Claude Poirier (journalist)

Claude Poirier (born October 26, 1938 in Montreal, Quebec) is a negotiator and crime reporter for the Quebec-based Canadian French-language television network TVA. He is best known for negotiating with suspects during hostage situations.

His 50-year career as a legal chronicler started in 1960 when he did the description of a bank robbery. He continued to do the job for several months without receiving a salary. Soon after, he covered the assassinations of U.S. former president John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert Kennedy as well as civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. during the 1960s. In Quebec, he covered the kidnapping and subsequent murder of former Quebec Liberal Minister of Labor Pierre Laporte, by the FLQ militant group in 1970. He has, perhaps unwillingly, rebaptised the RCMP (Gendarmerie Royale du Canada in French) la "Genmarderie Royale du Canada" ("marde" is a slang term for excrement in French). Rumour has it that he does it on purpose because of a grudge he has against them. Due to such events, he is often the central character of several funny anecdotes in comedy routines.

During his career he participated in numerous inquiries and trials as an expert and as a witness. He covered the publicized biker gang war that occurred in the province of Quebec during the 1990s as well as criminal trials of well-publicized murder or other crime cases such as the trial of several biker gang members arrested during a province-wide police raid operation called "Printemps 2001" which significantly reduced their criminal activities around the province.

During hostage situations or other events, some criminals often asked police for a negotiation with Poirier. In August 2007, he has been heavily involved over the well-publicized case of the disappearance of a 10-year-old girl, Cédrika Provencher, in Trois-Rivières, in a possible case of abduction.

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