Re Gregory T. Wuss, 2025 CanLII 114782

Re: Gregory T. Wuss

ORB File No: 8460

Hearing held on: Friday, October 3, 2025

Place of hearing: Southwest Centre for Forensic Mental Health Care 401 Sunset Drive, St. Thomas

Pursuant to: Section 672.81(1) of the Criminal Code

Before:

Alternate Chairperson: Mr. P. Capelle

Members: Dr. J.C. Ferencz Dr. G. Stones Ms. C. Murray Mr. A. Mete

Parties Appearing:

Accused: Gregory T. Wuss Counsel: Ms. P. Brown

The Person in charge of Hospital: Counsel: Ms. J. Zamprogna

Attorney General of Ontario: Counsel: Mr. D. Rows

REASONS FOR DISPOSITION

(Dated November 4, 2025)

Introduction

1. On January 5, 2024, Mr. Gregory Wuss was found not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder (“NCR”) on a charge of bank robbery, contrary to the Criminal Code of Canada (the “Criminal Code”).

2. On October 3, 2025, a panel of the Ontario Review Board (“Board” or “panel”) convened to review Mr. Wuss’ current Disposition pursuant to s. 672.81(1) of the Criminal Code. At the time of the hearing, Mr. Wuss was subject to a Detention Disposition.

3. Mr. Wuss was present at the hearing. He was represented by counsel, Ms. Patricia Brown, throughout the proceedings. This hearing was adjourned from May 14, 2025, to October 3, 2025, as Mr. Brown could not appear on May 14, 2025.

4. A Hospital Report dated April 14, 2025, was entered as Exhibit 1. An Update to the Hospital Report dated September 10, 2025, was entered as Exhibit 2.

5. The issues to be determined are whether Mr. Wuss continues to represent a significant threat to the safety of the public, and if so, the necessary and appropriate Disposition to manage that risk having regard to the criteria set out in s. 672.54 of the Criminal Code.

6. For the reasons set out below and based on the evidence and opinions before us, the Board found that Mr. Wuss continues to represent a significant threat to the safety of the public. The Board finds that a Detention Disposition at the Southwest Centre for Forensic Mental Health Care (“Southwest” or “the hospital”) is the necessary and appropriate Order having regard to the safety of the public, which is the paramount concern, and also having regard to Mr. Wuss’ mental health, reintegration into society, and his other needs.

Current Psychiatric Diagnoses

7. Schizophrenia;

Substance Use Disorder (in remission in a controlled environment);

Antisocial Personality Disorder; and

Learning Disorder, by history

Position of the Parties

8. At the commencement of the hearing, the parties were canvassed for their without prejudice positions. The hospital, represented by Ms. J. Zamprogna, supported by counsel for the Attorney General, Mr. Rows, took the position that Mr. Wuss continues to represent a significant threat to the public and the necessary and appropriate Disposition is a Detention Order with the same terms as last year.

9. Counsel for Mr. Wuss conceded significant threat and supported the hospital’s position. She acknowledged that there is a joint recommendation with respect to the issues at this hearing.

Index Offence

10. The Hospital Report contains a detailed description of the index offences. The offences are briefly summarized as follows:

On March 24, 2023, Mr. Wuss attended a branch of the TD Canada Trust in Chatham, Ontario. He mumbled and made some request of staff, but they could not understand what he was saying. Staff provided a notepad and pen and asked that he write out his request so that they could provide further assistance. He wrote, “all money in till” and turned the note over to the teller and manager. Fearing for their safety, as well as that of their coworkers and patrons, the teller and manager provided Mr. Wuss with bills totalling $365. After receiving the money, Mr. Wuss exited out the front door.

Background and History

11. The Hospital Report contains extensive information regarding Mr. Wuss’ background and history, the entirety of which need not be repeated here in detail.

12. The particulars of Mr. Wuss’ background are accurately summarized in last year’s Reasons as follows:

“Mr. Wuss became involved with the Children’s Aid Society starting at seven months old. He was put into foster care and made a Crown Ward of the Chatham-Kent Children’s Aid Society at the age of 8.

