Alleged sex assault in Toronto at prestigious St. Michael's College investigated

Legendary St. Michael’s College School has been rocked to its core amidst an alleged sexual assault scandal now under investigation by Toronto Police.

The alleged assaults in two hazing incidents, a video of the alleged incidents being labelled as child pornography, questions on when police were notified, and students being expelled had the Catholic school reaching out to parents to apologize while expressing a guarantee such actions fall beneath the highly regarded educational institution’s moral standards.

“At St. Michael’s College School, nothing matters more than the safety and well-being of our students,” the school said in a statement Wednesday. “Teaching our students goodness, discipline and knowledge in an environment where respect for others is paramount is a responsibility we take very seriously.

“This week, to our shock and dismay, we learned of two incidents that were in clear violation of our Student Code of Conduct. The school has zero tolerance for such behaviour.”

It is being described by sources as an alleged hazing incident involving the school’s football team.

“The school administration promptly conducted an internal investigation, including meeting individually with the students involved and their parents,” said the release. “As a result, swift and decisive disciplinary action has taken place, including expulsions.”

Sources say up to ten students may have been kicked out of the Grades 7-12 school, which is noted for scores of esteemed alumni including legendary Toronto Maple Leafs and parliamentarians Frank Mahovlich and Red Kelly.

“We are deeply sorry that these incidents occurred. From this unfortunate situation, we redouble our efforts to educate and promote respect for others in the school and in the community,” the school said.

Toronto Police spokesman Meaghan Gray said “police were not aware of the alleged incidents until the media called with questions about it today (Wednesday).”

The acting director of corporate communications said “we had no information on it” and immediately called 13 Division to see if they did.

“The school said they notified the police on Monday,” she said, adding that has not been verified.

Gray said from the information she has at this point “we became aware of this incident today.” Toronto Police’s Child and Youth Advocacy Centre and 13 Division detectives have started a “full scale investigation” into it.

“Regardless of who was notified and when we have the information, we have video and there is an active investigation going on,” said Gray, who added any children in need of medical assistance will be provided it.

Toronto Police also warned against broadcasting or sharing the video of the alleged hazing.

“Police believe a video depicting the alleged assault is being circulated” and “investigators from the Child Exploitation Section have been consulted and have determined the video meets the definition of child pornography,” Toronto Police said in a release.

“Anyone who has this video is in possession of child pornography. The video must be deleted immediately and cannot be shared with anyone.”
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Yohannes Brhanu, 22 was a 'Neptune Four' teen who alleged police misconduct

His youth was shattered by a police gun. And now his life has been cut short by a thug’s.

Yohannes Brhanu, 22, was this year’s record-tying homicide #89, killed in a midnight gun battle waged on a quiet residential street this week, yet another casualty of the gun violence that has plagued our city this year.

But he was supposed to have escaped it.

Brhanu was one of the infamous Neptune Four, black teens from Lawrence Heights who were stopped by Toronto Police on their way to an after-school program in November 2011. The police were looking for robbery suspects and demanded identification.

When one of the boys tried to walk away after learning they weren’t under arrest, he alleged he was beaten while his twin brother and their two friends were told at gunpoint: “Don’t move or I’ll f—–g kill you.”

The four boys were arrested but all charges were dropped after a Toronto Housing security video surfaced showing the police encounter.

Const. Adam Lourenco and Const. Scharnil Pais were later charged under the Police Services Act: Pais faces one count of unlawful arrest while Lourenco is charged with unlawful arrest as well as two counts of using unreasonable force for allegedly punching the teen and pointing his gun at Brhanu and the others.

Both officers pleaded not guilty in 2017 — and unbelievably, their disciplinary hearing is still ongoing with another date set for next week. The four teens also launched a civil suit against them in 2013.

Roderick Brereton had known Brhanu since 2011 when his Urban Rez Solutions ran a mentoring program in the Neptune housing project. “He was an individual who was bright, very witty, full of life and had tonnes of potential.

“He wanted to get into construction and we helped him get into a pre-apprenticeship program. I hadn’t talked to him in the last couple of months but he was working in construction and seemed to be doing pretty well.”

And so the community consultant was shocked when he learned not only that Brhanu had been killed in a gun fight but that a loaded, unused firearm was found in his vehicle.

