A Crown prosecutor in Montreal has resigned from her position following the revelation of an intimate relationship with a defence lawyer who was representing an accused in the same drug trafficking case she was prosecuting.
The Resignation in Court
On Monday, December 15, 2025, during a hearing at the Montreal courthouse, lawyer Marc Labelle informed Superior Court Justice Gregory Moore that prosecutor Alice Bourbonnais-Rougeau had recently resigned from the Directeur des poursuites criminelles et pénales (DPCP). The disclosure came as cross-examination was set to resume for defence attorney Mathieu Rondeau-Poissant, who was at the centre of the controversy.
Labelle requested that Bourbonnais-Rougeau's letter of resignation be entered as evidence in an ongoing motion for a stay of proceedings. Bourbonnais-Rougeau was the lead prosecutor in the case, known as Operation Postcure, a cannabis trafficking investigation.
A Relationship Across the Courtroom
The relationship between the two lawyers came to light during the legal proceedings. Rondeau-Poissant, who represented accused David Keith Bishop, 55, was removed from the file after his client confronted him about the liaison with the prosecutor.
During his testimony in November 2025, Rondeau-Poissant admitted, "I knew that what I did was wrong." Under cross-examination by Labelle on Monday, he described the relationship as "intense" at its peak. Evidence presented to the court, including text messages, showed the two lawyers exchanged daily morning greetings and nightly goodnight messages.
"On court dates (in Postcure), you would both come into the courtroom, say hello to each other and sit down on either side of the courtroom and no one else knew (about the relationship)," Labelle asked. Rondeau-Poissant replied, "Yes."
Legal Fallout and Past Conduct
The relationship has sparked a major conflict of interest challenge. One of the accused in the Postcure case, Bruno Desmarais, 63, is seeking a stay of proceedings on the charges he faces. He argues the relationship created a significant conflict and speculates that Bourbonnais-Rougeau may have been privy to defence strategy.
This was not Bourbonnais-Rougeau's first professional disciplinary issue. She was previously suspended for 20 days starting December 6, 2024, for her conduct during a 2021 arrest for impaired driving, for which she was convicted in 2023. In a separate 2021 case in St-Jérôme involving former Terrebonne mayor Jean-Marc Robitaille, she and another prosecutor were criticized by a judge for failing to disclose evidence to defence lawyers. That case ended in a stay of proceedings.
According to testimony from Paul Mercier, deputy chief of the DPCP, in September 2025, Bourbonnais-Rougeau initially denied the relationship with Rondeau-Poissant but admitted to it in June. She has not testified in the motion hearing and was reported to be on sick leave. Her resignation marks a significant development in a case that has exposed serious breaches of legal ethics and professional conduct within Quebec's justice system.
