Amélie Lemieux, centre, is comforted by family members as she holds pictures of her two daughters, Romy and Norah Carpentier, at a memorial in Lévis, Que., on Monday, July 13, 2020. The maternal grandmother of two young Quebec girls killed by their father in July 2020 says he was more agitated and nervous in the lead up to killings. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jacques Boissinot

QUEBEC - The maternal grandmother of two Quebec girls killed by their father in July 2020 told a public inquiry Tuesday that shortly before their deaths, the father was overwhelmed by divorce proceedings and obsessed with the idea he would lose custody of them.

Gaétane Tremblay told the inquest that she thought Martin Carpentier's obsession was like a "phobia."

"I don't understand, Martin had no reason to be afraid of losing his children," Tremblay told the inquiry investigating the murders of 11-year-old Norah and six-year-old Romy. Carpentier killed them in the woods near St-Apollinaire, Que., southwest of Quebec City, before he killed himself.

The girls went missing with their father after a car crash on July 8, 2020. The search for them turned into a multi-day police manhunt that gripped the province. Police found the girls' bodies in the woods on July 11. And since the case started, questions have arisen about the quality of the police investigation.

Tremblay said Carpentier lived directly next door to her and often confided in her. His health worsened in 2020, she said, particularly after he began working nights. Carpentier seemed agitated and nervous on July 6, two days before the disappearance, she told the inquiry.

Tremblay said an agitated Carpentier told her he did not want to go through with his plan to divorce Amélie Lemieux, the girls' mother, from whom he had separated in 2015. She said Carpentier was also anxious about the possibility he would have to move from his home next door to Tremblay.

The inquiry heard Monday that Carpentier had looked into divorce proceedings but had not informed Lemieux. Witnesses said that work colleagues had suggested to him that a divorce could lead to him losing custody and that Carpentier's new spouse wanted to marry before they bought a house.

Earlier in her testimony, Tremblay recounted another incident where Carpentier told her in May 2020 that he didn't like seeing his children being cared for by the boyfriend of Lemieux.

Lemieux and Carpentier were together from 2008 to 2015. Carpentier was not Norah's biological father but had adopted her in 2010.

"Martin didn't like anyone other than himself taking care of his children," Tremblay said, noting that even when the girls weren't in his care, Carpentier would tell his girlfriend, "in case Amélie calls … I will be available."

Tremblay, who first met Carpentier around 2008, said the family took to him right away. "We could see that he loved our daughter so we loved him even more," she said.

She described Carpentier as an "exemplary dad" who was always there for his daughters and remained close.

Tremblay said that on the day the girls disappeared, Carpentier told her he was going to take the girls out for ice cream but never returned. She said she can still see them every time she looks out a large window at her home.

"He told me, 'Gaétane, I'm going to bring the children back at 9 p.m., but I'd like to go there alone with my daughters,'" she recounted.

"He never came back."

Also Tuesday, Vincent Poirier, one of the first provincial police officers at the scene told the inquiry the hypothesis of a kidnapping was not considered when police arrived. Poirier said officers initially thought they were dealing with drunk driving or a hit-and-run accident.

Poirier said Lemieux had not reported anything abnormal about Carpentier and had seen him earlier that day. But her boyfriend at the time told police Carpentier was depressed and fearful of losing access to the children and urged that an Amber Alert be issued. Later, a friend of Carpentier's told authorities he'd been fighting depression but would never hurt his children.

Poirier said the information at the time did not meet the criteria to trigger an alert.

Martin Miller, the chief of the St-Apollinaire fire department, carried out the first search at the scene and didn't find anyone ejected from the vehicle. But he recounted Tuesday that his team was not sent into the woods because it would have created problems for the police canine units.

He noted his firefighters were trained to do off-road searches but police never answered their offer to assist in the search for the missing trio.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 14, 2023.

— By Sidhartha Banerjee in Montreal.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2023