Get the big fish.  Those who decided that reducing the number of engineers and   
   other employees who were involved with moving high-risk material across the   
   country - are the ones to go after.  That would also involve Stephen Harper's   
   government that    
   allowed the exemptions for number of employees on each train.   
      
   Even the families of the victims are onside with these three men who've been   
   exonerated today.   
   ______________________________   
   CBC News Posted: Jan 19, 2018   
      
      
   3 former MMA rail workers acquitted in Lac-Mégantic disaster trial   
      
   Locomotive engineer and 2 others found not guilty of criminal negligence   
   causing 47 deaths   
      
   Jurors have acquitted the three former Montreal, Maine and Atlantic (MMA)   
   railway employees charged with criminal negligence causing death in the 2013   
   Lac-Mégantic rail disaster.   
      
   Locomotive engineer Tom Harding, 56, rail traffic controller Richard Labrie,   
   59, and operations manager Jean Demaître, 53, were all charged after the   
   derailment of a runaway fuel train early on July 6, 2013.  Several tankers,   
   carrying highly volatile    
   crude oil exploded, turning downtown Lac-Mégantic into an inferno and killing   
   47 people.​   
      
   There was an audible gasp in the courtroom when the verdict was delivered   
   early Friday afternoon.   
      
   Labrie couldn't hold back tears as he described his relief. He said that his   
   thoughts are with the community of Lac-Mégantic.   
      
   "I would like to say the people of Lac-Mégantic, what they went through, they   
   showed a huge amount of courage," he said.   
      
   "I wasn't intending to cry. But I can tell you it was difficult — it was a   
   long process."   
      
       Just informed people at this coffee shop of the #MeganticTrial verdicts.   
   There was an explosion of joy and clapping. pic.twitter.com/1YtjwYgjrD   
       — @CBC_Hayward   
      
   The eight men and four women on the jury had been deliberating since Thursday   
   morning, Jan. 11, at the Sherbrooke, Que., courthouse, after a marathon trial   
   which began last September.   
      
   The jurors have endured countless hours of technical testimony from train   
   experts, heard dramatic audio recordings of emergency workers and railway   
   employees from the night of the explosions, and listened to other former MMA   
   employees called as Crown    
   witnesses describe a work environment with little regard for safety standards   
   and no budget for training.   
      
   Quebec Superior Court Justice Gaétan Dumas thanked the jury members for their   
   work, telling them that the case wasn't easy.​   
      
   "You are the most enthusiastic jury I have ever seen," he said.   
      
      
   'These aren't killers'   
      
   Jean Clusiault, who lost his daughter Kathy in the explosion, praised the   
   verdict outside the courtroom.   
      
   "I felt relieved because these are not the right people who should be there,"   
   he said.   
      
   Clusiault said Harding, Demaître and Labrie didn't deserve to be blamed for   
   the fatal rail disaster and explosion in downtown Lac-Mégantic.   
      
   "These are human beings with families who worked hard all their lives,"   
   Clusiault said.   
      
   "These aren't killers. We treated them like killers."   
      
      
   Last, ill-fated journey   
      
   Harding, who pitched in on the night of the disaster, helping emergency   
   responders detach the fuel cars that hadn't exploded, was the driver of the   
   ill-fated fuel train.   
      
   He picked up the 73-tanker car train in Farnham, Que., 60 kilometres southeast   
   of Montreal, on the afternoon of July 5, 2013.   
      
   Late that evening, he left the train idling on the tracks in the village of   
   Nantes, 13 kilometres west of Lac-Mégantic, where it was to be picked up by   
   an American crew the following day.   
      
   During the three-month trial, the court heard how a fire broke out in the   
   smokestack of that locomotive shortly after Harding left it unattended.   
      
   Firefighters arrived and extinguished the fire, shutting down the locomotive's   
   engine and breakers, which disabled the air brakes that were securing the   
   train. Jurors heard that less than an hour later, the runaway train barrelled   
   down the tracks,    
   derailing in downtown Lac-Mégantic. The resulting explosions engulfed the   
   town in flames.   
      
   Several of the Crown's 31 witnesses described Harding as an experienced,   
   knowledgeable and helpful co-worker, which the Crown alluded to in closing   
   arguments.   
      
   "Despite all comments on Harding, on July 5, he failed to do his job,"   
   prosecutor Sacha Blais told the jury.   
      
   "A careful engineer would have foreseen the danger."   
      
   Much of the Crown's testimony revolved around the seven handbrakes Harding   
   applied to the train, whether the engineer tested them and how many would have   
   been sufficient to secure the train properly.   
      
       'There were no brakes': Lac-Mégantic expert witness describes how   
   fuel-car convoy became runaway train   
      
   In closing arguments, Harding's lawyer, Charles Shearson, countered that the   
   engineer followed the MMA's general operating instructions.   
      
   Shearson listed a number of other factors that contributed to the derailment,   
   including the safety of one-man crews and MMA's failure to conduct a risk   
   assessment on the consequences of parking a heavy fuel train on a slope at   
   Nantes. The Transportation    
   Safety Board's report identified the rail line between Nantes and   
   Lac-Mégantic as the second steepest grade of any stretch of track in Canada.   
      
      
   Accused waived right to mount defence   
      
   Harding, as well as the other two accused, waived their right to mount a   
   formal defence to the charges.   
      
   Labrie, the rail traffic controller on duty that night, was on shift 200   
   kilometres away in Farnham, relying on information being provided to him by   
   telephone, his lawyer, Guy Poupart, reminded the jury in closing arguments.   
      
   Poupart said the Crown failed to "demonstrate in any way that a rail traffic   
   controller placed in the same position as Labrie and given the same   
   information, would have acted any differently."   
   CRIME Lac Megantic Trial jury thomas harding   
      
   Former Montreal, Maine and Atlantic locomotive engineer Thomas Harding leaves   
   the court during a break in the trial in September. (Ryan Remiorz/Canadian   
   Press)   
      
   Demaître, MMA's senior manager in Quebec, was at home near Sain   
   -Jean-sur-Richelieu and on call on the night of the disaster. The Crown argued   
   he had been negligent, ignoring complaints about the lead locomotive's   
   mechanical defects.   
      
   "A supervisor should have ensured all safety," Blais concluded.   
      
   Demaitre's lawyer, Gaétan Bourassa, urged the jurors to distinguish between   
   his client's actions and those of his former employer.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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