Former MNA loses defamation lawsuit, must pay $24,000

Quebec MLA Fatima Houda-Pepin announces her decision to run as an independent candidate for the coming election, at a news conference, Tuesday, March 4, 2014 at the legislature in Quebec City. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jacques Boissinot)

Fatima Houda-Pepin has lost a defamation lawsuit.

Judge Chantale Sirois has ordered the former MNA to pay $20,000 in moral damages and $4,000 in punitive damages to Paul Leduc, the mayor of Brossard.

Houda-Pepin was the MNA for La Piniere from 1994 to 2014, spending most of that time as a member of the Liberal party before she was expelled over her support of the Parti Quebecois government's Charter of Values.

She ran for re-election in 2014 as an independent but was defeated by Gaetan Barrette.

One week before the election, on April 7, 2014, Houda-Pepin wrote a letter published by the Rive-Sud Express newspaper in which she said Leduc was delivering a "turnkey election" for Barrette.

In the judgment, Sirois said that Houda-Pepin had committed a "significant defamatory error" in accusing Leduc of manipulating the election.

Barrette was elected with 25,955 votes, with Houda-Pepin receiving 10,452 votes.