Guilty of killing pregnant wife
Jury at retrial convicts Toronto ex-pastor of manslaughter in 2011 drowning death
Former pastor Philip Grandine has been found guilty of manslaughter for the second time in the 2011 drowning death of his 29-year-old pregnant wife Anna Karissa Grandine.
The Toronto jury’s decision Thursday afternoon came after two days of deliberation.
Grandine will have a fresh sentencing hearing in April where he could get a different sentence than the 15-year prison term he received in 2015, after his first trial. After the verdict Thursday, Superior Court Justice Faye McWatt did not revoke Grandine’s bail, which he has been on since his arrest in 2012, except for four months spent in custody.
Prosecutors told the jury Grandine, 32, played “Russian roulette” with his wife’s life by secretly drugging her with the sedative lorazepam, after which she drowned in a bathtub in their Scarborough home.
Grandine, a nurse at a retirement home, had access to the sedative and wanted to keep his wife incapacitated or confused so he could continue an affair even after it was discovered and he was forced to step down as a pastor, prosecutors argued.
Grandine’s defence lawyer argued Karissa Grandine’s death on Oct. 17, 2011, was a tragic accident or a suicide stemming from her husband’s continued affair with a woman from their church who she had considered a friend.
A jury acquitted Philip Grandine of first-degree murder at his first trial, but
found him guilty of manslaughter. The judge at that trial found that while jurors did not believe Grandine intended to kill his wife the night she drowned, he was planning to kill her in the future.
However, the Court of Appeal overturned Grandine’s manslaughter conviction and ordered a new trial after ruling the trial judge made an error in answering a question from the jury.
The appeal court found the judge had introduced a new theory not previously raised at the trial — that Grandine could be guilty of manslaughter even if he did not drug his wife, but knew she had consumed the sedative. This theory was introduced by the Crown at the second trial as an option for the jury.
Grandine hugged his mother prior to the jury entering the courtroom to deliver the verdict but showed no response after the jury declared him guilty.
Karissa Grandine’s family was not present in the courtroom Thursday, though her mother attended the closing arguments and testified during the trial.
Det. Sgt. Terry Browne, the lead homicide investigator in the case, said he spoke to her family after the verdict which has been a long time coming.
“It’s been taxing on the family, but I think at the end of the day the family can get some comfort that they’ve got a resolution,” he said. “There is not a day that goes by that they don’t think about their daughter, their sister and of course, as we know, the unborn child.”
Browne said the fact Philip Grandine will remain on bail will not affect the judge’s sentencing decision, noting he’d been on bail for several years without any violations.
The jury had three possible ways to reach a verdict of manslaughter, Justice McWatt said: First, they could find that Grandine put his wife at risk of serious bodily harm or death by drugging her with the lorazepam. Second, they could find he put her at risk by making the drug available to her. Or, third, they could find he was criminally negligent because he failed to stop her from getting into the bath despite knowing she had taken the drug and knowing the serious symptoms it caused in her, including dis- orientation and fatigue. That would show a “wanton disregard” for her life, McWatt said.
The jury heard Grandine had taken his wife to hospital two days before she died, after she showed symptoms of fatigue, disorientation and dizziness. A blood sample taken that night was later found to contain a therapeutic-level dose of lorazepam. The amount was slightly lower than the amount found in her system during her autopsy — also a therapeutic-level amount.
Karissa Grandine was not found to have a prescription for the drug, which is not usually prescribed for pregnant women.
Her mother testified she was present when her daughter asked Philip Grandine if he gave her a pill, an accusation she said he denied. Karissa Grandine’s sister testified her sibling said she was scared because she didn’t know what had caused her symptoms. The jury heard evidence someone had used the Grandines’ shared home computer to search the questions “would 100mg of Ativan be fatal” and “would you die from 100mg of lorazepam?”