MANDEL: He killed his godmother in a sex-fuelled fantasy
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WARNING: Graphic content
Shayne MacDonald was consumed by a sadistic fantasy of killing and raping his aunt. Eight years ago, he made half of that evil dream come true.
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MANDEL: He killed his godmother in a sex-fuelled fantasy Back to video
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On Dec. 16, 2016, at about 8 p.m, the 21-year-old arrived at the home of his maternal aunt and godmother Sarah Vermelhudo ostensibly to watch a movie. Vermelhudo, 38, was a life coach who lived on the third floor of a home at 1082 College St., while her mom Maria lived on the second.
Relatives said she was very protective and caring toward her nephew.
But within minutes of arriving, MacDonald was stabbing Vermelhudo with a pocket knife, inflicting nine stab wounds — three to the chest, one to the right abdomen and five to the lower back.
And then he sliced her neck, a 12.5 centimetre gash that fatally severed her jugular vein.
When Vermelhudo began screaming, her mom came running upstairs to find a scene of horror in her daugher’s bedroom: she was covered in blood, with MacDonald standing behind her, holding her across the neck. He then turned to Maria, grabbed her by the hair and stabbed her in the middle of her back and on her left side.
Following a struggle with Maria’s partner, he fled the home.
MacDonald pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder and attempted murder, claiming he was not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder. He admitted killing his aunt and injuring her mom, but argued that he was suffering from a brief psychotic episode at the time.
It became a battle of duelling psychiatrists before Superior Court Justice Rita-Jean Maxwell.
The Crown’s forensic expert, Dr. Phil Klassen, found MacDonald was malingering — or lying about — his symptoms of psychosis at the time of the crimes. He diagnosed him with sexual sadism and found “more likely than not (he) was motivated by his violent sexual obsessions related to Sarah Vermelhudo.”
The Crown argued that he was enacting his long-held fantasy of having sex with a dead or dying person — but he was interrupted by his victim’s mother.
The defence experts, including Dr. John Bradford, contended that MacDonald was suffering a brief psychotic episode where his paranoia and delusions led him to believe his aunt was keeping him trapped in her home so the military police could harm him.
The defence version is based on MacDonald’s self-reporting of his symptoms — but then you’d have to believe his version of how he was feeling at the time of the events. And Maxwell did not.
“I do not find Mr. MacDonald to be a reliable and credible historian,” the judge said in her oral reasons Tuesday.
He initially lied to police and feigned amnesia, she said. Then his account evolved from having no memory of the killing to having a very detailed recollection for the forensic psychiatrists who were assessing him for an NCR defence.
MacDonald also made “selective, contradictory and self-serving statements” to mental health professionals about sexual violence and his arousal by it to deflect psychiatrists away from the issue, Maxwell added.
“Mr. MacDonald’s account must be scrutinized in the context of Mr. MacDonald’s known history of having violent fantasies, in particular, violent sexual fantasies, about Sarah Vermelhudo.”
He knew what he was doing and that it was morally wrong, the judge concluded, rejecting his NCR defence.
“The defence has failed to establish on the balance of probabilities that Mr. MacDonald was in a delusional psychotic stage at the time of the events that influenced his actions. And secondly, that even if he was in some state of mental disturbance, the defense has failed to establish that he was incapable of knowing his acts were morally wrong by society standards.”
Instead, she found him guilty of second-degree murder.
“The evidence is overwhelming that Mr. MacDonald intended to kill Sarah Vermelhudo,” Maxwell said.
Lucky for him, the judge acquitted him of the attempted murder of Maria Vermelhudo.
“The wounds were not overly deep and were repaired with staples,” she said.
A sentencing hearing is expected to be held early next year.
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