His mother apparently was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, needed intense community psychiatric services and was periodically hospitalized. There were a number of protection issues related to Mr. Wuss. His family frequently moved. Neglect and poor living conditions were apparent. Mr. Wuss reportedly was physically and sexually abused by males both in his family home and in foster care.

Mr. Wuss reportedly had learning difficulties.”

13. Mr. Wuss has a significant substance use history and throughout multiple hospitalizations he has endorsed use of crystal methamphetamine, cannabis, cocaine, non-prescribed pills, ecstasy, and alcohol. He was admitted to the Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care from February 14, 2019, to April 12, 2019, on a Treatment Order.

14. The particulars of Mr. Wuss’ legal history are accurately summarized in last year’s Reasons as follows:

“Mr. Wuss has had numerous and diverse criminal convictions between 1995 and 2023. He has been convicted of offenses including sexual assault, assault, assault causing bodily harm, assaulting a peace officer, resisting a peace officer, escape lawful custody, mischief, being unlawfully at large, break enter and theft, theft, uttering threats, break and enter with intent, possession of a scheduled substance, possession of a weapon, possession of a firearm or ammunition contrary to a prohibition order, possession of a Schedule II substance, robbery, being a statutory release violator, failing to appear, failing to attend court, failing to comply with a disposition, failing to comply with a recognizance and failing to comply with a probation order. Mr. Wuss had previously been assessed as a very high risk to re-offend. He spent the majority of his adolescence incarcerated. Mr. Wuss had been involved with Maryvale Secure Custody, the former Bluewater Youth Centre and St. John’s.”

15. Mr. Wuss has an extensive psychiatric history, which started in 2003. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia at the age of 23. He has had several admissions to hospital in the past including admission to the Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care from February 8 to 24, 2011 on a Warrant of Committal after being found unfit to stand trial. In September 2012, Mr. Wuss was admitted again for about one month.

16. In October 2014, Mr. Wuss was admitted to the Windsor Regional Hospital Ouellette Campus for about two weeks. He was then admitted again to the same hospital from December 22, 2015, to January 5, 2016. He was on a Community Treatment Order at the time and refused to take his injectable antipsychotic medication. Until the spring of 2019, Mr. Wuss was connected with the ACT team. He was discharged for noncompliance with medication and aggressive behaviour toward staff.

17. In July 2021, Mr. Wuss was again on a Community Treatment Order and was involved with the Transition Stability Centre.

Course Since Last Disposition

18. The Hospital Report and Updated Hospital Report provide information regarding Mr. Wuss’ course in hospital since his last Disposition.

19. Mr. Wuss continued to experience fixed delusions, paranoia, and hallucinations over the course of the reporting period. Mr. Wuss confirmed these positive symptoms daily. As a result of these positive symptoms, Mr. Wuss’ thought process was often tangential, incorporating the delusions into his everyday tasks. Some of his fixed delusions involve him believing he is ‘Slim Shady’, he wrote all of Eminem’s music, and seeing and hearing a person named ‘Lonnie Talbot’ who he believes wants to kill him.

20. During this reporting period Mr. Wuss remained isolative to his room due to his ongoing belief that Lonnie Talbot is sending people to jump him. Unfortunately, Mr. Wuss was assaulted in hospital on October 2, 2024, and his isolative behaviours worsened as a result.

21. Mr. Wuss showed limited engagement in programming activities, with attention and concentration difficulties that were primarily related to positive and negative symptoms as well as his moderate cognitive deficits.

22. Mr. Wuss occasionally endorsed low mood, particularly when he felt his treatment team did not believe he is Slim Shady. On November 4, 2024, he reported that he attempted to kill himself by breaking the top off a spoon and using the handle to cut his wrists. Staff noted that there were redness and superficial marks on his wrist, but his skin was intact.

23. Mr. Wuss also took hand sanitizer from the medical carts, sniffing and ingesting it. This indicated a period of affective instability, characterized by impulsivity.

