'I really thought I was going to prison': Woman who killed man during marijuana-induced psychosis speaks out

(WGN) - The California killing was gruesome, its circumstances shocking: A woman stabbed a man to death — leaving him with 108 wounds — after smoking marijuana.

Her sentence? No jail time.

“I really thought I was going to prison,” Bryn Spejcher said.

Spejcher grew up in northwest suburban Bloomingdale, Illinois, with her parents, three brothers and a lot of pets.

She was diagnosed at an early age with hearing loss and has worn hearing aids since she was four years old. She discovered a passion for helping others with the same disability. After earning her Master’s degree at Washington University in St. Louis, she moved to Los Angeles to begin her career as an audiologist.

“I knew exactly that was what I wanted to do … work in the audiology field,” Spejcher said.

With her hearing service dog Arya by her side, the two spent much of their free time at a dog park in Thousand Oaks in the spring of 2018.

“Before work, after work, and I would be there for hours just to let her have fun and get to know people,” Spejcher said.

One of the people Bryn got to know was Chad O’Melia, a young accountant. A few weeks after they met, Chad was dead. Bryn was charged with his murder.

“I had no intention to hurt him, I never would hurt anybody,” Spejcher said.

The crime

It was Memorial Day weekend. After a visit to the dog park, Spejcher and O’Melia went back to his apartment, where he offered her marijuana in a bong. It was legal. Spejcher was an inexperienced user. What happened next shattered two families, when Spejcher unexpectedly became violent.

“You have no sense of time, you have no sense of morality, judgment, emotions. It’s the scariest thing,” Spejcher said. “It was like I was watching a TV screen of all these awful things happening.”

With what prosecutors say was three knives from the kitchen, Spejcher stabbed O’Melia, the knives’ serrated edges leaving him with 108 wounds. Spejcher even stabbed her own dog, Arya, and herself.

Ventura County Sheriff’s deputies responded, their body cameras recording. That video evidence remains under seal, but both Bryn’s defense team and the Ventura County prosecutor have watched it many times.

“She carved up his face. This stabbing was horrific — one of the worst our medical examiner has seen,” Ventura County Senior Deputy District Attorney Audry Nafziger said.

“One of the deputies shoots her with a taser gun four times so electrical wires go into her body four times, she keeps stabbing herself,” Robert Schwartz, one of Bryn’s lawyers, said.

Another deputy used his metal baton for the first time in his career. It took 9 blows to break Spejcher’s arm, finally freeing the knife from her grip.

“They saved my life and I’m forever grateful for them,” Spejcher said.

Spejcher was rushed to the hospital and into surgery. She survived her 43 wounds. Her mom flew from Chicago to take care of her, while her dad stayed behind for her younger brother’s high school graduation.

“She was going, ‘Ask Chad, ask Chad what happened. I don’t know what happened,’” Spejcher’s mom, Laurie Pearce, said.

“It was just a matter of trying to — of consciously waking up. It was a matter of trying to explain to the detectives what I was experiencing,” Spejcher said.

Spejcher spent six days in jail. Prosecutors initially charged her with murder, but over the course of the years-long investigation, just months before her 2023 trial, they reduced the charge to involuntary manslaughter. The reason? Experts on both sides agreed: Her actions were the result of cannabis-induced psychosis.

What is cannabis-induced psychosis?

“This is really rare, but it can happen, it’s known to happen. There have been human experimental studies that have shown if you give people high levels of THC into their bloodstream, you can illicit psychotic symptoms,” said Dr. Sachin Patel, the chair of the Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Department at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine.

Dr. Patel studies how cannabis and its primary psychoactive compound, THC, affect the brain. He says the most at risk of cannabis-induced psychosis are people with mental illness or people who have a family member with mental illness or a psychotic disorder.

Dr. Patel says it’s possible for someone to become violent during an episode of cannabis-induced psychosis when they otherwise wouldn’t.

“It’s possible depending on the degree of psychosis, so if people are perceiving things in the environment to be threatening when they ordinarily wouldn’t or when there is no threat, certainly one reaction to that could be, for example, fear, or withdrawal. Under certain circumstances, it could be heightened aggression,” he said.

The verdict and the sentence

In late 2023, a California jury convicted Spejcher of involuntary manslaughter.

“I really thought I was going to prison,” Spejcher said.

She was researching prison accommodations for her disability before sentencing. But her sentence included no prison time. 

“No one could have foreseen that a single hit of marijuana that night would have caused Ms. Spejcher to have a total psychotic break from reality, certainly not Chad and certainly not Ms. Spejcher. In light of these facts, I do not believe that further incarceration of Ms. Spejcher is appropriate,” Judge David Worley said in court.

He sentenced her instead to two years of probation and 100 hours community service, educating the public on the dangers of THC.

“That this judge absolved this defendant of really any responsibility other than being convicted sends a very dangerous message,” Nafziger said.

O’Melia’s father calls the sentence a travesty of the system.

“What does she have to do? Nothing? Nothing after taking another human’s life. I mean, probation, going and talking to people. That’s not justice,” Sean O’Melia said.

Asked what she wants to tell the O’Melia family now, Spejcher said she’s sorry.

“I am just so sorry. I am so sorry that they have to live with a hole in their life, will forever not be able to be with Chad and that they have to grieve. And I just hope and pray that they find some compassion and forgiveness,” Spejcher said.

The future of marijuana

Spejcher’s requirement to raise awareness about the risks of marijuana comes amid the drug’s normalization. The federal government is moving to re-classify it as a less dangerous drug. It’s legal recreationally in 24 states. And manufacturers are creating more potent products that are more accessible than ever.

“I see this not being good,” Dr. Patel said. “We as a population are being exposed to things today that were never even a possibility 10, 20, 30 years ago.”

Dr. Patel notes historically, cannabis plants contained 2-4% THC by weight. Now, plants have 20-30%, and some products are made with even higher concentrations.

There is some question about whether the marijuana O’Melia gave Spejcher in 2018 was high potency. Spejcher’s attorneys presented evidence at trial that showed O’Melia ordered a 30% THC product that came with a warning that it was intended for “high-tolerance” users only. But the bong was tested, Spejcher’s attorneys say, and the contents were used up.

“We did recover the only source of marijuana at the scene and it was tested and it was not high-potency marijuana,” Nafziger said.  

Still, with the rapid changes to the industry, Dr. Patel says it’s not surprising to see some increased incidents of adverse effects.

“Cannabis-induced psychosis is the extreme of that — It’s still very rare — but we’re sitting here because it’s happening,” Dr. Patel said.

What Spejcher experienced, the violence she unleashed, the life she took, it's a cautionary tale. And that concern is shared by both the prosecution and her defense team.

“As cannabis gets stronger the risks are going to be higher,” Nafziger said.

“If this could happen to Bryn, it could happen to anybody,” Schwartz said.

Back home in Bloomingdale with her family, Spejcher is appealing her felony conviction and working to obtain a license to continue her career as an audiologist in Illinois.

“I just hope my story will save somebody else’s life,” she said.