t_handle and sysmem_newhandle crash help needed

Thanks for the reply, I have since implemented my c-based text reader using the sysmem_newptr allocation function. I'm still not clear on the differences between t_handles and the memory allocated by sysmem_newptr. In any case, my function reads in a text file containing a list of notes, where each line contains things like vel, pitch, length. I'm posting my code since reading text files into max objects using c code (and Xcode) may be useful for others until new frameworks come out. WARNING: this is not "good" code, there is no error checking--a mis-formated input file would reap havoc. The code opens a dialog for the user to pick a file for reading, loads the entire contents into a newly allocated buffer, then parses that buffer line by line using sscanf and the 'n' char as a way to find the start and end of lines.

void myrecorder_open(t_myrecorder* x, long arg) {
t_atom myList[1];
SETLONG(myList,arg);             defer_low(x,(method)myrecorder_do_open,0,1,myList);
}

void myrecorder_do_open(t_myrecorder* x, t_symbol *s, short ac, t_atom *av) {    
    unsigned char p = av->a_w.w_long;
    // text file contains notes that will be stored into a phrase, pointed to by pp
    struct phrase_type * pp = &(x->phrases[p]);
    char filename[128];
    short pathID;
    OSType dstType;    
    t_filehandle *fh;
    char * text_handle;
    long size;
    int bytes_scanned;
    char teststring[128];
    long cur_note;
    int i, start_of_line;

    // note attributes
    long onset, time_from_prev, time_till_next, hand;
    float vel, pitch;

    if (!open_dialog(filename, &pathID, &dstType,0L,0)) {
        path_opensysfile(filename, pathID, &fh, READ_PERM);
        sysfile_geteof(fh,&size);         
        post("Storing file into phrase %d", p);
        text_handle = sysmem_newptr(size);     
        if(text_handle) { // successful allocation                
            if (!sysfile_read(fh, &size, text_handle)) {        
                // phrase variables to adjust:            
                pp->count = 0;
                pp->current_pos = 0;
                pp->total_length = 0;
                pp->tempo = 1.0;
                pp->current_time = 0.0;            
                // first read in the top header line and ignore it
                i=0;
                while(text_handle[i]!='n')
                    i++;
                i++;
                start_of_line = i;

                for(i;i
                    // search for a n character so we know there's a line                
                    if (text_handle[i]=='n') { // found the end of a line
                        sscanf(&text_handle[start_of_line],"%d %f %f %d %d %d",&onset,&pitch,
                             &vel,&time_from_prev,&time_till_next,&hand);
                        cur_note = pp->count;
                        pp->notes[cur_note].onset_time = onset;
                        pp->notes[cur_note].pitch = pitch;
                        pp->notes[cur_note].vel = vel;
                        pp->notes[cur_note].time_from_prev = time_from_prev;
                        pp->notes[cur_note].time_till_next = time_till_next;
                        pp->notes[cur_note].hand = hand;                
                        pp->count++;
                        start_of_line = i+1;
                    }                
                }

            }
            else
                post ("error reading file");
        }
        sysmem_freeptr(text_handle);
        else {
            post("memory allocation failed");
        }
        sysfile_close(fh);

    }    
}