Edmonton man testifies he didn't think killing of 7-year-old girl was real

The man accused of murdering a seven-year-old girl testified in Edmonton Court of Queen's Bench that he didn't believe the killing was real.

David Moss is charged with second-degree murder in the death of Bella Rose Desrosiers in May of 2020. The 36-year-old has admitted to the killing but his attorney argues he should be found not criminally responsible.

Court has previously heard a 90-minute interview with police the morning after the fatal stabbing where Moss claims the act was part of a spiritual awakening.

The accused testified on Friday and Monday, telling court he no longer believes in conspiracy theories or the spiritual ascension that motivated the killing.

"I just thought that I was awake and everybody was asleep," he said.

According to an agreed statement of facts, Bella's mother invited Moss to her house after she became concerned about comments he made that made her think he might have been suicidal.

Court has heard that the police and crisis response team visited Moss and referred him to a psychologist but he missed the appointment.

As Melissa Desrosiers was tucking her two children to bed, Moss suddenly appeared in the doorway wearing only underwear and brandishing a pair of scissors he used to attack the girl.

Moss told court he didn't think of the killing as being real.

"I thought it was like a game or something or a screen memory or something like that."

Hearing voices

Moss told court about a head injury when he was 18 caused by a thrown rock. He said he spent months in hospital and now has a metal plate.

Moss said he started hearing voices in the years leading up to the homicide. He visited a hospital in 2019.

"I remember I was hearing a voice — like a demon voice — [to] kill my son."

He said at some point he was prescribed Seroquel, the brand name for a drug used to treat schizophrenia. Moss said he did not take the medication.

Court also heard Moss' cousin had been diagnosed with schizophrenia some years earlier.

While in custody in remand and later at Alberta Hospital, Moss started taking medication. He said it has helped but that he still sometimes hears voices.

The Crown noted discrepancies between what Moss said in his testimony and what he told doctors in the weeks and months after the killing, although Moss said he had few memories of those interviews.

"I was pretty out of it the whole time I was there. I don't really remember."

Cause of psychosis

Among the prosecution's line of inquiry was the accused's frequency of cannabis use and feelings of paranoia it may have engendered. Moss said he used more cannabis once the pandemic began but had cut himself off days before the killing.

Dr. Marc Nesca, an expert in clinical forensic psychology called by the defence, said he disagreed with another expert report that concluded Moss experienced a cannabis-induced psychosis.

Nesca said the killing had happened within the context of a mental illness where Moss believed "conventional reality we experience was actually a hologram, that nothing was real, including the people."

"The brain injury is the focal point of all of this because it was followed by a characteristic set of changes," he said, adding that evidence showed Moss had become more reclusive and experienced difficulties with his memory and speech after his injury.

A schizophrenia-like psychosis has been identified after traumatic brain injuries, Nesca said, although Moss' case would be atypical as it developed slowly. Stress can lead to acute flare-ups, he added.

The judge-alone trial is slated to continue into next week.