TPL Crime Update： Gun-for-Hire Networks & Canada's Bail Reform
Episode Stats
Harmful content
Toxicity
4
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Hate speech
17
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Summary
On this week's Crime Update, Chief Mark Pana talks about the tragic shooting of two people in the city's west end, and the ongoing search for a suspect who may have been involved. Also, a manhunt is on the loose for an armed and dangerous suspect who police believe may have shot and injured two people near his elementary school. Finally, a large coyote has been sighted in the area, and there's a report of a large dog with a bloody face.
Transcript
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why why are we these young people doing this you know who are they who's their family who
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are their connections what are what is prompting them to take these actions i i'd like to know
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because quite frankly there's got to be a reason well whether it's psychological whether it's
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social or whether it's criminal like i think we just to say that it happened i guess mike where
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my frustration is coming a little bit i i don't want to do that anymore i don't think the public
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wants to hear that anymore they want to hear okay why is this happening who prompted them to do it
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why did they do where did they get the gun again where are the guns coming from
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Hey there, thank you for joining us. This is tplmedia.ca and tplmedia.ca slash local. Go ahead,
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you can say that 10 times fast. And I'm going to encourage you, by the way, to check out
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whether or not tplmedia.ca slash local has a local version of what we do here.
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And joining me, as he does, to talk about that, Paul Micucci.
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I woke up this morning, and I was raring to go.
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My son, my youngest one, is actually starting summer school.
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I should point out, when you say that, generally speaking,
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people are like oh he's he struggles no he's advancing himself these kids so we jump in the
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car and we actually head to school and i get a call from the office here and they say you're
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late for a conference call which i missed for some reason uh it's early in the march it's like eight
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o'clock so i'm i'm in the car and i'm rolling along i'm on this conference call i get to the
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school and i wave goodbye and just as i wave goodbye i remembered and it just hit me because
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i look forward in the car and there's a bunch of cruisers and there's one of those investigation
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units the the motor homes that they set up uh and i remember the news from late last night that in
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my neighborhood a gentleman actually shot two people and he's on the run armed and dangerous
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right beside my kid's school so so anyways you're on a conference call so i'm on a conference call
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he's be lying across to the football field to meet his buddies probably you know to do whatever
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and quite frankly he's not heading into the school so i said to my wife i put it on mute i
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say do me a favor go get him get him in the bloody school right so you know what what a start to the
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morning that is a that's startling right it's scary and the the whole drive for the next six
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blocks was barricaded off with cruisers trying to triangulate this person who's now uh armed
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and dangerous moving in this community and he shot two people last night shot two people they're in
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a critical condition so let's uh hope for them ah yeah and uh the police uh catch the guy in
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the neighborhood yeah did you check the garage before you left yeah well you know it's funny i
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was out this morning doing some things and it did come across my mind the only thing i came across
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was a bloody coyote who was as big as a freaking uh husky uh running through my front yard i don't
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know where these coyotes are coming from a story for another day but indeed are they getting bigger
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or are they getting bigger well i've heard estimates of 50 000 plus in the gta in the way
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of population there's got to be and this thing looks like a large dog like this is not a small
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animal and it's coming straight through literally i'm standing there and it's coming straight through
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my front yard at full clip yeah it's uh every day more and more sightings and people like right at
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their front doors and stuff they're yeah they're getting less afraid of humans and interacting
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more isn't working well i'm glad you you know what two close misses this morning i'm glad you're here
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Story number one, Toronto police linked dozens of shootings
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You know, we caught sort of a glimpse of this discussion last week
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after the tragic shooting of Constable Mark Pinazato.
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And now as they go deeper into this, chief of police saying,
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yes, in fact, this is a gun for hire network that focuses on using youth.
