Torontoist » Crime

Our Bad Habit When It Comes to Pot Laws

Included in the Tory crime bill now before the Senate: harsher penalties for marijuana possession which won't reduce interest in pot but could saddle even casual smokers with permanent legal records.

They have a statue on Parliament Hill for the person who turned pot smokers into criminals. It’s not far from the monument to Sir John A. Macdonald and the equestrian statue of the Queen. Emily Murphy was one of the Famous Five—the group of women who argued before the Supreme Court in 1927 that women [...]

Man Stabbed with Scissors in City Hall Library, Suspect in Custody

CP24 is reporting that a man was stabbed in the City Hall branch of the Toronto Public Library this afternoon. The wounds were apparently to his neck and chest, inflicted with a pair of scissors. EMS told reporters that the victim was alert when he was taken to hospital, though the severity of his injuries [...]

Queen’s Park Watch: Premier Dad Says, “No Thanks” to Big Brother Steve

Stephen Harper wants to put more people in jail, but Dalton McGuinty doesn't want to pay for it. Who's going to win?

Dalton McGuinty yesterday joined Quebec Premier Jean Charest in warning the federal Conservative government that he won’t pony up for the huge new anti-crime bill that the government has introduced. The omnibus crime bill that’s united our two solitudes deals not just with offences committed on omnibuses but looks to fix a panoply of crime [...]

Scene: Suspicious Packages at Amazing Party and Costume

WHERE: Amazing Party and Costume, just west of Islington at the Gardiner Expressway WHEN: Tuesday, approximately 2 p.m. WHAT: Amazing Party and Costume bills itself as “Canada’s largest party store,” and its owner is speculating that this success may have garnered the store the wrong kind of attention this Halloween weekend. A total of six [...]

TTC Driver Charged in Fatal Bus Crash

At the end of August a TTC bus was involved in a fatal crash, in which one woman, Jadranka Petrova, died, and approximately a dozen more were injured. Today, police charged 51-year-old driver William Ainsworth with criminal negligence causing death, as well as marijuana possession. Ainsworth has been suspended from duty by the TTC, and [...]

Tim Hudak’s PCs Press “Chain Gang” Initiative

No mention of whether this will actually involve chains.

Penal labour certainly isn’t uncommon, though framing it as a “chain gang” certainly is. And yet, a recent missive from the Ontario PC Party—titled: “Hudak Government Will Make Prisoners Work,” and an attachment labelled “Chain Gang Backgrounder”—calls for mandatory manual labour, stating that “an Ontario PC government will not make prisoners do anything more than [...]

Historicist: A Perfect Crime, Forgotten

"We're completely in the dark," a Trans-Canada Air Lines official admitted after thieves took gold bullion from Malton Airport in 1952 in a seemingly perfect and still-unsolved caper.

On the evening of September 24, 1952, $215,000 worth of gold bullion was stolen at Malton Airport. The heist—which, at the time, was the largest gold robbery in Canadian history—involved no threat of violence and no gun play. In fact, no one had even seen stick-up/hold-up men. Of 10 boxes of gold removed from a [...]

Conrad Black Returning to Jail

CRIME In a Chicago courtroom a few minutes ago, Judge Amy St. Eves reappraised Conrad Black's sentences on a variety of crimes. Originally convicted on three counts of fraud and one for obstruction of justice and sentenced to 78 months, Black subsequently saw two of the fraud charges reversed and was released from prison for a time. The new verdict: a total sentence of 42 months, of which he has already served 29. Black will therefore return to prison for just over a year. Wife Barbara Amiel reportedly collapsed when the verdict was read out.

Murder Charge Laid in Beating Death of George Wass

CRIME Ricardo Morrison was arrested six weeks ago and charged in the assaults of two Parkdale men—part of a string of assaults this winter targeting mentally ill men living in that neighbourhood. Today police greatly expanded the list of charges against Morrison: he is now charged with second-degree murder in the death of George Wass, [...]

One Year Later: An Update on G20 Legal Cases

The Toronto-hosted G20 last June was the scene of the largest mass arrest in Canadian history—more than 900 civilians in one weekend. Most of those arrested were not charged, and many of the charges that were pressed were dropped in the aftermath of the summit. To many of us, the G20 is a faded, nightmarish memory of what our city could look like. A story we tell when out-of-towners comment on Toronto’s beauty and peaceful streets. A year after world leaders packed up shop, though our streets were cleaned and our windowpanes fixed, some people are still enmeshed in lawsuits stemming from the G20. Here are the updates.

Valuable Artwork Goes Missing From the Drake

Lou Reed as Christ, (2009). Jenny Hart, an Austin, Texas–based artist, has been working in the medium of hand embroidery for 11 years, but this February was the first time she’d ever had work of hers vanish without a trace. Two pieces went missing in an apparent theft, and the last place either of them [...]

Platform Primer: Law and Order

In the run-up to the federal election on May 2, we’ll be comparing the major parties’ platforms on issues that matter to urban voters. Each party’s key messages, according their respective colours. Image by Michael Chrisman/Torontoist. Crime is a perennial hot-button issue, even when there’s not really that much of it around. Our national parties [...]