A killer has offered a C$100,000 ($71,400; £56,000) reward for the murder of a crime reporter for Montreal newspaper La Presse, the outlet reported.
Convicted killer Frederic Silva admitted to The News that he had offered the contract to anyone willing to carry out the attack on Daniel Leonard, who is reporting that he will be killed in 2021 Three murders and one attempted murder.
Silva was convicted in 2022 and became a police informant.
Quebec Premier Francois Legault condemned the plot. “In Quebec we’re not in a movie and it doesn’t make sense to give a journalist a contract because he did his job,” he said.
“This is not the Quebec we want,” he said, adding that police in the province must continue to fight organized crime.
In order to become an informant for authorities, Silva had to confess to his entire criminal history, according to The News. The outlet said it learned of the plot against Mr Leno after reviewing a statement Mr Silva made to police.
Silva admitted that he contacted two influential organized crime figures during his 2021 trial about the assassination of Mr Leno.
Silva expressed hesitation about the numbers and said targeting journalists was a bad idea.
According to La Stampa, the “contract” was signed for about two months but was never implemented. He said Silva ultimately canceled the order because he “had more important issues to deal with.”
Silva is currently serving a life sentence in prison.
Mr Leno told The Press he was “shocked” by the revelations.
“I will not censor myself, but I always exercise restraint and will not disclose details of criminals’ private lives to avoid endangering lives. So I never thought that I would be the subject of such a contract,” he said.
Vincent Marissal, a former colleague of Mr. Reno’s who is now an elected provincial politician with the left-wing Quebec Solidaire party, described the journalist as “a very serious person — not the kind of person who would be a big deal in the newsroom.” A loud and noisy guy, but obviously a very serious guy.
“That means he was doing his job, but it’s certainly not a reason to put a bounty on him.”