“I was utterly surprised,” said the shaken Brereton, 47. “I didn’t know him to be involved in any of this activity. To be honest, nobody knows what happened. I don’t know if he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The police said they found a gun. I don’t know if it was his.”

His mother and siblings are equally stunned and none of it fits with the young man he thought he knew.

“There was no indication this would be in his deck of cards,” he said. “I’ve been trying to wrap my head around what the message is. There’s still shock that this young person is gone. I’m still trying to process it.”

Brhanu had testified last year at the police tribunal against the two officers who stopped him and his friends when he was 15.

“I think it had a huge adverse impact on his psyche,” Brereton said. “There was a loss of trust, there was paranoia. The police are supposed to be there to serve and protect …they ran into some bad apples that day.”

The three surviving Neptune Four are all doing well, he said, attending university and starting businesses. They’re equally mystified by what’s befallen Brhanu, he said. “They grew up together. They’re a close-knit family. They’re very traumatized by what happened.”

Brereton is still waiting for more information before accepting that the teen he mentored was involved in gang activity. He insists the rest of us should wait as well.

And if turns out to be true? “Everybody’s accountable for their choices,” he sighed. “I couldn’t say what has gone wrong. Sometimes people fall off the path.”
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Toronto's new homeless warehouse opens at Queen Elizabeth Building

It was billed as an advance tour of the latest 24-hour respite care shelter to open in Toronto.

Scheduled to open Thursday night in the Queen Elizabeth Building at Exhibition Place, it looked awfully much to me like a warehouse for 200 poor souls — a perfect example of what is known as three hots (hot meals, plus snacks) and a cot.

Under sharp fluorescent lighting, the cots were lined up on top of each other like an army dorm — with blue tape outlining men’s cots and pink for women’s. The cots are barely high enough to store the most minimal of worldly possessions underneath.

There is an additional storage room at one end of the room but it doesn’t look to be secure.

There will, however, be at least five security guards and between five and seven support workers on at all times, not that I expect they will be watching client possessions.

Since the shelter allows pets, there were 20 crates lined up against the side of the room containing nothing more than a hard looking black tray, no little blanket, nothing. (I suppose that’s better than the sidewalk).

SHARPS containers to deposit needles are contained in key locations throughout — clearly indicating that taking one’s drugs in the respite shelter is fine by City Hall.

The “dining area” — where catered meals will be served — consisted of a series of portable tables set up at one end of the large room.

This cramped warehouse facility will be provided at a cost of $105 per client per night by Homes First.

“This is not what we’d like to be doing,” said Patricia Mueller, CEO of Homes First, which also runs the respite centre at 354 George St.

“We’d rather be running more housing.”

Mueller says the people who have turned up at their other shelters primarily have addiction or mental health issues — but some have just genuinely lost their housing.

She said the problem is that there has been a “perfect storm” — many contributing factors causing homelessness in the city.

The influx of refugees is part of the issue, she adds, but there’s people losing their housing because of rising rents, addictions, the opioid crisis or hoarding issues or because landlords are converting units into Airbnbs.

“They’re so many things causing this and right now we want to make sure no one dies on the streets,” she said, noting when asked that cots are “within city standards” for how apart they should be.

“It’s definitely within health standards … it’s not how I’d like people to live,” Mueller admitted. “I want people to get housed.”

She said they will have a worker on hand to try to get people into permanent housing but there’s a relative dearth of “deeply affordable” and “supportive” housing units.

I asked her about the 1,200 rent-geared-to-income units at Toronto Community Housing Corporation (TCHC) currently sitting vacant — most of them bachelors and one-bedrooms.

“I would be happy to take those units on, clean them and get them repaired,” she said.
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Toronto is loading more costs on to new development, costing consumers

I’m sure that as you sip on your Saturday morning coffee and flip through the paper or your phone, looking at new home ads, that you had no idea the City of Toronto increased development charges by $20,000 on a new single family home.

From the $41,251 fee set this past May 1, development charges for a single family home increased to $60,739 this past Nov. 1. That charge will increase to $71,432 on Nov. 1, 2019 and then to $80,227 on Nov. 1, 2020, adding $38,976 to the cost of a new home in just three years.

