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MONTREAL — A jury has found a Montreal man guilty of manslaughter in the killing of his ailing wife.

Michel Cadotte was on trial for second-degree murder in the suffocation death of Jocelyne Lizotte, who was in the last stages of Alzheimer’s disease.

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The Crown had argued that Cadotte had intended to kill his wife of 19 years, who was unable to care for herself.

Defence lawyers argued their client was in a disturbed state of mind and acted impulsively on Feb. 20, 2017, seeking to end his wife’s suffering.

Jurors had only two verdicts open to them: second-degree murder or manslaughter.

The crime had been framed in the media as a compassion killing — an offence that doesn’t exist in the Criminal Code. The trial, which began Jan. 14, heard that Cadotte had inquired about a medically assisted death for Lizotte a year before she was killed.

Justice Helene Di Salvo told jurors their deliberations would not consider the laws around medically assisted death or the quality of care provided in long-term care centres like the one in which Lizotte lived, even if those issues inevitably surfaced in the case.