Child's death 'work of the devil'

Child's death 'work of the devil'

Published on Monday August 04, 2008

Joanna Smith

Staff Reporter

Beverley Walker wiped away tears as she spoke about the heartbreak her long-time friend Bernice Sampson experienced yesterday after learning her 7-year-old daughter had been killed.

"I'm sorry for Bernice," the 56-year-old woman said while sitting in a coffee shop in the Queen St. W. and Lansdowne Ave. area with a group of close friends.

"She's not going to make it. She's gone. She was having a hard time already. She didn't want to give her up in the first place."

As she spoke, Walker spotted Sampson with a friend stumbling along the sidewalk outside, clutching a school photograph of her chubby-faced daughter Katelynn Sampson, who earlier in the morning had become Toronto's 39th homicide victim of the year.

Walker ran outside to meet her and the grieving mother collapsed into her arms.

About an hour earlier, Sampson had screamed and hurled herself at the front door of a highrise apartment building at 105 West Lodge Ave. where her daughter had been found dead. Her weeping friends had pulled her into a car and tried to calm her.

Katelynn had been pronounced dead in a second-floor apartment shortly after Toronto EMS responded to a 911 call made around 2:30 a.m. regarding a young girl who had stopped breathing while choking on food.

The paramedic realized quickly that the girl "had been dead for quite some time" and that her body showed "obvious signs of trauma" that contradicted the story, Toronto homicide Det. Sgt. Steve Ryan said at a press conference at police headquarters yesterday.

"She clearly had not choked," Ryan said. "I can't get into specifics, just that she was assaulted around her entire body."

Ryan, describing the scene, said, "It's the work of the devil. That's what it is."

Police arrested Donna Irving, 29, who had called 911 and was alone in the apartment with the victim at the time, and charged her with second-degree murder. She is scheduled to appear in court today.

Irving was coherent as she was arrested and has no history of mental illness, Ryan said. She had been granted sole custody of Katelynn in January but Ryan could not confirm how or why.

He said Irving was living with her boyfriend – who Bernice Sampson identified as her friend Warren Johnson – and their two biological sons who were not harmed and are with their father. The father has been co-operative with police and is not a suspect, Ryan said.

Irving has two other underage children who do not live with her, he said.

She has a criminal record that involved "some violence," he said.

Bernice Sampson, who recently lost her mother and had found transitory joy dancing at Caribana Saturday night, said outside the apartment yesterday that Katelynn, who was going into Grade 3 at Parkdale Public School, was living with the couple while she sorted out her life.

"There was some problems going on with me," she said. "I don't want to talk about it."

She said she had known Irving for about 10 or 12 years and thought things were going well.

"I thought it was a good family setting," she said, but added that she had not seen her daughter for about a month.

"Donna was always going on and saying that Katelynn was always at camp, so I couldn't see her," she said.

"When I asked her to bring Katelynn down or I'd come up, she didn't want me to see Katelynn."

Sampson said one of the last times she saw her daughter she had bruises on her face. "I asked Katelynn what happened and she said she was playing hockey with the boys."

She said she was trying to reach her daughter's biological father, Mark Letang, who lives in the Toronto area.

She described her daughter as "always laughing, happy-go-lucky." Her middle name was Angel, she said.

An autopsy is set for tomorrow.