 years ago when we seized the opportunity to come and practice medicine in this country. We became american citizens in 1989. The dream of James was to become a reality. He was so happy. The United States, it is home “, she then continued.

To preach in the desert

Photo courtesy

Doctors Roy and Lamarre during a night shift at the emergency hospital of Trois-Rivières in 1982.

Born in Montreal, and also a doctor, Dr. Lamarre took the floor after a long and bitter argument the prosecutor, Mr. P. J. Meitl.

Found guilty of fraud by a jury after a long trial, Dr Roy is a doctor who is incompetent, a “threat” to the safety of the public and a ” criminal without remorse, that no qualities cannot redeem “, had insisted the prosecutor.

“The judge listened to me not at all, reported in the Journal the wife of Dr. Roy. He would not look me in the face. His decision was already taken. “

Father of the Bachelorette

Photo courtesy

Rachel Lindsay, daughter of judge Lindsay and star of the popular reality show The Bachelorette, in ABC network.

Maybe the judge Sam A. Lindsay had the head elsewhere. Forty hours earlier, he was one of 7.5 million viewers to watch his daughter, a lawyer, Rachel, is to choose a fiancé as

first African-American star of the tv reality show The Bachelorette on the ABC network.

The judge Lindsay was appointed in 1997 by president Bill Clinton in the State of Texas, where less than 3 % of 3000 judges are black — is not of the kind that is easy to tenderize.

Photo courtesy

The judge Sam Lindsay, who presided over the trial of Dr. Roy in Texas.

In may, he rejected a lawsuit brought by the parents of a student muslim 14-year-old who had been handcuffed in the middle class by the police of Irving for having brought to the school a clock that he had made himself, but that his teacher was mistaken for a bomb.

“Crucified “

“His work was his life, told him the wife of Dr. Roy. All he wanted was to do good, not evil. He saw too large ? Would he have had to refuse to see patients ? “

She asked for his leniency, adding that since her husband’s arrest in 2012, the daily life of the couple and its two children is like ” a storm that desperately tries to cross without capsizing “.

Even Jacques Roy has begged its “mercy” by speaking briefly to him.

Judge Sam Lindsay ruled in imposing “which is almost a life sentence” according to his words : 35 years of the penitentiary, and 268 million $ to pay back to the public system of health insurance in the country.

“It was the worst day of my life. They have crucified him “, dropped Louise Lamarre in the interview, very bitter towards the legal system of his country of adoption.

$ 2.5 Million confiscated

Dr. Roy was also confiscated $ 2.5 million in its bank accounts or investments, and that the FBI considers revenues to be fraudulent.

His lawyers have claimed the paltry sum of $ 1.2 million in fees. The money that he and his wife had saved while working in emergency hospitals in Quebec, Alabama and Texas and that the u.s. authorities had decided not to enter.

Now penniless, Jacques Roy has raised its appeal. It will be defended by a lawyer of legal aid of Texas.

“There may be one chance in 100 of winning, but he has always proclaimed his innocence, according to his wife. At times, you wonder how it could happen and if we are going to wake up one day… “

 

Like father, like son

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The accused Jacques Roy, in a court room in Dallas

The sixth of a family of eight children, Jacques Roy has followed in the footsteps professional her parents, both doctors.

Joseph Roy had known his wife, Renee, while they were studying at the faculty of medicine of Laval University, at the end of the 1940s.

“Like jack and me in 1977, remarked Louise Lamarre. His father was a pulmonologist. His mother has not practiced for a long time, and devoted to the family. “

“This is the only doctor of eight children,” said her sister, Helen Roy, a pharmacist, who is four years his senior.

“Always the big smile “

Photo courtesy

Jacques Roy, flanked by his wife and his father, Dr. Joseph Roy, on the shores of lac Saint-Joseph, near Quebec city.

Jacques Roy was born on June 20, 1957, in Quebec city. It was a kid, energetic and playful who ” moved air “.