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right and they're communicating them with them through a social email whatsapp app and uh quite
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frankly it's it's a little crazy because he uh you know police chief demke who i'm a fan of i
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said in other shows i'm like okay we're trying to figure out who is behind this and i'm like okay
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you have all their social now right you must be able to track somewhere where these messages are
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coming from and where the where the monies are being sent to pay them and and so now i'm gonna
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make okay there's got to be a there's got to be a link here and how fast do we move because this
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has to be with everything going on in vancouver and toronto right now this has to be like number
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one or up there in the priority list it's got to be okay we need to cap this because we don't know
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how big this is and how many communications is it like how many people is this how big is the
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message these people are trying to deliver at a time where we have mass crowds from around the
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world and at these games well are you following this ufc story that's breaking actually this
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morning in the u.s no so so this is crazy remember uh freedom 250 you know the ufc 250 right so you
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know they barricaded these people in a park and had them watch the the game on the screen okay
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right there was uh there are uh a group that was trying to uh basically that had snipers and a plan
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to rush the white house and everything and they arrested them this morning it was all over the
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news in the u.s i did see a glimpse of that yeah yeah and i'm like wow this is crazy like that's
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a crazy story and they they wanted to get the crowd rolling uh towards the sniper group that
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they had set up in the park to start shooting certain people and then move towards the white
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house so they wanted to cause a disruption have everyone stampede in a certain way strategically
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shoot people with the snipers and then move towards the white house this is and they're
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I think they've got now six or eight people arrested well so when I'm listening to this
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I'm like okay make that connection yeah I'm trying to figure out like you know how bad are
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these stories we're hearing right now 27 separate incidents thought to be executed through this
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network and now if you had this network of ready to shoot individuals you probably would test them
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out in a couple of places that sent a message before you actually executed what you wanted
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to do with them because i mean 27 separate incidents i'm i'm gonna say we've only got
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stuff. It's very frightening. Very scary stuff.
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a shooting. Saskatoon police say that their guns and
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adds to ongoing concerns about youth involvement
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and violent crime and repeat firearm incidents in canadian cities and where they're sourcing
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their inspiration and firearms so once again police in saskatoon yeah facing similar frightening
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moments yeah again you know the on the last show we went into it the who what why where how so
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that's where i'm kind of i want to break it down now when you hear these incidents why why are
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were these young people doing this you know who are they who's their family who are their connections
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what are what is prompting them to take these actions i i'd like to know because quite frankly
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there's got to be a reason well whether it's psychological whether it's social or whether
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it's criminal like i think we just to say that it happened i guess mike where my frustration is
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coming a little bit i i don't want to do that anymore i don't think the public wants to hear
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that anymore they want to hear okay why is this happening who prompted them to do it why did they
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do where did they get the gun again where are the guns coming from this is the thing it's so wild
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to me they're recruited through encrypted messaging apps yeah how do you recruit how i need to
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understand how are you doing this like what do you why do i get on an encrypted messaging app
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like why all of a sudden do i actually find myself in front of a computer on a map and then i action
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it how's your headspace as a youth to receive a gun okay what's the process we're gonna set we're
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gonna mail you a gun yeah go find a gun at learn to shoot it go online and read this do you already
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have a gun like how like what's the process here to recruit i think it's important that we find this
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out yeah we got to break these down i think it just you know just reporting them in 30 seconds
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and never saying oh that's too bad and going on never hearing about it again i will tell you that
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We reached out to Toronto Police Service this week.
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I think they're very busy this week, of course.
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They've got pretty major things going on here in the city.
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and why are the youth being able to accept it and act on it?
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OPP sees over 40,000 kilograms of contraband tobacco in Six Nations.
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Now, I know people, you're out there buying your cheap smokes.
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The OPP and Six Nations Police, CBSA, and other agencies
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described this as a large-scale illegal tobacco manufacturing operations
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He's smoking in a pipe, like a hygge pipe.
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Oh, I know what you're talking about in the water pipes.
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It's a whole strategy, and you've got to be good at it
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The estimated street value of the tobacco was about $10 million.
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This is a non-Indigenous criminal network.
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So they are doing this, and they're operating on the territory.
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So it behooved the Six Nations police and OPP to take care of this
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It's, you know, it's not safety marked in any way.
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But the fact that it's a non-indigenous criminal network
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like, it funnels money away from the indigenous community
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uh anyway canada border services agency got involved in the investigation and have ramped
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it up to see where the connection to distribution is and they're finding that out now well let's hope
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because it again you know you hear so many issues in the indigenous world uh that require funding
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right now we're hearing water issues again we're hearing a bunch of just disheartening things that
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i thought we'd gotten past you know as far as living conditions and quite frankly you know
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to have the monies not go back to the indigenous people in the proper way right yes it's and you
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know seriously bad it's so funny because uh you know we say okay it was a cigarette manufacturing
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opportunity or whatever tobacco but that's a major historical and uh cultural element of the
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indigenous community they've dealt tobacco yeah to their own community for for many many years
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Try to unravel this one for me if you can, Paul, okay?
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Four individuals charged after an extensive $48 million fraud investigation.
