Juno News - Robbers STRIKE AGAIN, store forced to shut down in Mississauga

00:00:00.000 Well, a sharp rise in jewelry store smash and grabs in Ontario has pushed one store

00:00:09.880 to close, and there may be more to follow. The Charm Diamond Center in Mississauga has

00:00:15.620 called it quits after a series of robberies there. One video captured the latest incident

00:00:21.220 in which masked robbers made off with valuables at the Aaron Mills Townsender store.

00:00:26.720 Now, these robberies often involve men smashing display cases with hammers or other tools.

00:00:35.300 And police have noted the alarming increase in the number of jewelry store robberies

00:00:40.120 just over the last few years.

00:00:42.480 Our guest today is Joe Warmington, who is covering this story for the Toronto Sun.

00:00:46.800 Welcome, Joe.

00:00:48.840 Good to be with you, Mark.

00:00:50.180 How are you today?

00:00:51.320 Excellent.

00:00:51.900 Thank you.

00:00:52.300 So this, I'm doing better than charm, the story you're referring to.

00:00:56.580 yeah the reason i ask it is because we live in kind of a police state now where the police tell

00:01:03.500 us that they've got a little thing called patrol rifles and they're going to wander around the

00:01:09.080 streets of toronto and you know nothing to see here um there's no no no reason for it we've just

00:01:14.860 decided to bring out patrol rifles so i guess uh when i ask you how how you're doing you're living

00:01:20.500 in kind of like a, you know, a kind of a mini police state, if you will. It's like ice or

00:01:26.960 something like that. But since the liberals are doing it, it's okay, I guess. Yeah. And it's not

00:01:32.240 stopping these criminals. I mean, they are brazen in the way that they are bringing in

00:01:37.560 tools and hammers and all sorts of things, smashing their way into accessing jewels and

00:01:44.580 watches and all sorts of valuables of rings. But this is more than just about the closure of a

00:01:49.800 store. This is the broader issue I think you have to speak to because there's the ongoing bail

00:01:56.260 problems where you're letting criminals back on the streets almost, you know, within an hour or

00:02:02.560 two. Police are picking up the same people over and over again, suspected of committing crimes.

00:02:08.720 You're talking about issues around immigration, high youth unemployment. I mean, you factor all

00:02:13.740 of this in and what you end up with is businesses having to close because of crime.

00:02:19.800 Yeah, and the crime also funds all the other activities that you talk about. So, you know, it's all kind of a circle around. But when you've got a store like this charm store in the Aaron Mills Town Center, it's been there for decades, closing its doors because they say they just don't feel safe anymore.

00:02:42.160 They've been robbed four times in 15 months, violently smash and grab people that are wearing masks.

00:02:49.240 And, you know, they're never, ever arrested, if you will, or if they are, you know, nothing happens.

00:02:55.260 And so we shrug our shoulders and go, well, that's okay.

00:02:58.920 Can't say anything about that.

00:03:00.240 But as you say, you know, it's a crisis.

00:03:03.340 I mean, if you don't have free enterprise and commerce and the people have to basically would rather close than to take the risk of putting their employees or customers at risk, you know, of being hurt or robbed or whatever, all of it, what kind of country do you have here?

00:03:19.480 And that's why I mentioned off the top about the guns.

00:03:22.220 I'm not blaming the police.

00:03:23.360 I mean, they have to respond, but they haven't responded to so much.

00:03:26.740 I mean, the Jewish people have been put up with so much here in Toronto in terms of anti-Semitism for three straight years, right in their neighborhoods, taking mezuzahs off, you know, their doors and, you know, these kinds of things, shooting up their schools and their synagogues and their businesses.

00:03:44.720 And so, you know, now all of a sudden, okay, well, we better deal with it. Well, if you don't deal with these things right off the top, you give a criminal or a criminal organization or a terror organization one inch, they'll take a lot more than that one inch. And that's what we're dealing with. And it's hard to put that genie back in the bottle, as you well know, Mark, having been a reporter for all these years yourself.

00:04:06.080 If you don't get on this right away, you don't say to the people, look, leave your keys at the front door and don't bother them.

00:04:13.260 They don't want to hurt you.

00:04:14.720 They're just misunderstood.

00:04:16.360 They're going to take that car, no problem.

00:04:19.180 And if they're attacking you in your house, just don't upset them because you might get hurt.

00:04:25.060 That is all backfired.

00:04:26.840 And people are not doing that anymore.

00:04:28.240 They don't trust the system anymore.

00:04:30.320 They pay a lot for it.