“A trickster, according to his sister. He always had the big smile in the face. “

The Roy family lived in Sillery, a well-off suburb of the Old Capital, and Jacques was educated at the private.

Bernard Desgagné made his acquaintance at the Seminary of Quebec.

“A type skilled for social relations, very enterprising and kind. It was a real Jean-Luc Brassard in alpine skiing. And he had a great talent for sailing, ” according to the official Gatineau.

The DJ nerd

Jacques Roy spent his summers doing water sports in the lac-Saint-Joseph, where his parents owned a cottage.

“It was both an intellectual and a boute-en-train “, said Dr. Marie-Josée Ladora, who has made his studies in medicine alongside Louise Lamarre and Jacques Roy.

The latter was 20 years old when a fire destroyed the family home.

“He has lost all his papers and his books in the fire, reported Dr. Lamarre. I passed my notes to follow in class. Marie-Josée also. We became good friends all three. “

“He came to live with me, said Helen Roy. He slept on the lounge chair. He spent his time studying by listening to music. He has gone to a disco-mobile. I love the opera, but to him, it was more rock. “

Roy was our “DJ at all parties students, it is he who animated the dance,” recalled Dr. Ladora.

Robert Charlebois, and Harmonium and Beau Damage were his favorite artists, after Louise Lamarre.

“I noticed more and more, said Louise Lamarre. He was always full of ideas, easy way with words. And then we started dating during the Holiday season in 1978. “

Beginnings in Mauricie

After graduation in June of 1980 and done their internship together at the hospital of Saint Francis of Assisi, in Quebec city, the two young doctors began their career at the emergency of the hospital Sainte-Marie, Trois-Rivières, at the beginning of the summer of 1981.

“It was very busy, but we had energy to spare. We liked it a lot, ” recalls Dr. Lamarre.

A few months after their marriage, in June 1982, Jacques Roy and Louise Lamarre would quickly be attracted to the South, well away from the Mauricie region.

 

From Quebec to Texas… with a detour to the Cayman islands

“These are two of the best er doctors to be practised in Trois-Rivières. It doesn’t bother me to say it out loud. “

The psychiatrist Pierre Mailloux “well-known” Jacques Roy and Louise Lamarre, while they worked at the same time as him in the hospital he, who was at this time baptized in Sainte-Marie.

photo in The Newspaper of Montreal, Chantal Poirier

Pierre Mailloux, A Psychiatrist

“In the world. Friends that I loved very much. I have seen them at work and they worked a lot for the well-being of their patients, ” said the Doc Mailloux in the Journal.

He remembers in particular Jacques Roy as ” a sort of genius “.

The call of the south

Photo courtesy

Jacques Roy at his graduation, in June 1980, received his diploma from the dean of the faculty of medicine of Laval University and future Health minister, Jean Rochon.

“A very big iq. Extremely intelligent. And impeccable with his patients on a human level. But Jacques and Louise were part of the wave of quebec physicians left in exodus to the United States. “

A year and a half after their arrival at Trois-Rivières hospital, the couple of eps, was planning his departure in the company of three fellow orthopaedic surgeons.

“The orthopedists wanted to leave and make more money here, said Louise Lamarre at the other end of the phone, in the south of the United States. James spoke with them, there were openings in Alabama, and it was also of interest. Our salary to the urgency of the Three-Rivers had already been capped, and it was thought that it did not make sense. “

Photo courtesy

Bernard Desgagné (in the foreground), with her friend Louise Lamarre in the wedding of this last one with Dr. Roy in 1982.

This was not only a question of money.

“Jacques had dreamed of since always settle in the United States, after his sister Helen. It was the style of the Americans. He loved the fact that on the other side of the border there is nothing free and you have to work for what you have. And James loved to work a lot. “

Photo courtesy

Dr. Roy during a ski trip in Colorado, in march 2011.

Pq and republican

“He found that he was paying too much tax in Quebec. It has always been good at English and he was living there, ” said Dr. Marie-Josée Ladora, her friend and ex-classmate.