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The Waterloo Regional Police has laid charges against four individuals
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following a lengthy investigation into an alleged fraud scheme
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and the investigators allege that the accused used a network of companies
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and financial transactions to defraud investors, lenders,
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and business partners of approximately $48 million,
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making it the largest financial crime investigation
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home of BlackBerry and all the legendary tech companies.
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white-collar crime, firearms and ammunition distribution business.
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so i guess they go get people to invest in it because they're going to bring guns and ammunition
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and distribute them across the nation you know they have a business plan they go out they issue
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here's the crazy thing they issue 20 000 fraudulent invoices wow so you know oh my god i've sold this
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you know so here are all these invoices 20 000 so they're saying to the lenders we've got all
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this incoming revenue yeah here's our sales sheets here's the money we're making quite frankly
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it's not there uh huge losses so 48 minutes so they do this to the tune of 48 million in losses
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so they make fictitious books i guess they claim itc's from the government they uh you know file
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bankruptcies you know all this stuff anyways they get away with 48 million dollars what will happen
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of it you know it's white collar crime you know we talk about you know just blue collar crime quite
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a bit on the show and whatever but white collar crime it's even worse very seldomly does anyone
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get any uh sentencing or anything of any uh material amount while they have peeled through
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48 million dollars of investor money well and i you know it's sort of uh coming out of covet i i was
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not involved but one of my good friends uh was uh part of an investment structure that had a housing
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business thank goodness i didn't put any money into it but it turned out to be bogus quite frankly
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and there was someone running and took their money
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And the interesting part is the gentleman's actually resurged
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Yeah, so he goes to show you sort of what happens
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but it's disappointing for all those people in waterloo that thought that this was a good business
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plan and back because it does take your faith away and you know investing money and it's hard enough
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nowadays you know you put your money into the stock market you put your money into all these
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different structures and you know you're you're losing it because the market's going up and down
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like a yo-yo based on the next you know conversation that donald trump has with someone in a foreign
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land right you know so where do you take your money you try to put it somewhere where there's
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a business you can see you put into business you can see and this happens right yeah and you know
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to the people who are uh anti-guns and ammunition rest assured 48 million dollars worth of nothing
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occurred in the guns and ammunition business in waterloo now look like it uh this week i think
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the biggest uh fish to fry in canada has been something that has been on the brew in our minds
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for a long time i think that we held the government accountable long enough to see this happen and
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But it looks like we are actually getting bail reform in Canada
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Bill C-14, the federal government passed its bail reform legislation,
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and now it's up to the provinces to make it work.
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So they kind of, we're going to go through this for a minute.
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But I just wanted to highlight some of the things about it.
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They kind of passed the buck now over to the provinces.
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And for most of you know, the criminal offenses in Canada primarily sit with the provincial governments.
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So, and it's in the past, you know, it's been based on the federal government sort of sets the tone and sort of the general policy rules.
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So this piece of legislation had over 80 targeted changes to the criminal code on bail and sentencing.
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and it's going to go into effect 30 days from monday night okay so it's going it's actually
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it's it's in effect yeah so quickly so these are a lot stricter laws just to give you some
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highlights right because i think this is really important um they're making bail harder to get
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for those of q accused of repeat and violent offending by creating new reverse onus rules
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in certain cases meaning the accused must now show they should be released that's pretty
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significant you have to prove your release yeah that's very significant it's like proving your
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innocence before you even have to arrive into court this has got to be this is going to be a
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difficult process for many people to get through right and this is reverse of what it was before
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so before you just had someone show up a bondsman or a family member and say i'll vouch for them
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It directs the police to detain and accuse for all bail hearings
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So the police don't have to just let them go if they're required to.
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It requires courts to consider more factors at bail hearings,
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including whether the allegations involved violence
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So if you just went and did something randomly,
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like you know this this thing in my neighborhood they catch the person they're not going to let
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them out on any type of bail they don't require to prove themselves yeah exactly um so this is so
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we talked about prohibit it prohibits courts from naming anyone as a surety who was convicted of a
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criminal offense in the past 10 years okay so you can't have one of your gang members you can't have
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one of your crime syndicate bail you out so you know the stories we heard about people you know
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the town that had three people that had uh basically uh perpetrated 90 of the crimes
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that won't happen anymore so they're in so funny that you cut that off that that one element of it
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is consistent across the country in smaller to medium-sized cities and towns yes there's
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a consistent four or five people that just keep getting back out exactly now sentencing laws are
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changing too and they're getting tougher it requires consecutive sentences for violent auto
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theft and break and enter so now you get consecutive sentence right so which wasn't there
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requires consecutive sentences for extortion and arson and requires judges to consider consecutive
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offenses for repeat violent offending these are all ticking the boxes of the things we
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really couldn't i and and frankly paul all of those items just seem like a logical logical steps
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to incarcerating violent people right so the interesting part and it got a little bit of you
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know of course the liberals loved it they said you know we finally uh collaborated with the
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provinces and stakeholders to make uh bail reform changes that will have uh rapid structural changes
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The conservatives criticized the bill of not providing or not prioritizing
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public safety enough, advocating for stricter bail measures
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NDP raised concerns about disproportionate impacts on indigenous
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and marginalized communities and emphasis evidence-based community-focused solutions.