24. Mr. Wuss’ cognition is greatly impacted by his intrusive psychosis and cognitive deficits, resulting in poor concentration, short attention span, poor memory and inability to organize his daily routine independently. This also impacts his ability to cope with stress.

25. Mr. Wuss demonstrated poor or lacking insight in all domains. His treatment continues to provide education relating to insight. Mr. Wuss has a long history of violent behaviours. He demonstrates poor insight into the factors related to his violence risk, including his schizophrenia and substance use disorder.

26. Mr. Wuss had no privileges this reporting year, including no community access for therapeutic recreation. He was able to enter the community for medical appointments with staff escorts, which demonstrated some progress in his treatment.

27. Mr. Wuss was found not capable of making treatment decision related to is mental illness on February 21, 2025.

28. Mr. Wuss has been trialled on ten different antipsychotics to date, which is well beyond the normal number of medications ordinarily tried prior to initiating treatment with clozapine. He now receives an optimized daily dose of 300 mg of clozapine. On May 20, 2025, consent was provided by the Public Guardian and Trustee (“PGT”) to start ECT treatments for Mr. Wuss. As of July 8, 2025, Mr. Wuss completed twelve ECT sessions without any observed improvement in his mental condition. Consent from the PGT was received for a further six sessions. On July 17, 2025, the treatment team reassessed whether continuing ECT was recommended as there had been no improvements observed in Mr. Wuss’ mental status. Mr. Wuss continued to exhibit persistent delusional thinking, hallucinations, and there were no appreciable changes in mood, cognition or behaviour. The remaining ECT sessions were cancelled.

29. Mr. Wuss is supported by ODSP. He is in the process of being assessed for Developmental Services Ontario (“DSO”) funding.

30. Mr. Wuss had regular contact with his mother by phone. She is unable to visit him due to her physical limitations. He has no other family or formal support outside of the forensic system.

Oral Evidence at the Hearing

31. Dr. Naghmeh Mokhber, Mr. Wuss’ attending psychiatrist and signatory of the Hospital Report and Updated Report, provided oral evidence at the hearing.

32. Dr. Mokhber testified that she became Mr. Wuss’ attending psychiatrist on April 29, 2024.

33. Mr. Wuss’ illness is chronically treatment resistant. There are no psychiatric treatments that can help Mr. Wuss except for supportive assistance. Mr. Wuss requires assurance several times per day that the treatment team is helping him.

34. Dr. Mokhber testified that Mr. Wuss’ behaviour is significantly better than last year despite experiencing the same hallucinations and delusions. He is not acting on the hallucinations and delusions anymore. Before clozapine levels were optimized, Mr. Wuss chose to be seclusive in his room. Now he is coming out of his room more often. He continues to have limited interactions with patients and does not initiate interactions with staff.

35. Mr. Wuss is attending programs with prompting. He is adherent to his medications but requires reminders for his oral medications.

36. Dr. Mokhber testified that Mr. Wuss is a very kind person. He often tries to help on the unit with different tasks. He does not make negative comments. During his stay on the unit, Dr. Mokhber has not observed any antisocial behaviours. Mr. Wuss does not prey on other patients, he is not showing aggressive behaviours, and he does not exhibit unacceptable behaviours around female patients or staff.

37. An application has been made for DSO funding, but the treatment team has not heard back from DSO yet about the status of his application. Dr. Mokhber is not sure that he meets the criteria for DSO funding because his cognitive functioning is not as impaired as most applicants who apply for funding.

38. This year, Dr. Mokhber anticipates that Mr. Wuss will receive privileges into the community accompanied by staff who will monitor his behaviour.

39. The treatment team has submitted an application for Crest Support Services, which operates a highly supervised and supported group home in Lucan, Ontario. One of Mr. Wuss’ most significant risk factors is substance use. Because the Crest home is in the rural setting of Lucan, it is anticipated that access to substances will be restricted.

