CALGARY, Alta. — Matthew Brown had “lost touch with reality” when he ran naked through a city neighbourhood in freezing temperatures, broke into two homes and viciously assaulted a Mount Royal University professor, an expert testified Tuesday.
Dr. Mark Yarema said the former MRU hockey team captain would have been in a state of delirium and experiencing delusions and hallucinations after consuming magic mushrooms at a friend’s house party.
The forensic toxicologist said he reviewed testimony from Brown’s Calgary Court of Queen’s Bench trial in concluding he was suffering from severe intoxication.
Witnesses said Brown, 28, ran naked from the house party before breaking into the home of MRU professor Janet Hamnett, who had never met him, and violently assaulting her.
A still-nude Brown was arrested by police inside a second Spring Hill community home after breaking into that residence as well.
Yarema said based on the testimony of the arresting officers, Brown was starting to come down from his drug-induced delirium when he was taken into custody.
Yarema says he deals with an average of at least one patient a shift suffering a drug-induced psychosis when working emergency for Alberta Health Services’ poison and drug information service.
“They can induce a state of delirium,” Yarema told defence lawyer Sean Fagan of mind-altering drugs such as magic mushrooms, or psilocybin.
“An altered level of consciousness,” the doctor explained.
“People have a lack of understanding of what day it is, what time it is, where they are and they can’t maintain focus,” he said.
“The impairment in judgment is such that because there’s this excess of serotonin in the body … people also lose the ability to make judgments on what is right and what is wrong.”
Brown faces two Jan. 13, 2018, charges of break-and-enter as well as aggravated assault for his attack on Hamnett, who suffered severe wounds to her hands and arms from trying to ward off blows when Brown entered her bedroom.
The 28-year-old is from Truro and was a forward in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League from 2007 to 2011. He was with the Moncton Wildcats for his first two and a half seasons before being traded to the Quebec Remparts in 2010 and where he spent a season and a half.
Yarema said psychosis involves experiencing delusions and hallucinations.
“What he had likely experienced was an episode of delirium where he was unaware of his surroundings, where he may have experienced delusions and hallucinations.”
Fagan asked the doctor whether a person in such a state could control their actions.
“In somebody who is delusional, one of the major issues is they have an altered level of consciousness.”
Someone who has contact with reality wouldn’t “stand naked in a house, run naked through the Spring Hill neighbourhood, break into homes and injure people.”
Meanwhile, Justice Michele Hollins ruled forensic psychologist Dr. Thomas Dalby can offer an opinion of psilocybin intoxication when he returns to the witness stand Wednesday.
On Twitter: @KMartinCourts
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