L’Affaire Coffin/Hébert : justice, politique et liberté de presse au Québec, 1953-1966

Type of resource
Author/collaborator
Title
L’Affaire Coffin/Hébert : justice, politique et liberté de presse au Québec, 1953-1966
Abstract
In 1956, Wilbert Coffin (b. 1915) was hanged for the murder of three Americans in Gaspé three years earlier. Many believed that his conviction, based mostly on circumstantial evidence, was politically motivated. Accusations were made that the Premier of Quebec at the time, Maurice Duplessis, made Coffin, a unilingual Anglophone, the scapegoat for the murders so as not to disrupt Quebec's lucrative American tourism industry. Jacques Hébert, a reporter who covered the Coffin trial, wrote two books condemning the verdict -- Coffin était innocent (1958) and J'accuse les assassins de Coffin (1963). As a result of these two books, a Commission of Inquiry was held into the case, which concluded that Coffin had received a fair trial. The author examines the controversy created by Hébert's two books, how the press covered the trial and subsequent inquiry, and how Coffin's conviction remains contentious to this day.
Publication
Bulletin d'histoire politique
Volume
Vol. 25
Issue
no. 1
Pages
113-150
Date
Automne 2016
Language
fr
URL
Citation
Little, Jack I. “L’Affaire Coffin/Hébert : justice, politique et liberté de presse au Québec, 1953-1966.” Bulletin d’histoire politique Vol. 25, no. 1 (Automne 2016): 113–150. https://www.erudit.org/en/journals/bhp/2016-v25-n1-bhp02660/1037418ar.pdf.
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