Richard Henry Bain’s doctor feels ‘badly’ about not sending him to psychiatrist

Jul 26, 2016 | 10:05 AM

MONTREAL — Richard Henry Bain’s longtime personal physician told his first-degree murder trial Tuesday he regrets not having referred his patient to a psychiatrist.

Dr. Stan Van Duyse told jurors he feels “badly” about that decision because he said he witnessed Bain presenting manic behaviour in the years leading up to Quebec’s 2012 election night shooting.

Bain has pleaded not guilty to one charge of first-degree murder, three of attempted murder and two arson-related charges in connection with a shooting on Sept. 4, 2012, the night the Parti Quebecois won the provincial election.

The Crown has alleged the acts at a PQ victory rally were politically driven.

Bain’s lawyer is arguing his client was not criminally responsible.

The accused himself has blamed the use of Cymbalta — which he was taking without his doctor’s knowledge — and said he took as many as nine of the anti-depressant pills the day of the alleged crimes. 

Lighting technician Denis Blanchette was killed and fellow stagehand David Courage was seriously injured after they were both struck by the same bullet.

Bain was treated for depression and anxiety over many years, but began displaying manic behaviour in 2009 not long after retiring. He was self-medicating, taking double the amount of Cymbalta than he’d been prescribed at an unknown date.

The accused was obsessed with an H1N1 pandemic and spent tens of thousands of dollars stockpiling military vehicles and uniforms, weapons, food and medicine in preparation for a possible end to civil society.

“I told him that I thought it was off the wall,” Van Duyse replied when asked if he’d tried to reason with Bain.

“The man was in a state of anxiety, panic, fear, doom,” he said. “This was the end of the world (and) he didn’t want to hear from me.”

There were other examples of “grandiose” behaviour exhibited by Bain.

In one instance, the accused hired a $600 limousine to ferry Van Duyse to the Laurentians, a trip the doctor understood to be to treat Catherine Zeta-Jones, who owned property in the area with husband Michael Douglas.

But upon arrival, it turned out treatment was actually for Bain’s business partner’s wife.

Van Duyse also recalled that Bain would walk around with a money pouch holding several thousand dollars.

The Montreal doctor thought at the time he had the situation well in hand and didn’t require psychiatric intervention.

“No, I thought I had a handle on it,” Van Duyse said, noting that Bain’s condition improved a few weeks after changing medication.

Defence lawyer Alan Guttman asked him how he felt today about that decision to not seek mental health help.

“Badly,” Van Duyse replied, telling Guttman later he would have acted if it had gotten worse.

Under cross-examination by Crown prosecutor Dennis Galiatsatos, Van Duyse confirmed he’d had dinner twice with Bain, including at a trendy Montreal seafood restaurant, as well as gone gambling with him.

He defended the outings despite having raised concerns about Bain’s manic behaviour and over-spending, and stopped short of calling the accused a friend.

“There was always a doctor, physician barrier that I had to respect,” Van Duyse told the court.

Van Duyse’s notes suggest the last time he saw Bain as a patient was January 2012, but spoke to him by phone after his arrest.

The doctor said he had no recollection of a phone call four-to-six weeks after Bain’s arrest when the accused told him he’d overdosed on Cymbalta, was “higher than a kite” and had no idea what he was doing.

Van Duyse told a Crown expert in 2015 that Bain’s depression was “benign” and largely related to stress at the workplace and with his girlfriend.

Bain never complained about psychotic symptoms, amnesia or hallucinations before the shooting, Van Duyse had told the expert, and showed no real signs of disorganized thinking or grandiosity afterwards.

Van Duyse conceded to Galiatsatos that “it was very possible” that details of his testimony to the jury might have been affected by reading expert reports that will be presented to the court at a later date.

The doctor defended consulting them, however, as he said he still considered himself Bain’s treating physician.

Sidhartha Banerjee, The Canadian Press