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Winnipeg Free Press
17 hours ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Drunk driver ‘detonated bomb inside family'
The daughter of a 28-year-old mother of four killed by a drunk driver cried as she told a Winnipeg court how her family was 'destroyed' by the July 2021 highway collision. 'There is a part of me that wants to scream at you, freak out, tell you how much I hate you, but even that doesn't feel strong enough,' the now 17-year-old told Chantelle Deprez. 'You didn't just steal a life — you detonated a bomb inside a family and walked away alive.' Deprez, 37, previously pleaded guilty to impaired driving causing death for the crash that claimed the life of Angelina Wiens. She was sentenced Monday to three years in prison. Since Wiens' death, her four children have been separated — her young son now lives with his father, while his three sisters live with an aunt and her family. 'I love my cousins and my auntie and uncle, but it is not the same without my mom,' Wiens' youngest, now 11-year-old daughter wrote in a victim impact statement provided to court. 'It's not fair, she was very young,' the girl said. 'She could have had a great future and a longer life if you weren't drinking.' Support letters from family friends and her employer described Deprez as a good person, great mother and valued employee. Five of seven support letters, as well as a psychiatrist report, described the crash as an 'accident.' King's Bench Justice Ken Champagne said there was nothing accidental about someone getting behind the wheel after drinking. 'It is not an accident — it is a serious crime… an all-too prevalent crime that causes more deaths in Canada than any other crime,' often committed by otherwise law-abiding people with no criminal records, Champagne said. Champagne rejected a recommendation from defence lawyer Jay Prober that Deprez be sentenced to two years house arrest, ruling a 'significant' sentence was necessary to satisfy the sentencing principles of deterrence and denunciation 'and more importantly send a message to the community at large that this kind of criminal conduct is unacceptable.' Court heard Deprez was behind the wheel of a 1998 Ford Explorer, heading north on Highway 6 in the RM of St Laurent at about 11:30 p.m., when she veered into the southbound lane and into the path of Wiens' 1994 Chevrolet pickup truck. Wiens 'was able to try an evasive manoeuvre; she braked, she tried to go on to the shoulder, but it just wasn't enough, the accused was too far over,' Crown attorney Thomas Boulton told court. Deprez did not try to apply the brakes or veer out of the way and collided with the front right side of Wiens' truck, sending both vehicles spinning. Emergency responders had to extract Wiens from her vehicle. She was pronounced dead at the scene. She wasn't wearing a seat belt. Deprez was taken by air ambulance to Health Sciences Centre with a broken leg and hip and collapsed lung. She spent 12 days in hospital and was in a wheelchair for four months. According to a pre-sentence report, Deprez told a probation officer that prior to the collision she had been watching movies at a friend's house and had one glass of wine before leaving to drive home to Winnipeg. But according to an agreed statement of facts provided to court, Deprez told an air ambulance paramedic she had four glasses of wine prior to the collision. Medical records later obtained by police showed Deprez would have had an estimated blood-alcohol level of .246 at the time of the collision, more than triple the legal limit for driving. Deprez told a probation officer she continued to drink following her arrest, which court heard was in violation of a bail condition set by Champagne prohibiting her from consuming alcohol. Prober argued Deprez did not remember the bail condition and was not consciously flouting Champagne's order, which he accepted. Following the collision, Deprez was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression. A psychiatric report described her as an 'emotional invalid.' Deprez hasn't driven since the collision 'and may never drive again,' Prober said, adding she was 'genuinely remorseful' and that she pleaded guilty in the face of a problematic Crown case. None of the paramedics who treated Deprez said they saw any signs she was impaired, he said. A crash reconstruction report, meanwhile, made reference to police finding open containers of alcohol in Wiens' truck and detecting the smell of marijuana. Wiens was a suspended driver at the time. Deprez apologized to Wiens' family, saying she was 'extremely sorry' for her decision to drink and drive. 'I am a mother as well, so I sympathize with you 100 per cent,' she said. 'I'm not taking any of this lightly. I wish none of this ever happened.' Champagne prohibited Deprez from driving for five years following the completion of her prison sentence. Dean PritchardCourts reporter Dean Pritchard is courts reporter for the Free Press. He has covered the justice system since 1999, working for the Brandon Sun and Winnipeg Sun before joining the Free Press in 2019. Read more about Dean. Every piece of reporting Dean produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
CBC
28-05-2025
- Politics
- CBC
Saskatoon trial of man who stabbed partner to death now up to the judge
The case against accused murderer Thomas Hamp is closed and it's now up to a Saskatoon Court of King's Bench judge to decide which interpretation of events to agree with.