00:04:31.640 everybody that works in the police and in justice and the lawyers and the crown, they make not only

00:04:36.920 a little more than the average person, but they're making 50, 75, a hundred thousand dollars a year

00:04:42.600 more. The people that do the protection are the rich people now. And the other people that are

00:04:48.220 the victims, they can hardly hang on to make ends meet and they have to close their store

00:04:53.180 because of it. And that's Canada. And if you're okay with that out there, in my view, you shouldn't

00:04:58.800 be but you do you do you but we'll bring out the stories of something like this i think it's pretty

00:05:04.100 shocking yeah i mean these stores they don't have the kind of money um to hire permanent security do

00:05:11.760 they i mean they kind of they do hire permanent security but the security don't have weapons and

00:05:19.720 so they get victimized as well look at charm is a store that started in over there in dartmouth

00:05:26.580 in scotia in the selby's and it was a it's still a family business run uh by the same family uh

00:05:33.220 good canadian products uh there's nothing from china in there or india nothing wrong with china

00:05:39.300 and india but you get my point it's canadian made in canada and just out of business in the air

00:05:45.620 mills town center very big mall for those across the country or around the world that watch your

00:05:50.580 podcast. You know, it's a big mall and you should feel safe. It's kind of a main street. I live in

00:05:56.920 the area. It's our main street in the winter when you don't know where to go. We don't have in some

00:06:03.540 of the residential parts of Mississauga, you don't really have a traditional main street. So the mall

00:06:07.320 is it. Well, this has happened and there's other things like this. I mean, if you look at the way

00:06:13.520 people live on the streetcars in Toronto or on the buses or subway, they basically just, it's

00:06:19.540 turned into zombie man it's not safe now people smoking crack and there's fentanyl mixed in with

00:06:25.920 that crack and you're sitting next to it with your child and you got to inhale that into your system

00:06:30.920 and you know nobody does anything about it and you go back the next time they're lying around

00:06:35.580 there they may rob you they may blow smoke in you they may you know uh other things that are

00:06:41.460 degrading in front of your children etc and everyone just shrugs their shoulders and say

00:06:46.180 you know you're the problem and that's what happens when the people that are running the

00:06:50.060 system the mayor the deputy mayor the chief of police they're all making four or five hundred

00:06:54.880 thousand dollars a year like hockey players used to make and the people that pay into it can't pay

00:07:00.000 their mortgages because the rates are up the gas is a dollar 75 i mean there's a little reprieve

00:07:05.700 today but it's going back up things like that and so i'm for the little person in the street who's

00:07:11.660 becoming littler by the moment as these fat cats get richer and richer and then not do their jobs

00:07:17.580 yeah you've done your job covering all of this stuff i mean we've seen the pictures the on the

00:07:23.020 ttc the transit system the buses you were referring to the subways where people are are clearly

00:07:31.500 on drugs heavily medicated slouched over urinating and defecating uh in the subways it's disgusting 0.53

00:07:40.860 And it just speaks to the overall decline that this country is going through.

00:07:44.940 And you've spoken about that many times.

00:07:46.460 They're in charge.

00:07:47.340 They're in charge.

00:07:48.060 And, you know, this FIFA World Cup, $380 million of taxpayers' money.

00:07:53.380 You can't tell me that that couldn't have helped with some of these things that we're talking about.

00:07:58.300 Instead, it's going for five soccer games.

00:08:01.700 You know, I'm all for the World Cup.

00:08:03.720 Like I was in favor of the Taylor Swift concert or the Journey concert that they just had that I went to,

00:08:09.740 which we talked about on your radio show but that wasn't taxpayer funded those are private

00:08:14.900 enterprises it's entertainment you pay for it you get good entertainment for this it's subsidized

00:08:20.020 by you they're spending a hundred thousand dollars on condoms another 27 000 on other products that

00:08:28.140 relate to that um and that's for people that you know the and and crack pipes and and and where to

00:08:35.580 buy safely by your you know your drugs now they're starting to change that in ontario the damage is

00:08:41.980 done but you got to remember that people paying for this just shake their head and go well like

00:08:48.240 what about us what about us is paying for it 380 million dollars for five soccer games and yet now

00:08:54.820 they have to have uh police with long guns in the street like a martial law kind of environment um

00:09:03.000 I'm not going to be quiet about it.

00:09:06.020 Look, I don't blame the police.

00:09:07.160 I understand it.

00:09:08.140 They don't want to be caught flat-footed.

00:09:11.040 But I don't want to live in a place that the criminals get to keep on going,

00:09:15.240 and we just keep responding to them by putting more and more security on it.

00:09:18.440 Before you know it, you've got a place where you're kind of under martial law,

00:09:24.760 if you will.

