Alok Mukherjee is a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Ryerson University. He served as chair of the Toronto Police Services Board from 2005 to 2015, and is the co-author, with journalist Tim Harper, of the forthcoming book, Excessive Force: Toronto's Fight to Reform City Policing.
The handling by the Toronto police of the deaths of Toronto billionaire Barry Sherman and his wife, Honey, raises issues that should concern police forces across the country. The big question is this: Do Canada's police forces treat all murders equally, no matter what the victim's socio-economic, racial, ethnic or Indigenous background, or sexual orientation happens to be?
The public interest demands an answer to this question in order to dispel the possible perception that people in a position of privilege receive better service.
The bodies of Mr. Sherman and his wife were discovered on Dec. 15 by the side of their indoor swimming pool, tied to the poolside railing. It took the Toronto police six weeks to end speculation about the manner of their deaths. In the meantime, the deaths drew international attention. At a press conference last Friday, lead investigator Detective Sergeant Susan Gomes confirmed that this was a double homicide. She said the Shermans were "targeted."
The police are now on the same page as the Sherman family, who had hired a former Toronto police detective to lead a private investigation. The family had insisted from the beginning, based on their own investigation, that these were murders. Early leaks to the media from unnamed police sources had called it a case of murder-suicide.
The Sherman family had shared their dissatisfaction with Toronto Mayor John Tory, a friend, who then personally conveyed their concerns to the police service. Was it appropriate for the mayor, as a member of the police board, to intervene in any way? Regardless of his intent, a communication regarding an ongoing criminal investigation from the most powerful member of the police board could be interpreted as a direction.
Det. Sgt. Gomes has a large team assisting her with this investigation, and it will probably be a long time before there are any conclusive answers. Det. Sgt. Gomes, a 30-year veteran, said that her team had an "endless" list of things to do. This in itself is not surprising, but needs to be looked at in the context that the Toronto Police Service is facing severe resource pressures because, as part of an ambitious modernization plan, there is a three-year moratorium on hiring and promotion, and a greater-than-expected number of police officers and civilians left the organization in 2017.
In the meantime, questions are bound to arise about whether the handling of the Sherman case by police investigators is different from their treatment of other, much less privileged victims and cases. There is a good reason why this should be of concern.
Violent deaths affect families regardless of socio-economic, racial or ethnic backgrounds, whether through murder or other ways. Take the thousands of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, the young Indigenous people who died in Thunder Bay, the murder of black and other racialized youth in Toronto. All remain unresolved. It is a national list – and a national shame. In none of these cases does it appear that the local mayor picked up the phone to convey community and family concerns to the chief of police. Instead, people had to protest and shout their dissatisfaction with police investigations or the lack of clear communications with victims' families. There was no private conversation with a police chief or a police board chair.
Most recently in Toronto, community outcry compelled the police to take the case of several missing gay men seriously. After initially turning a deaf ear to public concerns, the police are now in the midst of a major murder investigation. Failing to get action, the LGBTQ community initiated its own inquiries.
Often, police will claim that these deaths remain unsolved because the communities do not co-operate and assist them in finding evidence and witnesses. The communities do not come forward because of an increasingly worsening level of confidence in the police, due to previous bad experiences.
Politicians and police governors go on about how we need community-based models of policing that enable the police to build good relations at the neighbourhood level. Indeed, this goal is a cornerstone of the Toronto police board's modernization plan. And yet, the fact remains that in 2017, clearance rates of homicides in Toronto – the percentage of murders that have led to an arrest – fell to an all-time low of 41 per cent. Numerous homicides involving victims who were black, poor or from other marginalized backgrounds are going unsolved. They are from families who do not have the means to do their own investigation or the connections to have their frustrations taken to the police brass.
Police boards and police chiefs ought to pay attention to this broader issue. Police boards should frown upon any action by a member that gives the message that some people deserve more consideration than the rest of us.