40. Mr. Wuss’ lack of insight into the impact of his use of substances renders him highly likely to use substances again in a community setting. Therefore, a high level of supervision and a rural setting would provide Mr. Wuss with the most chance of success in a community setting.

41. Dr. Mokhber testified that cognitive and personality assessments are not being done because Mr. Wuss will not remain in the room with the hospital’s psychologist.

42. Dr. Mokhber testified that amisulpride, which the team had hoped would augment the clozapine therapy and help with symptoms, is no longer available to the hospital.

Analysis and Conclusions

43. Having heard and considered the entirety of the evidence as well as the joint submissions from the parties, the Board independently finds that Mr. Wuss remains a significant threat to the safety of the public.

44. Mr. Wuss has schizophrenia with ongoing positive and negative symptoms of the illness. He continues to experience the same symptoms as those present at the time of the index offence. His insight is lacking into the index offence, his mental illness, his dysfunctional coping, his need for treatment, and his risk for violence. Mr. Wuss is unable to list his medications or describe why they are being prescribed. Mr. Wuss acknowledges that he has schizophrenia but required prompting to identify his diagnosis. He does not believe he has a personality disorder.

45. Mr. Wuss has a long history of substance use, which historically destabilized his mental disorder and is related to his psychotic symptoms and violent behaviours, including during the index offence. This year Mr. Wuss affirmed he would use substances if he were to return to the community and does not know of any negative consequences of using recreational drugs.

46. The Board relies on the Re-Offence Scenario extracted from the Hospital Report as follows:

“Absent forensic supervision, Mr. Wuss would not maintain his current treatment and medication regimes. He would use substances and would not be adherent to treatment. His psychotic symptoms would exacerbate, including auditory hallucinations, and grandiose and persecutory delusions. Due to his lack of insight, he would not be able to recognize the delusional content of his thoughts and would believe that others are at fault for his fears and losses (e.g. Eminem owing him money) or that others are attempting to kill him (e.g., Lonnie Talbot), or people prevent him from contacting his daughters. He would become distressed, fearing for his safety and that others were not believing him or helping him alleviate what he was experiencing. He would likely manage his stress with substance use, which would intensify his psychotic presentations causing behavioural and affective instability. His psychosis would compromise his judgement. He would become aggressive and would react violently in response to psychotically perceived threats, as was evident in the index offence and demonstrated across his adolescence and into adulthood.”

47. In light of the Board’s finding of significant threat, it is charged with shaping a Disposition for the coming year.

48. Without a Detention Order it is highly likely that Mr. Wuss would leave the hospital without appropriate housing or community supports in place. This would lead to non-adherence to medication, substance use, further deterioration of his mental health, and an unacceptable level of risk to the public. The Board accepts the hospital’s evidence that ongoing support and monitoring are essential to maintaining Mr. Wuss’ mental stability and that his risk to public safety cannot be safely managed within the framework of the Mental Health Act. To effectively manage his risk, the hospital requires the ability to return Mr. Wuss to hospital promptly if he were to experience signs of decompensation.

49. It is unfortunate that the hospital no longer has access to amisulpride given its possible effectiveness as an adjunctive treatment along with clozapine for refractory schizophrenia. Since trials of ECT have been exhausted with no benefit to Mr. Wuss, given the highly refractory nature of Mr. Wuss’ schizophrenia, the Board encourages the hospital to again seek approval for use of amisulpride through Health Canada. Our specialized knowledge leads us to believe that it remains available.

50. Dr. Mokhber highlighted that, in terms of behaviour, Mr. Wuss is doing better this year despite the continuation of his hallucinations and delusions, which the panel believes is reason for optimism. We wish Mr. Wuss the best in the coming year.

51. For the above reasons, the Board finds that the necessary and appropriate, least onerous and least restrictive disposition is a Detention Disposition with no change to the current terms as set out in our formal Disposition.

DATED this 4th day of November 2025, at the City of Toronto, in the Toronto Region.

Ms. C. Murray Legal Member Office of the Registrar Ontario Review Board