00:09:25.640 And I'm not comfortable with it.

00:09:27.860 I'm all about freedom.

00:09:29.160 I know you are too, and I know this audience is.

00:09:31.320 And so we pointed out all the other things about, you know, how is it that people can go through a neighborhood where a lot of Jewish people live and harass the hell out of them and, you know, then turn around and arrest the journalists, if you will, for covering it. 0.72

00:09:50.180 There's something really wrong with all this.

00:09:52.560 So anyway, maybe it makes us sound popular, but it's also, you know, telling it as it really is.

00:09:58.240 And I think that's what we need to do.

00:10:00.420 I think that's why what you do is so important, because people get to hear the real story and not just what's sanitized.

00:10:08.020 Well, thank you, Joe.

00:10:08.780 I appreciate that.

00:10:10.380 But I want to ask you as well about the businesses.

00:10:12.500 I mean, imagine you're a business person in this country.

00:10:15.080 We've seen the outflow of billions of dollars in investment.

00:10:19.560 And, yeah, some of it are the high rollers, people who are moving corporations and head offices out of Canada, like Brookfield, for instance, ironically.

00:10:29.820 And other companies choosing not to invest, not to expand their companies in Canada.

00:10:36.100 And of course, you have the many thousands of small business owners, small and medium-sized companies like this one that we're referring to, Charm, getting frustrated with the way things are going and having to shutter at least one store.

00:10:50.560 and it just sends such a terrible message to the entrepreneurs out there looking at Canada as a

00:10:58.220 place to start a business, expand a business. I mean, who wants to do that? I mean, who wants

00:11:04.620 to expand their business or even start a business in the environment that this country is in right

00:11:10.600 now? You know what? You see Cuba falling and you see what happened in Venezuela and you can see

00:11:16.200 what's happening in iran and canada's suffering its own thing i mean like this you mentioned

00:11:20.400 brookfield like that is not really a canadian company and uh you know they moved the under the

00:11:27.040 supervision or you know signing off on it from prime minister carney when he was the chair of

00:11:32.520 that company moving their headquarters down the states but i remember all the stories about the

00:11:37.680 offshore islands and stuff where they had their offices that were in an apartment old man's

00:11:43.400 apartment or behind a bike shop in a building and again these are great stories to tell but

00:11:49.300 nothing's done about it but i'll tell you you don't put in every penny on your taxes at this

00:11:53.980 tax time you're going to hear about it they'll audit you and then they'll come and crush you

00:11:58.640 and they'll laugh about it and they make the people doing it they're making two hundred thousand

00:12:03.020 dollars a year to do it while you're meagerly under that way under that you know so that's

00:12:08.220 that's the kind of uh thing that we're dealing with now which is a a country that is no longer

00:12:16.480 servicing the people that pay the bill it's the other way around they're servicing the you know

00:12:21.900 the hard-working taxpayer services the people that administer them and um you know it has to

00:12:28.980 be pointed out i don't know how you fix it but i think you fix it by pointing it out you know and

00:12:33.980 saying enough is enough i i can't believe that people don't have enough money to eat and they

00:12:39.540 you know there's not a pothole that you know it hasn't met my car uh this year all over the gta

00:12:46.260 and yet they got 380 million dollars for fifa fifa is not something that i'm interested in i'm glad

00:12:52.680 that we're you know gonna have some soccer games i guess i'll watch them on tv but i don't think i

00:12:57.920 should have to pay for it you know and i don't think anybody should you know if you think of

00:13:02.340 places in this country all over this country no wonder they're talking about separating and things

00:13:07.860 like that they see their money going only to toronto and only to people the you know the fat

00:13:12.960 cats to get to go to all these events and that's where their money goes i mean and they don't have

00:13:18.300 their own local library or they have you know roads or bridges that aren't fixed and their

00:13:23.360 airports aren't open and all these kinds of things so you know maybe we'll get a common sense

00:13:28.680 government one day but i doubt it because they all just cater to where the money is anyway they're

00:13:33.000 all the same there's not red white or green or blue or whatever it's all it's all just one color

00:13:39.480 green for them and i don't mean to be so negative but that's the kind of mood i'm in i guess i felt

00:13:44.920 a little bit emotional seeing all these ladies packing up all this jewelry these are ladies 0.99

00:13:51.000 that i've known for 20 years you know buying christmas and birthday presents in that store

00:13:56.760 and i won't be able to do it anymore because it closes tomorrow yeah so sad i mean they

00:14:01.960 they didn't even think it was worth it to hang around until um you know next christmas or