Jacques Roy “was not a big fan of the social system” in force in Canada and Quebec, according to Louise Lamarre, recalling that her husband has become an ardent supporter of the right wing republican once in the United States, and he has even contributed to the fund election of the Tea Party.

It is a curious paradox. Before leaving the province, it was also ” voted and worked for the Parti québécois “, the political left, and he was “happy when René Lévesque was elected” in 1976 and in 1980, after his wife.

The Stones, Dylan…

In January 1983, the couple left the winter in quebec to go and work in Alabama, in the hospital, Helen-Keller.

This hospital is located in Muscle Shoals, a mythical city in the music industry, as many legends have recorded albums, including the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and Aretha Franklin.

This seemed like the perfect place for the former DJ of the faculty of medicine of Laval University.

However, he and his wife did not expect to have to share their working hours between the consultation bureau and their true passion, the urgency.

In July 1984, they moved to the State of Texas where they have found full-time positions in the emergency of a hospital in San Antonio.

Photo courtesy

Jacques Roy could go sailing on lake Ray Hubbard, the edge of which her house was located, in Rockwall.

Their son Nicolas was born in 1986, and their daughter, Roxanne, in 1991. Everything was for the better.

But not for long.

 

In the shadow of the tax man

The problems of Dr. Jacques Roy date back to the release of the film in the shadow of Shawshank, which has given him a desire to open a bank account in a tax haven, as the main character.

This may seem like a scenario drawn by the hair, but it’s the version that Dr. Roy himself has given to a probation officer who met him at the prison in Seagoville, June 30, 2016.

“I’ve seen the film Shawshank Redemption in 1994. The main character had forged a false identity. It intrigued me, ” says a court document in which it is cited.

In this film based on a story by Stephen King, the banker Andy Dufresne — played by the actor Tim Robbins — is unjustly imprisoned for murder. His talents financial are used by the director to be corrupt from the prison of Shawshank.

The latter, who receives bribes, force the inmate to conceal the dirty money to the shelter of the authorities. The banker stripped cache, then the loot in the accounts opened under an impersonation identity.

In the name of a parent death

“Then I tried to make one with an old driving licence,” said Dr. Roy to the probation officer.

The following year, Roy travelled to the Cayman islands where he opened a bank account in the name of Michel Poulin, using a driving licence in the name of the latter, but with a picture of the doctor.

RENE BAILLARGEON/LOG “QUEB” Courtesy

Michel Poulin, who died in 1984 and whose identity has been used by Dr. Roy to open an account in the Cayman islands.

Michel Poulin was married to a cousin of Dr. Roy when he died accidentally at the age of 26 years, on 12 February 1984.

Very poor quality

“It was so poor quality that it would never have been able to be used in a financial institution in the least bit serious. [But] the Cayman islands, there is no verification. The only requirement to open an account is to provide a piece of identity. No matter which one, ” argued the doctor.

He insisted on the fact that there had been “no transaction” in this account after its opening and that it had “no relevance” in the fraud charges brought against him.

The FBI has found the licence, falsified documents and bank in a dusty box in the attic of the home of Dr. Roy, during a search in 2011.

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The FBI has found that book in the attic of Dr. Roy in 2011.

Officers also found a book titled ” Hide your A$$et$ and Disappear (How to hide your assets and disappear). A book incriminating, of any appearance, but ” he did not even read “, has defended his friend Bernard Desgagné.

“It was a bad idea, he said. Jacques admitted that it was dumb. There were only 2000 $ in there. Federal prosecutors are well-kept, to say that they have found nothing, or almost. It has all the same been very useful for build their thesis far-fetched that James was planning to hide its so-called million $ and run away. What he would never have done. “

Photo courtesy

The photo that the FBI has taken Dr. Roy after his arrest in 2012.

“I knew at the same time as everyone else in the newspapers, after his arrest in 2012, for his part, recounted his wife, Louise Lamarre. He put the minimum required and has never touched this account. I saw it as a blow to the head. Unfortunately, it has come to haunt him 20 years later. “