So, what are development charges? They are a tax imposed by local municipalities on new homebuyers, as well as GO Transit and education boards. They contribute to the capital costs of municipal services such as roads, water services, sewers, parks and recreation and emergency services. The building and land development industry supports the need for new homebuyers to pay their fair share of these costs.

New homebuyers pay their fair share for infrastructure and services, but municipalities like the City of Toronto are loading excessive costs on to new development. The bottom line is that these costs are pricing new homebuyers out of the market. Development charges have increased exponentially and it has shifted the burden of paying for critical infrastructure onto the newest residents and businesses moving into a neighbourhood.

This past May, BILD commissioned a study by Altus Group that calculated all government fees and charges on a new single family home in six municipalities across the GTA. The study found that, on average, all government fees, taxes and charges amounted for 22 per cent of the cost of a new home. The biggest contributor was development charges, which accounted for 30 per cent of all charges.

Since 2004, development charges have increased between 236 and 878 per cent across the GTA. Once the City of Toronto finishes the phase-in of its latest round of increases in 2020, the increase over 2004 levels will be a whopping 1,700 per cent. To provide a comparison over that same time frame, the Consumer Price Index (CPI – Inflation) rose by 22 per cent and the average new house price in Toronto increased by 143 per cent.

Development charges are increasing 10 to 40 times faster than inflation over the same period. Existing City of Toronto homeowners faced a property tax increase of 30 per cent per household during that same period.

When we talk about affordability of new housing, we must ensure that development charges do not become a barrier to new home ownership.
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Federal government orders Canada Post to permanently cease delivery of Your Ward News

Federal LIEberals tells us what we should and should not read 
 
The federal government has ordered Canada Post to permanently cease delivering a controversial Toronto-based tabloid that has been criticized for promoting hatred against Jews, visible minorities, women and LGBTQ Canadians.

In June 2016, the government issued an interim order to stop delivery of Your Ward News to some 300,000 households through Canada Post’s unaddressed bulk mail.

After considering the recommendations of an independent board of review on the matter, Carla Qualtrough, the minister responsible for the post office, has now made that order final. The public services and procurement minister says her decision is consistent with the law and the government’s support for diversity and inclusiveness.

Last fall, the tabloid’s publisher, LeRoy St. Germaine, and editor-in-chief, James Sears, were each charged with two counts of wilful promotion of hatred against an identifiable group, namely Jews and women.

They were also both charged with uttering death threats against political consultants Warren and Lisa Kinsella, but a judge last month dismissed the charge against St. Germaine.

The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, which had filed a criminal complaint about the tabloid, applauded Qualtrough’s decision Thursday to permanently ensure Your Ward News is not disseminated through Canada Post.

“Your Ward News promotes disgusting anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, misogyny, homophobia and racism,” Noah Shack, the centre’s vice-president for Toronto, said in a statement.

“Our taxpayer-funded mail service should not be used to distribute such hateful content to hundreds of thousands of households.”

Until the interim prohibition on delivery, the tabloid had been landing unsolicited every month on the doorsteps of about 300,000 households and businesses in the Greater Toronto Area.

“Just think about a Holocaust survivor picking up their mail only to find neo-Nazi propaganda on their doorstep,” said Shack. “This is totally unacceptable.”
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Toronto Hood Life

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Toronto Shooting near Albion and Weston is #89 and Ties City Record Homicides

A man is dead after a shooting near Albion and Weston Rds., the city’s record-tying 89th homicide of the year.

Toronto Police say up to 10 shots were reported on Ann Arbour Rd. just before midnight Tuesday.

Officers found a male victim without vital signs in a vehicle. He was taken to a trauma centre, where he died.

There was no immediate information on any suspects or the victim’s identity.

The murder ties the city’s record for homicides, which was set in 1991.

“You are always shocked when you get news like this,” said Supt. Ron Taverner, who heads up 23, 12 and 31 Divisions. “Every murder is shocking.”

Speaking from the murder scene, he said he was hoping to not get that call, “but when it came, it is upsetting. This is another young person lost.”

Last week, Taverner told media that the northwest corner of Toronto has had about 40% of the city’s shootings. It’s not lost on him that it was inevitable another one would likely come.

