Saskatoon woman sentenced to 18 years after pleading guilty to fatally stabbing former boyfriend

CBC

30-05-2025

A packed Saskatoon courtroom heard how Adam Willett's final act of kindness to his ex-girlfriend Ryah Sorenson cost him his life.
"She came to stay one night — and it was his last night alive," prosecutor Michael Pilon said at Court of King's Bench Friday. Sorenson pleaded guilty to manslaughter before Justice Richard Danyliuk.
Pilon read from an agreed statement of facts that the pair had started dating in February 2022 when Sorenson was 20 and Willett was 37, and that they broke up that November.
Pilon said Sorenson showed up at the apartment on the morning of Dec. 2, 2022, and Willett agreed to let her stay that one night. By her own account, she began drinking "large amounts of whisky" and then began arguing with Willett.
Just after 7 p.m. CST, she attacked Willett in his bedroom and stabbed him 21 times. He left a blood trail through the apartment, finally collapsing on the couch where he died. Sorenson then kissed his forehead and lips, covered him with a blanket and went into the hallway with a jar of pills from the coffee table to kill herself, Pilon said.
The pills were vitamins, though, and she ended up vomiting and calling 911, he said.
"It's not good. I'm sick," she told the operator.
"I know I did so bad."
She told officers who arrived, "Not fair, not right, I just have a lot of anger."
'Adam's dead'
Pilon and defence lawyer Brian Pfefferle made a joint submission for 18 years, which Danyliuk accepted after hearing 13 victim impact statements from Willett's immediate and extended family.
"Two words are ingrained in my mind," his father Bryan said. "Adam's dead. Hysterically repeated on the phone by Adam's mother."
Family spoke of his love of music and skill at playing guitar and saxophone. Bryan spoke about how Feb. 3, 1959 is called "the day the music died," because that's when Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens perished in a plane crash.
"After Dec. 2, 2022, that's the day the music died," Bryan said.
Willett's nine-year-daughter from an earlier marriage wrote, "my Dad was taken away from me and that makes me sad."
"I worry I'll forget all my memories of him as I grow up."
Various family spoke directly to Sorenson, who sat with her head down in the prisoner's box. Their comments echoed twin themes of how it's too early to consider forgiving her, and that she took away all of Willett's future chances.
Troubled past
Both Pilon and Pfefferle spoke of Sorenson's difficult childhood, marked by substance abuse, self harm, domestic violence and family dysfunction. Although she was charged with second-degree murder, the lawyers settled on manslaughter because of her mental health conditions and the substance abuse impairment that day.
Pilon said that she has a history of self harm and addictions to cocaine and alcohol. A psychiatric report described her as "naive, child-like and very timid."
In accepting the sentencing recommendation, Danyliuk said "today there are no winners."
"There is only loss."