Vandewater guilty of ‘brutal’ murder
Judge convicts 31-year-old man in 2017 stabbing, beating of Sask. Pen cellmate
PRINCE ALBERT Calling the fatal beating “brutal” and “unprovoked,” a Prince Albert judge has found a 31-year-old man guilty of murdering his cellmate in a Saskatchewan prison nearly three years ago.
Tyler Vandewater learned his fate on Thursday in Prince Albert Court of Queen’s Bench, where Justice Brian Scherman convicted him of second-degree murder in the June 2017 death of Chris Van Camp.
Van Camp, 37, was on parole when he took cocaine laced with fentanyl and overdosed on May 24, 2017. He was in a coma until May 29, then was arrested and found to have breached the conditions of his release. Van Camp was returned to federal custody and eventually sent back to the Saskatchewan Penitentiary, where he was housed in a cell with Vandewater, then 28.
On June 7, 2017, Van Camp was found beaten, stabbed, and wrapped in blankets and bags in the cell. According to Cpl. Janelle Samoila’s testimony, items seized from the scene were ripped institutional towels, T-shirts, pillow cases, bed sheets, paper and plastic bags, most of which were stained with blood. Under the bed, she saw cloths in a bag that was so wet, blood was seeping through, Dupuis told court. Blood had also “saturated all the way through the mattress,” she said.
Vandewater claimed he acted in self-defence, that a paranoid Van Camp lunged at him with a homemade blade before Vandewater pushed him back, and that the ensuing 60- to 90-second struggle turned fatal before he realized it.
Crown prosecutor Linh Lê said she had “concerns” about elements of Vandewater’s self-defence argument, describing as a “fail” his claim that his actions were reasonable under the circumstances.
Court heard during the trial that Van Camp had 26 wounds to his face and 25 wounds on his upper back. He died of blood loss and suffered a collapsed lung. Vandewater had light scratches on his side.
Prior to the trial, Van Camp’s mother, Lauren Laithwaite, said she was looking forward to its conclusion “so I can actually put that out of my day-to-day thought process and then I can look back and remember the good times and my love for Christopher, not the way he died.”
The case was adjourned until June 5, at which time sentencing submissions are set to take place.