00:14:07.000 whatever it's got to be there well that's one of the things the manager told me and you'll read

00:14:12.280 this in my column torontosun.com is that they actually were hit twice where they had to close

00:14:19.800 during christmas which is where they make their money one of those this is actually a different

00:14:24.360 mall because they've been hit 10 times in total wow in the area so they might close other stores

00:14:29.160 too and just do an online model we haven't talked about that part of it too all that online craze

00:14:35.720 and what it's done to retail um you know and the people uh i see these online ads for things and

00:14:43.080 i think well that looks pretty good someone's handcrafting this and then you see the same

00:14:47.320 person in a different it's like an ai thing you don't even know what's real anymore looks real

00:14:52.840 but it's probably made in offshore somewhere and yet there's this local company from our

00:14:59.460 canadian company from dartmouth that makes its own products it's all sourced here we should be proud

00:15:05.200 of that that shouldn't be closing you know you know i you gotta say mall the hudson when the

00:15:10.740 hudson's bay was there by 380 years or something and now in canada and now it's empty and i see

00:15:17.180 this big empty space there and i think like what the hell happened to this country you know we're

00:15:22.340 losing everything and you know until we've got someone prepared to talk about what's the reason

00:15:28.020 for that how do we fix it sure you got to move forward with technology but it can't only go in

00:15:33.460 mark carney's friends pockets and it can't just be you know for the people that are doing the

00:15:38.360 security where they get to tell you look if you're a woman you better not dress like that like as if 0.87

00:15:43.800 that's their business how somebody dresses or if you're someone's in your house just hide and just 0.98

00:15:49.440 kiss their butt you know and i do think that the tide is kind of changing a little bit people are 0.97

00:15:55.680 starting to fight back and the police are less inclined to charge people for doing that we just 0.99

00:16:01.580 had that incident here where somebody was shot in a house by a legal gun owner and they didn't

00:16:06.680 charge the person so i think the advocacy that we kind of try to do through our platforms does play

00:16:13.500 a role it takes time but you've got to have a free press you've got to have people to say

00:16:18.500 not just what's on the press release that's approved by the people in ottawa but what the

00:16:24.900 regular street person feels in the gut and what they see and they know walking onto a streetcar

00:16:30.340 with people smoking fentanyl you know it's mixed in with the crack they know that's not right and

00:16:36.340 yeah okay that you can't get a police officer for six years to come and help you but it still

00:16:42.020 doesn't make it right no absolutely not joe how do people uh get hold of your stories read your

00:16:47.700 stories and follow you online well i mean i'm on torontosun.com and i'm on twitter

00:16:54.260 you can call me 416-947-2392 um i'm old school you see me say hello if you have a story email

00:17:05.360 it to me jwarmington at postmedia.com you know i don't have ai i don't have a robot i don't have

00:17:12.560 an assistant I just go where the stories are and I try to tell them I can't tell them all but

00:17:18.720 everyone that's really good I eventually get to it and nobody controls what I what I do I make

00:17:25.520 my own decisions and what I write I hope it's resonating for the street because that's where

00:17:30.480 I'm focused on and uh you know that that somebody's got to stick up for the little guy and that's

00:17:36.500 going to be people like you and i and others and you know we can't just let let thing let the

00:17:42.060 country die because uh you know there's too much money for people that for for them to have that

00:17:47.220 happen um i am really really upset about this store closing because for me it's a symbol it's

00:17:54.260 not just the the death of one store you know one goes and many goes there's many stores that are

00:17:59.700 empty in that mall yeah including Hudson Bay it's not okay it's not okay with me and I'm not going

00:18:06.420 to order something online I want to go to the Dartmouth you know Nova Scotia owned company

00:18:12.020 that expanded and is successful and hires all local people here in Mississauga those women

00:18:17.700 are devastated you know they're not going to get another job and why should they have to face some

00:18:22.560 16 year old punk that no one cares you know the whether to to throw the book out to get bail the

00:18:28.840 next day, even if they're caught. And no, they threatened these women. And two occasions,

00:18:35.040 they took women to the back of the store into the back office and tried to take the back there. I 1.00

00:18:41.640 don't like this. I don't like it at all. Not good. Not good. Joe, thank you so much for coming on

00:18:47.640 the show. Fantastic work. Thank you. If you enjoyed this show, consider supporting great

00:18:53.860 independent journalism by becoming a premier member of Juno News. Go to junonews.com backslash

00:19:00.200 straight up. It helps us do what we do. We'll see you next time.

Juno News - March 25, 2026

Robbers STRIKE AGAIN, store forced to shut down in Mississauga

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