The Crown appealed the verdict, saying it believes Turcotte, a former cardiologist, planned the murders.
After a complaint from a customer, an OQLF inspector visited Menchie's frozen yogurt to look at plastic spoons like these. The OQLF has yet to decide if the spoons are permitted or not. Photo courtesy Menchie's.
The Office Quebecoise de la Langue Francaise, reacting to a complaint from a customer, visited a frozen yogurt store in the West Island to inspect some English words written on plastic cutlery.
The owners of Menchie's in DDO's Blue Haven Mall say they were told by inspectors from the Office Quebecoise de la Langue Francaise that their plastic spoons violate Quebec's law on languages.
According to a post on the company's Facebook page somebody filed a complaint with the OQLF about the spoons which are stamped with the words "Sweet Moosic." The company is now trying to find a new source for utensils.
However the OQLF says any rush to judgment is premature.
OQLF spokesperson Martin Bergeron told CTV's Maya Johnson an inspector followed up on a complaint about the spoons and has filed a report, but added the Office has not yet analyzed the inspection report, and has not told the restaurant to remove the spoons.
"That means no demands for correctional steps have been made to the company," the OQLF wrote in a statement Friday.
"Every time the OQLF opens a complaint file, a member of its staff goes to the spot to check the situation. To do that, they might take pictures, request documents, or simply seek information from the business. They will also hand over a letter explaining the reasons for the intervention.
"After that, the OQLF analyzes the file and, if it sees a violation of the Charter of the French Language, it asks the business to take corrective measures."
This file is still at the analysis stage.
The OQLF began its statement by expressing frustration at what it views as overblown coverage of its activities by "certain media," likely a jab at anglophone newspaper, radio and TV stations that also reported at length on an earlier controversy over the word pasta on a menu, a kerfuffle known as pastagate.
Menchie's spoons, which it promotes as take-home souvenirs, are provided by the head office in California and distributed worldwide. The company periodically changes the colours available and the slogan, such as "this is my mix" and "chip away."
In recent months the OQLF has come under fire after fining a restaurant for using Italian words like "pasta" on its menu, and other restaurants have been informed the word "caffe" is forbidden.
Those decisions made international headlines in February and March, leading to the resignation of OQLF head Louise Marchand. Language Minister Diane De Courcy also said the inspector who made the rulings about menu items was "overzealous" even though each infraction conformed to the letter of the law.
The provincial government is struggling to pass a more restrictive version of the provincial language law that would see francophones barred from attending English-language CEGEPs and force all companies with more than 25 employees to conduct all internal communication in French.
The OQLF received a six per cent budget increase, to $24.7 million, this year under the new Parti Quebecois government after it also received a smaller increase the previous year under the old Liberal government.
But the organization has also come under criticism from the PQ, which is generally more hawkish on language. The PQ government said the agency had been "overzealous" in its handling of files and would review its complaints procedure.
The number of complaints to the organization nearly doubled over three years, to 4,067 in 2011-12.
More than half of those files -- 2,475 of them -- were acted on and closed.
Of those 2,475 cases, corrective measures were taken 58 per cent of the time; "incentive" measures were applied in 17 per cent of cases; two per cent of cases were sent to the Justice Department for possible penalties; and 19 per cent of the time the original complaint was deemed to be unfounded.
-With a file from The Canadian Press
It has merely opened a yogurt-spoon investigation.
The Office quebecois de la langue francaise confirms that it has opened an investigation after receiving a complaint about the plastic spoons served by the American frozen yogurt chain Menchie's.
Someone complained that the plastic pastel-coloured spoons contained the words, "Sweet Moosic."
So the OQLF opened a file. An inspector went to the outlet to look into the case, and an inspection report is underway. No decision has been made yet.
"That means no demands for correctional steps have been made to the company," said the statement Friday.
"Every time the OQLF opens a complaint file, a member of its staff goes to the spot to check the situation. To do that, they might take pictures, request documents, or simply seek information from the business. They will also hand over a letter explaining the reasons for the intervention.