CBC
28-05-2025
- Health
- CBC
Judge hears closing arguments in Saskatoon trial of man who stabbed partner to death
The case against accused murderer Thomas Hamp is closed and it's now up to a Court of King's Bench judge to decide which interpretation of events to agree with. Prosecutor Cory Bliss and defence lawyer Brian Pfefferle made final arguments Wednesday before Justice Grant Currie at the 28-year-old's judge-alone second-degree murder trial. The issue is not whether Hamp fatally stabbed his partner Emily Sanche on Feb. 20, 2022 — he admitted that at trial. Rather, the defence contends Hamp was in a mental health crisis that left him incapable of knowing that what he was doing was wrong. "There's only one explanation for why Thomas Hamp would have done this to Emily Sanche and it's he was suffering from an acute psychotic episode where he was not in touch with reality," Pfefferle said. The Crown is suggesting that Hamp was in a drug-induced psychosis when he killed Sanche and then claimed an intruder had stabbed her and tried to kill him. "From our perspective, it's very unusual that someone would commit a crime while deluded and then immediately suggest that someone else committed the crime," Bliss said. Both Bliss and Pfefferle relied, to varying degrees, on a 25-page assessment done by forensic psychiatrist Shabehram Lohrasbe. The veteran doctor was hired by the defence. Lohrasbe concluded in his report, based on five hours of interviews with Hamp and a review of notes kept by Sanche and her cousin Catherine, that Hamp "was acutely and severely psychotic" when he killed Sanche in their apartment. "Psychosis was the dominant factor that drove his violence," Lohrasbe wrote. "It is likely that his capacity to 'know' that his actions were wrong, in the real world, was severely impaired." While testifying by video, Lohrasbe said he could not overstate the importance of the notes kept by Emily Sanche and her cousin. Pfefferle noted in his close that "her real time overview was not marred by memory, delusion, distortion or inaccuracy." "The detailed notes and text messages that Emily and her cousin Catherine compiled, described by Dr. Lohrasbe as 'incredibly important documents' are rare in their depth and immediacy." he said. "Dr. Lohrasbe, a psychiatrist with over four decades of experience and thousands of assessments to his name, testified that he had 'never seen anything like it.' Emily's text message chain, he testified was 'poignant, and so close to the offence' that it offered unparalleled insight into the rapid deterioration of Thomas's mental state." Bliss offered a different take on the impact of Sanche's detailed record. He suggested that a list compiled by the 25-year-old in her journal in the days before her death, which referenced the need for a mental health warrant and the necessity of seeing a doctor, actually provided the motive for the attack. Hamp, already in a drug-induced psychosis because of his sustained cannabis use, would have seen the list as evidence Sanche was going to force medical treatment and planning on leaving him, Bliss argued. This threat of a partner pulling away is often a trigger for violence in intimate partner cases, he said. Bliss referenced how Lohrasbe was generally concerned about the impact of high-potency cannabis on a user's mental health. The doctor agreed that symptoms from drug-induced psychosis could look like mental illness. "I think there is a real concern for the public that people that choose to take psychoactive drugs, and they lose touch with reality because of that, those people should be responsible for their crimes," Bliss said outside court after the day's proceedings were done.
CBC
26-05-2025
- CBC
Psychiatric report says Saskatoon man 'acutely and severely psychotic' when he fatally stabbed partner in 2022
A forensic psychiatrist who assessed accused killer Thomas Hamp said the 25-year-old "was acutely and severely psychotic" when he fatally stabbed his girlfriend Emily Sanche on Feb. 20, 2022. "Psychosis was the dominant factor that drove his violence," Shabehram Lohrasbe wrote in a 25-page assessment. "It is likely that his capacity to "know" that his actions were wrong, in the real world, was severely impaired." Hamp was charged with second-degree murder and is appearing before Justice Grant Currie in a judge-alone trial at Saskatoon Court of King's Bench. Defence lawyer Brian Pfefferle is not disputing that Hamp stabbed his partner. The point of contention between Pfefferle and prosecutor Cory Bliss is whether Hamp is criminally responsible for his actions. Treatment trail The defence hired Lohrasbe to do a psychiatric assessment. Lohrasbe testified that he met with Hamp twice in person and then again by video, for a total of five hours. He also interviewed Hamp's parents and reviewed reports from his clinical treatment for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). He also reviewed detailed notes and text messages written by Sanche, who was studying for a master's degree in counselling and expressed concerns about her partner's deteriorating mental health in the year before he killed her. Lohrasbe also reviewed notes take by Sanche's cousin, Catherine. The notes included observations Emily made hours before her death, after the couple contacted the Saskatoon Crisis Intervention Service. Hamp was supposed to go to the hospital the day that he killed her. "He seemed extremely agitated and upset," she wrote. Lohrasbe said he's done thousands of assessments over his four-decade career and that the written records from the two young women "are incredibly important documents." He said Emily's text message chain "is poignant, and so close to the offence." "I've never seen anything like it." In his analysis, Lohrasbe said Hamp's worsening OCD symptoms and heavy cannabis use almost surely played a role in the psychotic episode, but "their precise potential roles cannot be delineated." Day of the killing Lohrasbe said Hamp was in the full throes of a psychotic episode the day he killed Emily Sanche. Hamp believed that the couple were under police surveillance and that friends and family were pedophiles, Lohrasbe said. He was suspicious of medical professionals, fearing that he would be castrated if he went to the hospital. "In some way the fear of going to hospital was intertwined with his fears of the police, surveillance, Tetris, technology, pedophilia, doctors, toxic medications, and the castration," Lohrasbe wrote. Hamp said he was obsessed with video game Tetris because he believed it was being used to test him and as a spying device. "The idea of killing Ms. Sanche and then himself came to him abruptly; 'I thought we both had to die to avoid a worse fate,'" the report said. "The 'worse fate' that awaited Ms. Sanche was, 'that Emily would be made to breed and then tortured to death.' He believed that Ms. Sanche was a target for 'their breeding because she came from a smart family.'" Lohrasbe concluded that the psychiatric assessment "would support the legal consideration for finding Mr. Hamp not criminally responsible."
