A Quebec Court judge has acquitted an alleged Montreal street gang leader and another man on charges of obstructing police officers, citing a lack of credible evidence and significant contradictions in the testimony of the officers involved.
Judge Criticizes Police Testimony and Lack of Notes
On Friday, January 9, 2026, Judge Rose-Mélanie Drivod delivered her verdict at the Montreal courthouse, clearing Jean-Philippe Célestin, 45, and Bastian Rituit, 25. The judge highlighted a critical flaw in the Crown's case: none of the Montreal police officers who testified during the trial had taken any notes about the alleged obstruction incident from April 9, 2022.
Judge Drivod stated the officers provided contradictory accounts, which represented insufficient evidence to secure a conviction. The charges stemmed from an early morning traffic stop on St-Laurent Boulevard, just north of Sherbrooke Street.
Details of the 2022 Incident and Subsequent Trial
The situation began when police pulled over Hardy Kinsley Bonhomme, 30, for suspected impaired driving around 3 a.m. Célestin and Rituit were passengers in the vehicle. When an officer requested Bonhomme's keys, he refused. According to testimony, Rituit then moved to the driver's seat and drove away with Célestin still in the car.
During the trial, a key issue emerged: no officer could definitively state how the vehicle's keys ended up in Rituit's possession. Furthermore, the judge noted that Montreal police only decided to pursue obstruction charges against the two men during a meeting held two days after the incident.
Other officers followed the vehicle and conducted a second stop on Sherbrooke Street. Testimony about this stop was also inconsistent. One officer could not recall why they pulled the vehicle over again, while there were contradictions about whether Célestin joked about carrying a firearm. The judge also heard conflicting accounts about the speed at which Rituit drove away from the initial stop, with one officer saying it sped off and others claiming it departed slowly.
Legal Arguments and Broader Context
Defence lawyer Richard Tawil argued that the officer who initially asked for Bonhomme's keys did not testify, making related evidence hearsay. He also contended that his clients had a right to ask why they were being detained before identifying themselves during the second stop.
Judge Drivod ultimately agreed that the evidence was too unreliable. This is not Célestin's first encounter with the justice system. In 2017, he was sentenced to a 46-month prison term in a major drug trafficking and gangsterism case. Police documents from a past investigation, Projet Magot-Mastiff, alleged he was assigned a part of downtown Montreal to control drug trafficking by the late Hells Angels associate Gregory Woolley.
In a related outcome, Bonhomme was acquitted of impaired driving charges in 2023 but pleaded guilty to obstruction for his initial refusal to hand over the keys, receiving a $500 fine.