"After that, the OQLF analyzes the file and, if it sees a violation of the Charter of the French Language, it asks the business to take corrective measures."
This file is still at the analysis stage.
The OQLF began its statement by expressing frustration at what it views as overblown coverage of its activities by "certain media." It did not specifically mention CJAD, the English-language radio station that reported the yogurt incident.
CJAD also reported the recent "Pastagate" incident that embarrassed the language watchdog, as it made international headlines and led to the departure of the organization's head.
The station reported Friday that the frozen-yogurt chain was looking to replace its spoon supplier, at considerable cost, because of the OQLF intervention.
But the statement from the language watchdog said the report was inaccurate and premature. It urged media to seek its side of the story before reporting on language flareups.
The OQLF received a six per cent budget increase, to $24.7 million, this year under the new Parti Quebecois government after it also received a smaller increase the previous year under the old Liberal government.
But the organization has also come under criticism from the PQ, which is generally more hawkish on language. The PQ government said the agency had been "overzealous" in its handling of files.
CTV Montreal
Published Friday, June 21, 2013
Baron Byng High School - 1921 - 19824251 St. Urbain, Montreal, Quebec, CanadaSituated at the centre of the densely populated Jewish neighbourhood between the wars, Baron Byng High School was a Protestant public school with a student body that was, for a time, 99 percent Jewish. This paradox is testament to the segregation efforts of the Protestant School Board, which sought both to avoid the dilution of Anglo-Saxon culture and Protestant religious instruction taught in their public schools, as well as the perceived disruption of classes when many students left for Jewish holidays. Baron Byng is iconic in the memories of many Montreal Jews who grew up along "the Main." The confessional school system of Quebec relegated Jews and other "non-Catholics" to Protestant schools. As long as Jews did not outnumber their Christian counterparts, it was rare that problems of accommodation rose. Until 1907, most Jewish children were concentrated in the Jewish-run Baron de Hirsch Institute Hebrew Free School on Bleury, which fed students into a number of Protestant schools. However, the school's closing, coinciding with a wave of immigration, resulted in an influx of newly arrived East European Jewish students who overwhelmed the Protestant schools. Members of the school board expressed concerns about attendance during Jewish holidays, especially the High Holy Days, which were deemed to play havoc early in the school year. At the same time, it was difficult to ensure religious instruction along Anglo-Saxon cultural traditions, as Jewish teachers were vying for equal opportunities to teach, and some schools had very few Protestant students. The board sought to rectify the problem by segregating Jewish students into separate classes, and, where possible, as in the case of Baron Byng High, making the entire school Jewish. Named in honour of the Governor General at the time, the Baron himself opened the school at 4251 St Urbain Street in 1922. The proportion of the Jewish population attending Baron Byng rose from 89 percent in 1924 to 99 percent just fourteen years later, reflecting a similar pattern at the Bancroft, Devonshire, and Mount Royal schools. Other Protestant schools with large Jewish populations included Aberdeen, Fairmount and Strathearn schools as well as Commercial High. Through the 1920s, most Protestant schools with a majority Jewish population were located east of Hutchison Street. By the 1960s, the Jewish population was slowly migrating to the suburbs and only Baron Byng was situated in the old area of Jewish settlement between Hutchison and St. Denis. Baron Byng High's most illustrious graduates include poets Irving Layton and A. M. Klein, Supreme Court of Canada Judge Morris Fish, N.D.P. leader David Lewis, and writer Mordecai Richler, who paid tribute to it in his novels as "Fletcher's Field High." The Baron Byng building currently houses Sun Youth/Jeunesse au soleil, a community organization which was co-founded by Sid Stevens, a Baron Byng graduate. To this day, many Baron Byng alumni groups gather to reminisce about the Protestant school that was Jewish. Compiled by Marian Pinsky Links: Interactive Museum of Jewish Montreal |