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The block questions the bill's effectiveness and warns of potential risk
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to judicial discretion and presumption of innocence now this is an interesting one so
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they do have a point here which is i can see that one a little bit the judicial
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discretion right yeah so what we've done kind of here by changing the sentencing and reversing
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you've now left a bunch of discretionary decisions by provincial judges yes so uh you know you've
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we've been reading a bunch of articles across the nation about how now provinces have to go
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and provide training to their judges who they've appointed
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to make sure that their rulings are consistent across.
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Well, Sean Fraser says that they're putting money behind,
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the federal government's putting money behind updating the judicial community
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So, I mean, the one thing I will say is it gets very specific.
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but what i noticed was it got very specific about how this is to be executed it was
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really specific in many spots yeah no no listen it you said it on the way in when we were talking
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about it the provincial governments want more power yeah so with that demand or with that ass
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becomes the the judgment or responsibility now is on you right so now it's on to the provinces to
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say okay you have the power to do this i've created the the bail reform legislation that
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gives it to you now how do you use it and that's an interesting thing in politics because you know
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watch what you ask for because now when something on the bail side goes awry there's going to be
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fingers pointed at the provinces now so this is a big you know this really quietly on monday night
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went through you know we're at the end of you know legislative sessions and you know everywhere
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everyone's going off for summer and this one goes through now if i sit and i don't do anything and
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this reform is in place it's enacted in 30 days and something bad happens the federal government
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should say well they went away for the summer they didn't put this into place so this is really
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interesting because now oh right all the provinces are scrambling a little saying okay how do i get
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something in place to make sure i don't have a problem and then your issue which you pointed out
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out to me just before the show we're coming back to the show we did months and months ago is where
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do you house these people and what do you do them with them as you're actually waiting for them to
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go on trial right as you're denying bail you're putting them up we don't have the resources so
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now what's that doug oh uh doug ford's uh taking bids right now in private prisons yeah i can see
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that oh oh and daniel smith cut a deal with trump to send you to alcatraz but right now we don't
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really have the facilities to house people yeah we have to have that discussion sooner than later
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and we have to figure out where that budget comes from again with huge budget deficits here we are
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again with the same issue where does the money come with how do we allocate it where does it go
00:24:06.080
who builds it which we've been notoriously slow on building infrastructure as we've talked on
00:24:11.660
the major projects now it's in the provincial hands to do that how can they do that you know
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right now i have to think about you know if i'm in their shoes i have to think about large empty
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buildings that i can actually transform transform uh at least temporarily because i have a holding
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issue right i have a security holding issue that i have to deal with and so now i'm looking around
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saying okay you know which large company is left uh hopefully finding something on the outskirts
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almost an american idea right go you go to the outskirts of major cities into small communities
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you find abandoned warehouses and and homes and farms or whatever you find you you uh renovate
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them you turn them into prisons and quite frankly you barbed wire them you you put fences up and
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we do have a few of those as i made my way through merrickville uh between uh ottawa and
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uh toronto there there's one of those out there and it's like a farm field yeah it looks like a
00:25:11.860
major industrial farm but it's it's actually a prison i uh what about the ev plant i'm just
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making suggestions now it's empty uh by the way i said daniel steel before i meant daniel smith
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just so that we are factually correct uh interesting yeah we'll be curious to see
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where this dives deep and i wonder how policing feels uh how this feels to the policing community
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They've, can you imagine being a police officer
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and you finally get somebody, they get processed and released.
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The catch and release must be devastating for police
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But now, so the interesting thing, in 30 days from now,
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The potato's now in the provincial, you know, it's in their court,
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and they have to figure out what to do with it.
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Take a look at our crime pillar and all of the news pillars that we follow on TPL Media.
00:26:07.600
TPLmedia.ca slash local may just have a localized version of this for you.