A man accused of having a firearm in cop cruiser has convictions for dealing drugs while serving a prison sentence for earlier crimes, the Sun has learned.
Sources told the Sun that Ali Nassir Showbeg, 38, was wearing multiple layers of clothing and perhaps strapped the Ruger handgun underneath his genitalia when he was busted for impaired driving on the weekend.
A videotape of him producing the concealed handgun from clothing while handcuffed in the back of a Toronto police cruiser made headlines earlier this week.
Showbeg’s criminal past reveals he concealed contraband drugs while serving time in penitentiaries for earlier narcotics and weapons convictions.
Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders said the incident is being investigated to determine whether “it is a training or disciplinary matter.”
Showbeg was sentenced to six months on top of six months of pre-trial custody in June 2003 for possessing a prohibited weapon.
He later got two years in jail plus a two-year-less-two-days conditional sentence for possession of a firearm with tampered serial numbers in 2006, as well as a lifetime weapons ban.
He wasn’t convicted of the attempted murder charge stemming from a Feb. 13, 2005 shooting outside of a Rexdale grocery store.
Later, he got a three year and seven month sentence for a drug dealing conviction.
While serving this sentence at Millhaven in 2007, Showberg was convicted of conspiracy to sell drugs in jail and received an additional 18-month consecutive sentence.
The next year, at Collins Bay Penitentiary, he was convicted of two counts of possessing drugs.
Veteran criminal defence lawyer Daniel Brown said strip searches “can’t be conducted by police as a matter of routine for all arrested individuals.
“Our laws permit police officers to do a thorough frisk search as part of any arrest to ensure the safety of the public or the officers,” said Brown.
“If a frisk search reveals a possible weapon or other circumstances raise the risk that a weapon may be concealed on the detainee, a strip search to locate the weapon will be completely justified.”
A quarter of Brown’s clients are charged with drunk driving offences.
“Police will even be permitted to conduct a strip search at the roadside if there are urgent circumstances requiring the search to take place before arriving at the police station,” explained Brown.
“You don’t always find weapons on a pat-down search, especially if they are hidden in the rectum or under their testicles,” a source told the Sun.
“It’s perfectly feasible if the gun was hidden under the scrotum, perhaps in compression underwear, and the suspect wore multiple layers of clothing, it could be missed by a pat-down search.”
Concealing firearms in underwear is a frequent occurrence.
In January, military man Randy Jackson was sentenced to eight years in prison for smuggling 67 handguns — including three stashed in his compression underwear while driving across the border from his native Michigan into Ontario’s black market.
Jackson, 35 and a first-time offender, previously pleaded guilty to importing three handguns in his underwear and illegally transferring four other firearms in 2017.
He brought 67 handguns across the border in 2017, 52 of which remain in the hands of criminals who may use them and “harm entirely innocent persons,” court heard.
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