But he was hoping it could be avoided. “We have been taking a lot of guns off the street,” he said.

“What we don’t know is how many homicides we prevent because of the actions we take to take guns off the street.”

He credited paramedics for keeping the homicide number from being much higher and his officers for “working so hard to try to keep the community safe.”

When you have 89 murders, tying the mark set in 1991, it’s a sombre day, he said.

“The problem is there are so many guns out there.”

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Toronto nixes possible Toronto Plaza Hotel purchase near Jane and Wilson Aves

The city has dismissed speculation that it is buying a North York hotel to house refugees.

Toronto had looked into buying the 199-room Toronto Plaza Hotel, at Hwys. 400 and 401, to determine if that was a cheaper way to shelter refugees than building something new.

The city decided against spending millions on the purchase because the hotel and its seven acres of land is on a flood plain with limited development potential.

“Earlier this year, the city’s real estate division conducted due diligence to determine if there was a business case to purchase the land,” said a city release.

“As it was a large site, it would have been for broader city needs, not solely shelter, support and housing. It has now been determined that this wouldn’t be possible and the purchase is not being pursued.”

Virk Hospitality, which owns the hotel, declined comment.

The Toronto Plaza is currently used to house refugees and homeless families at the city’s expense. The CBC reported that the hotel has a market value of $35 million and the city has spent more that $4 million to shelter people at the location.

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Toronto Star publishes very biased article about Moms and Gun Control

A gun control group is hoping a new 13-foot-tall bullet-shaped exclamation point outside Toronto’s city hall will lend a sense of urgency to the debate about gun violence in Canada.

In the wake of increasing gun violence in Toronto and Canada as a whole, the Coalition for Gun Control launched a national campaign Tuesday morning urging Ottawa to ban handguns and military-style assault weapons.

Stacey King, whose two children were shot this summer in a Toronto playground, said the time for platitudes has passed.

“Thankfully they survived, but our lives have been changed forever,” she said. “Mothers of children that have been shot do not want prayers or flowers. We want gun control.”

The campaign consists of billboards and a social media campaign directing people to the website triggerchange.ca. The site links to a government petition calling for the weapon ban — more than 600 people had signed as of noon Tuesday — and urges Canadians to contact their member of parliament.

The exclamation point sculpture was briefly placed next to the Toronto sign at city hall Tuesday morning.

“I’ve been doing this for almost 30 years,” said coalition president Wendy Cukier, who started advocating for gun control after the 1989 École Polytechnique massacre. “And personally, I feel like in the last decade we’ve been moving backward, not forward.”

Gun homicides are up sharply this year in Toronto — 45 so far this year, up from 35 by this date in 2017 — and the city is two killings away from breaking its record for homicides in a single year, set in 1991. The city councils of Toronto and Montreal have urged the federal government to ban handguns in their cities.

“We have all the evidence, we have all the data, we have all the experts, who have argued very clearly that stronger controls on guns reduce the risk that people will be injured and die — not just in the big cities, but right across the country,” Cukier said.

Cukier said she is worried Canada is approaching a “tipping point” where gun ownership is too saturated to be rolled back. She gave the example of the United States, where public opinion is generally for stricter gun control, but meaningful action is slow-moving.

In 2005 there were about 300,000 legally-owned handguns in Canada, she said. “Now there are almost a million, and if we wait longer, there will be two million,” she said.

An Ekos poll last December found 69 per cent of Canadians support strict gun bans in urban areas.

“There’s a real disconnect between public opinion on this issue, and political action,” Cukier said.

The campaign is taking aim at handguns and assault weapons, but not rifles to be used for hunting.

“You don’t use a handgun to shoot deer, and you can’t hunt partridge with an AR-15 — these are guns designed to kill people,” said campaign activist Meagan Trush, who grew up in an area outside Thunder Bay where many people, including most of her family, often go hunting on weekends.

King’s daughters, 5 and 9, were shot on June 14 while playing at a Scarborough playground. Her younger daughter was shot in the stomach; her older was shot in the ankle.

Both underwent emergency surgery.

Trush said she’s hopeful about the campaign’s potential to talk about gun control with youth.

“I’m tremendously proud of all the hard work that’s gone into it,” she said. “I think it’s a really important opportunity to engage younger demographics, millennials like myself in the issue that has traditionally been a narrative dominated by those of our parents’ generation.”

