‘You are my worst nightmare:’ Nanaimo woman awaits sentence for murdering/dismembering ex-boyfriend

After slitting his throat and cutting Mantee up into many pieces, the offender placed the remains in the fridge to then be dispersed around Nanaimo over the course of several months.

On Friday, Jan. 31, the presiding judge heard extended arguments from Crown counsel and Laroche’s lawyer regarding parole eligibility.

While a second-degree murder conviction carries an automatic sentence of life imprisonment, it’s up to judges to determine when an offender can first apply for parole eligibility of between 10 and 25 years.

Laroche has been locked up for nearly three years, a factor expected to be considered when a final decision is made.

Crown prosecutor Nick Barber suggested Laroche’s parole eligibility be set at 15 years.

Barber referenced the hands-on, personal nature of the homicide, the fact Mantee was sleeping face-down at the time, Laroche’s indignity to his remains, and her post-offence conduct.

“We’re asking you to impose a sentence which positively instills the basic set of communal values shared by all Canadians and that’s in large part due to the method of killing and the method of disposing of the remains,” Barber told court.

He noted Laroche continued to mislead police and Mantee’s mother with the contention Sidney’s whereabouts were unknown, and he’d left on his own accord.

Barber pointed to a forensic evaluation of Laroche finding she wasn’t suffering from any mental illnesses at the time.

He acknowledged Laroche’s relationship with Mantee was an abusive one.

Victim Impact
The victim’s mother, Emma Mantee, travelled from Saskatchewan as the legal case surrounding her son’s murder is set to come to an expected resolution shortly.

With her voice trembling, Mantee said Laroche is the evilest person she knows.

“You hit him with a hammer and it took him a few hours to die, that tore me to pieces, and you threw him away like he was garbage. You, Paris, had his head sitting in your freezer, in my son’s freezer, for several months,” she said.

She took issue with Laroche going on with her life as if nothing happened, while her son was cut into pieces and being spread callously throughout the Nanaimo area.

“Why didn’t you just let him die without cutting him up? You are the most despicable person I have ever come across. Why did you have to do the most horrific, atrocious act to my son? You took away a part of me!”

The mother added Laroche made her a stronger woman and she hopes the offender lives with this memory for the rest of her life.

“You have no heart in your eyes, you are my worst nightmare.”

Defence attorney Glen Orris requested the minimum ten years before parole privileges could be applied for.

Acknowledging the murder was brutal, he said it was Laroche’s intention for Mantee to die as quickly as possible.

He said Laroche didn’t know how to handle the physical and psychological abuse Mantee inflicted on her, stating he was her first serious relationship.

“She was dealing with this as best she could hoping that the relationship would return to its start and how good they were together at the outset. It became clear afterwards that that wasn’t going to happen, but that was her hope throughout.”

Justice Robin Baird told the hearing he intended to make his ruling on Laroche’s parole eligibility next week.

He emphasized the parole eligibility period he’ll decide on doesn’t automatically determine if or when Laroche could be released under the control of the Parole Board of Canada.

“I want that to be clear to everybody, I don’t think that can be said often enough because a lot of people think that what it means is that the penitentiary doors spring open after the passage of ten years…”

Jusice Baird reminded the court that many offenders handed life sentences are never released from prison.

Case background
Laroche’s trial heard testimony from multiple witnesses describing the woman was the subject of an abusive relationship at the hands of Mantee.

Laroche confessed to the killing and dismembering Mantee’s remains to several people, including a pair of undercover police officers about a year and a half after the murder.

She detailed the graphic slaying and how she got rid of the remains within minutes of meeting the officers at her ground-floor Rosehill St. apartment unit in late April 2021.

Police tape surrounds a Rosehill St. apartment building during searches in late May 2021. (file photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

Chilling undercover police recordings played during her judge-alone trial in Vancouver heard Laroche describe how she carried out the early morning ambush at about 4 a.m.

Laroche revealed she hit Mantee several times in the back of the head with a small sledgehammer as he slept on a living room mattress.

After slitting Mantee’s throat, she dragged him to the bathtub and gutted him.

She then cut his remains into many pieces and stored body parts and organs in the fridge before getting rid of the remains around Nanaimo, including Neck Point Park, Pipers Lagoon Park and the waterfront near her apartment unit.

Laroche told undercover officers she visited this pier beside the Nanaimo Yacht Club to get rid of Mantee’s remains. (file photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

Laroche told officers she used public transportation to move around Nanaimo to dispose of the remains.

She used public toilets to flush portions of the body parts, while pieces of Mantee’s body were found at a south Nanaimo fish plant where the pair worked together.

Her confession spawned searches for Mantee’s remains around Nanaimo in the spring of 2021, as well as their apartment.

Laroche gave up the sledgehammer to the undercover officers as well as tools and other items associated with dismembering Mantee’s remains under the guise the undercover officers could help her get rid of the incriminating evidence.

Some of those items contained Mantee’s DNA.

Laroche used the same knives she used to cut up Mantee to prepare herself meals, the trial heard.

Laroche’s legal team pitched a self-defence argument at trial, with veteran attorney Glen Orris going as far as to say his client had no other choice for her own safety but to kill Mantee.

Justice Baird didn’t buy the self-defence argument, saying the evidence showed no use of force was imminent against Laroche at the time.

“Ms. Laroche knew that he had no present capacity to harm or threaten her as she stood over him with her hammer. She acted unilaterally. It was entirely a one-sided transaction. Mr. Mantee was unarmed and defenceless. The level of violence that Ms. Laroche used was extreme and catastrophic,” justice Baird stated during his July 19 verdict.

Paris Laroche and Sidney Mantee had an estranged relationship. She had no prior criminal record (Facebook)

While Crown counsel argued signs of pre-meditation existed, justice Baird ruled the slaying was more spontaneous in nature.

“I find as a fact that Ms. Laroche turned in for the night, she set her alarm for an early hour the next morning because she had to go to work. Her plan for the day was to process fish, not kill Sidney Mantee.”

Mantee’s case was long considered a missing persons case until a confession to a close of Laroche was made, which led to undercover police shifting the case to a homicide investigation.

Nanaimo RCMP conducted several searches around Nanaimo in the spring of 2021 for forensic evidence.

Laroche, who didn’t testify in her own defence, was arrested a second time with charges officially laid in March 2022.

She’s been in custody ever since at Alouette Correctional Centre for Women in Maple Ridge.

Laroche, a former Wellington Secondary School student, unsuccessfully applied to be released on pre-trial bail in July 2022.

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by Ian Holmes

‘You are my worst nightmare:’ Nanaimo woman awaits sentence for murdering/dismembering ex-boyfriend

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