Testimony in Thomas Hamp’s second-degree murder trial described repeated attempts to obtain medical help before he stabbed his longtime partner, Emily Sanche, in Saskatoon in February 2022. Sanche’s messages documented growing concern about Hamp’s delusions and the difficulty of securing an effective response.
The case centred on Sanche’s death
Hamp was accused of stabbing Sanche on February 20, 2022. She remained in hospital for 25 days before dying from her injuries.
At the September 2024 proceeding, the charge was an allegation to be decided through evidence, applicable intent requirements and any mental-disorder defence.
A relative described escalating symptoms
Sanche’s cousin Catherine testified from messages exchanged with her. She said Sanche had become worried about false memories, conspiratorial beliefs and increasingly severe delusions during the months before the attack.
The records showed concern for Hamp’s health and safety rather than a clear expectation that he would attack her.
They sought help in several settings
Evidence described emergency-room and walk-in-clinic visits and calls to Saskatchewan’s health line in December 2021. Hamp did not always appear delusional during an assessment, and some behaviour was attributed to a prior obsessive-compulsive-disorder diagnosis or questions about medication.
A brief clinical encounter may not reproduce symptoms reported at home.
Sanche believed the system had failed
Her final messages expressed anger that the situation had been allowed to worsen despite their efforts. Those words offered important contemporaneous evidence, but they could not alone establish negligence by a specific clinician or predict what intervention would have prevented the violence.
Medical accountability would require records, expert standards and the facts available at each encounter.
Mental illness does not equal violence
Most people living with psychosis or other mental illness are not violent and are often more likely to be harmed than to harm others. Reporting one grave case without that context can intensify stigma and deter people from seeking care.
Risk assessment must be individualized and based on behaviour, symptoms and circumstances.
Later proceedings added legal context
Hamp testified about paranoia and false beliefs, and later psychiatric evidence examined his state of mind. In 2025, a judge found him not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder.
That verdict was not an acquittal based on innocence; it meant the legal test for criminal responsibility was not met and brought oversight through a review board.
The victim must remain central
Discussion of care gaps and Hamp’s condition should not erase Sanche’s life, suffering or family’s loss. She actively tried to help someone she loved and left a record that became important in court.
Her family was entitled to grief and to disagree with aspects of the process without being used to stigmatize all patients.
System learning should be specific
Health authorities can examine how collateral information from relatives is received, whether follow-up occurs after repeated visits, how medication and substance use are assessed and what options exist when a patient declines care but symptoms appear to intensify.
Confidentiality does not prevent families from giving clinicians information, even when clinicians cannot disclose details in return.
The trial record showed that requests for help occurred; it did not support a simplistic claim that any mental-health visit can reliably forecast homicide. Better continuity, accessible urgent psychiatry and careful use of family observations may reduce risk while respecting patient rights. Both the legal findings and Sanche’s documented efforts deserve precise, humane reporting.
