2 weeks Ago By Bre McAdam, Saskatoon StarPhoenix
In the months leading up to her death, Emily Sanche sent text messages to her cousin, describing the increasingly concerning delusions and “false memories” her boyfriend Thomas Hamp was having, and the lack of proper assessment he was receiving from doctors. Sanche was worried about Hamp and frustrated with the system, but never expressed concern for her own safety, her cousin Catherine Sanche testified on Tuesday in Saskatoon Court of King’s Bench. She said as far as she knew, there was no previous violence in the relationship before Sanche, 25, was stabbed in her Greystone neighbourhood condo unit on Feb.
20, 2022 and in hospital. Catherine testified that she was friends with Hamp and very close with Sanche, who was also her roommate and sewing business partner. She described her cousin, who was aspiring to be a psychologist specializing in obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), as an intelligent, insightful and compassionate person who truly wanted to help and support people.
Hamp, 27, is . An agreed statement of facts was presented when his judge-alone trial began Monday. It states that Hamp was living with Sanche at 2710 Main Street East when he stabbed her in the chest with a kitchen knife, which broke inside her.
He then harmed himself with a multi-tool knife. “Thomas told a neighbour and police that a stranger had entered the apartment and stabbed both Emily and himself. In spite of what was said by Thomas to neighbours and police, he was responsible for Emily’s injury.
There was no intruder who broke in and stabbed Emily and himself and then fled without detection,” the statement of facts notes. Defence lawyer Brian Pfefferle will argue that Hamp should be found not criminally responsible for the killing due to a mental disorder. Catherine said she knew Hamp was taking medication for OCD.
She said Sanche told her Hamp was decreasing his dosage; Sanche researched his medication and found that psychosis could be a withdrawal symptom, Catherine testified. Sanche told her that doctors increased his dosage, but he stopped taking his medication days later because “he felt fine.” Sanche told Catherine that Hamp was accusing his parents of being pedophiles, and alleging that a mutual acquaintance was trying to break into the condo.
This followed months of similar, increasingly serious “memories” of abuse and violence Hamp was claiming to have, Catherine told court. She said before making a police statement in 2022, she documented months of text message conversations she was having with Sanche, who told her she believed Hamp’s memories were false after looking into the claims. Sanche detailed multiple calls to Hamp’s parents, crisis lines and doctors’ offices, starting in November 2021 and ramping up the next month.
Catherine said Sanche believed doctors were getting “sidetracked” by his OCD, and were dismissing her concerns because Hamp was articulating his false memories in a believable way. “They seem to just validate everything,” Sanche wrote. The day before she died, Sanche told Catherine that she’d woken up at 5 a.
m. to find Hamp in the bathroom, taking his phone apart and claiming that Tetris (a video game) was spying on him. She said Hamp thought he would be castrated if he went to the hospital or police, and told Sanche he was worried that doctors would hurt her.
“I feel like this isn’t his fault or my fault at all. This could have all been avoided.” Crown prosecutor Cory Bliss asked Catherine if Hamp ever tried to convey to her that his paranoia and psychosis were caused by smoking marijuana.
She said no. Sanche said she didn’t want to execute a mental health warrant because Hamp was afraid of being persecuted, Catherine told Bliss. She said Sanche was trying to convince him to seek help instead.
“Emily had been worried about me for months by the time my condition got really bad, and she was asking me to go to the doctor and quit smoking weed long before I did,” Hamp wrote in a letter to Sanche’s family, which was entered as a Crown exhibit on Tuesday. Four pages from Sanche’s journal were also entered into evidence, corroborating much of Catherine’s testimony. A handwritten entry from Feb.
18, 2022 — two days before her death — summarized that Hamp said his grandparents molested him as a child, that Tetris was watching him through his phone and that doctors would castrate him. It also included a written statement — “I feel much better taking my antidepressants every day at 50 mg” — which Hamp and Sanche signed. Bliss closed the Crown’s case after Catherine’s testimony.
The Crown will call medical evidence later in the trial, after the defence evidence is called. Hamp’s aunt, Heather Johnson, testified for the defence on Tuesday afternoon. She said Hamp called her twice — in December 2021 and January 2022 — and asked her to confirm or deny “false memories” he was having about their family.
She said Hamp asked if she remembered a family supper where they discussed his cousin being a “predator.” Johnson testified she told him that never happened, and he asked if anyone in their family was a predator, to which she also replied no. Johnson said he also asked if there was a history of mental illness in their family, if his grandmother was a narcissist and if his aunt’s wife was actually “that nice.
” She testified that Hamp said he was trying to understand what was happening by reaching out to people he trusted. He said he believed these events probably hadn’t happened based on what they were telling him, Johnson said. “Thomas is a quiet, thoughtful guy, and I would say what I heard in his voice is that he was scared, he was nervous as he tried to figure this out.
” Pfefferle said Hamp and several of his family members will testify when the trial resumes on Wednesday..