For the veteran Cukier, it’s more difficult to muster optimism about an issue she’s been protesting for nearly three decades.

“On the one hand, I’m grateful and happy that so many people have stepped up to help move this forward. On the other hand, every time there’s a shooting, I am furious that people who could’ve taken action did not take action,” Cukier said.

“To me, it’s now come down to, what do we value — our assault weapons and handguns, or our children’s lives?” she said. “For me, that choice is really clear.”

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Toronto Police shocked by disturbing shooting video

It might be the grossest, most disturbing crime video ever captured in Toronto history.

It has angered Toronto Police and shocked a community.

As you see on torontosun.com, all three gunman stood over a man they had already shot and each unloaded their hand guns into him again.

“He was hit with eight bullets and is still recovering in hospital,” said 23 Division Supt. Ron Taverner. “He was an innocent man who had never before had dealings with police.”

It didn’t stop these murderous creeps.

“If not for the amazing EMS paramedics this, and many others, would have been a Homicide no question,” said Taverner.

It’s a disturbing video to watch.

It was not a movie. It happened right here in Toronto.

It was June 10 on Driftwood Avenue.

Taverner did the city and province a real service by showing this video and two others of ugly shootings because it puts out there what these shootings look like.

It’s frightening. It’s reality.

The video evidence does not just show shocking shootings of innocent people but also demonstrates the pure cruelty some gangland style thugs employ.

“It’s senseless violence against a community that is 99 per cent very good people,“ said Supt. Ron Taverner of 23 Division. “These shooters have no regard for human life. I can’t use the word I would like to use to describe them.”

The veteran officer says enough is enough.

“Innocent people get caught up in this and it’s pathetic,” he said. “People barbecuing or having a coffee. It has just got to stop.”

He wants it to stop.

He knows the only way to make these gunmen stop is to find the gutless shooters, arrest them, convict them, incarcerate them and then fight to keep them locked up.

“But we need help,” he said. “If people know who these people are in these videos please contact Crimestoppers.”

Taverner knows, as does everybody else who fight crime, many of these slugs are out on bail faster than the next shipment of illegal guns come across the border and back into their hands.

“But a new approach at the province level is seeing special crowns going to court on gun offences and contesting bail,” he said. “We are hopeful that will keep these dangerous people behind bars. ”

First, in these three cases, police have got to catch them.

Police are trying hard.

Just this week Toronto Police Deputy Chief James Ramer and Acting Inspector Don Belanger displayed to the media a cache of 30 illegal handguns and drugs and cash they kept out the hands of criminals in Project Belair.

Thursday Toronto Police announced the arrests of two men in the Kipling Avenue and Dixon Road area of 31 Division and seized a loaded 9mm Taurus G2C firearm in the process.

Brothers Abdiaziz Mohamed Abdi, 24, Ibrahim Mohamed Abdi, 29, of Toronto, are charged with a truckload of offences.

Taverner displayed a photograph of five loaded, illegal handguns the 23 Division Gun Suppression Unit has recently seized.

But the three videos he show provide a glimpse into the reality of how vicious these people in the gang world can be.

The first incident near Jane Street and Steeles Ave. shows three masked suspects rob at gunpoint several victims getting out of their cars, before one of them struck a victim when a gunshot went off.

Then all three shooters “approached the victim, stood over top of him and discharged multiple rounds from three separate firearms striking the victim numerous times.”

It’s evil.

The next one was Aug. 30 near John Garland Boulevard and Martingrove Road. People were barbecuing in front of a residence when two gunmen approached victims and then “immediately began firing at the group.”

The victim was wounded and is recovering. But the shooters are still on the loose.

In each case innocent people are wounded — just because they happened to be there.

“We have no evidence to show they are anything other than random so we need people to assist investigators,” said Taverner.

These gunmen make look like tough guy gangsters from the movies but when you see the videos what we now see is they are nothing but gutless cowards who are stalking and shooting innocent people who are not armed and hurting no one.

Taverner was visibility upset when showing the videos.

“I am pissed off. No one should have to live like this,” he said.

He is right, but in Toronto many live fearing being shot for no reason.

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