Winnipeg Free Press
26-05-2025
- Winnipeg Free Press
‘An execution, plain and simple': man who killed neighbour sentenced to life
A Manitoba man convicted of murdering a neighbour allegedly caught stealing from him on his rural property has been sentenced to mandatory life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years. Eric Wildman, 38, was convicted of first-degree murder following a jury trial earlier this year for the June 2021 killing of 40-year-old Clifford Joseph. 'The facts are horrific and whatever version of facts the jury accepted, it amounts to an execution, plain and simple,' said King's Bench Justice Rick Saull. JASON PARKS / PICTON GAZETTE FILES Eric Wildman leaves the Picton, Ont. Superior Courthouse in November 2024, where he was found guilty of attempted murder of an Ontario police officer prior to his first-degree murder conviction in Manitoba. Wildman's sentencing was adjourned following the February jury verdict in part for the preparation of victim impact statements, but none were ultimately provided to court. Wildman and Joseph lived on neighbouring properties near Stead, about 90 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg. Prosecutors argued Wildman caught Joseph stealing a winch from his property in the early hours of June 7, ran him down with his vehicle, breaking his jaw, leg and ribs, then moved him to a bushy area a few kilometres away, where he shot him at least two times, including once in the back of the head. Wildman called RCMP from his mother's Winnipeg home on June 9 and claimed that on the night of Joseph's disappearance, he had been staying at a friend's home, a claim the friend later refuted, jurors heard. Investigators found Wildman's Chevrolet Impala outside another friend's house in Winnipeg. Inside the car, police found an empty gun case and a receipt from an auto parts store dated June 9, where jurors heard Wildman had purchased a hood and replaced it in the parking lot. Prosecutors alleged Wildman replaced the hood to cover up the damage that occurred when he ran over Joseph. After RCMP towed Wildman's vehicle, he called Mounties from his mother's home to report a handgun missing from his Stead property. Prosecutors allege Wildman knew police would have found the gun case in his car and claimed it was stolen to divert suspicion. SUPPLIED Clifford Joseph, 40, was killed by his neighbour in June 2021 in what a judge described as a horrific execution. Police told him he was a suspect in Joseph's killing and to stay where he was. Instead, Wildman took a taxi to the airport, rented a car and drove to Belleville, Ont., where police arrested him June 18. Jurors were not given details about Wildman's arrest, which came after he shot at police who were executing an arrest warrant at the home where Wildman was staying. Last November, an Ontario jury convicted Wildman of one count each of attempted murder and possession of a restricted firearm with readily available ammunition. He was sentenced in March to 10 years in prison Weekday Mornings A quick glance at the news for the upcoming day. Wildman testified at the Ontario trial, claiming he thought police were home invaders and that he was protecting himself. 'If ever there was post-offence conduct that would suggest somebody's… guilty of the charges, this is pretty convincing,' Crown attorney Chris Vanderhooft told Saull on Monday. 'It's as if the murder wasn't bad enough, he could have killed police officers, too.' Wildman's Ontario sentence will effectively be served concurrent to his murder sentence and have no impact on when he is eligible for parole, court heard. Wildman will be eligible for parole in June 2046. RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS FILES After Manitoba police told Wildman he was a suspect in Joseph's death, Wildman fled to Ontario, where he was ultimately arrested. Wildman first stood trial for Joseph's killing in 2023, but it ended in a mistrial after defence lawyer Martin Glazer fell ill and was unable to continue. Dean PritchardCourts reporter Dean Pritchard is courts reporter for the Free Press. He has covered the justice system since 1999, working for the Brandon Sun and Winnipeg Sun before joining the Free Press in 2019. Read more about Dean. Every piece of reporting Dean produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
