News Release

The Director of the Special Investigations Unit, Joseph Martino, has found no reasonable grounds to believe that a Toronto Police Service (TPS) officer committed a criminal offence in connection with the arrest and injury of a 24-year-old man in January.

In the evening January 23, 2022, TPS officers were dispatched to a convenience store on Kipling Avenue to investigate a report of a man pulling a knife while stealing cigarettes. Travelling on Kipling Avenue, two officers located a man on foot who fit the description of the robbery suspect. They followed the man as he turned east onto Warnica Avenue and made his way onto a driveway. The officers came to a stop, exited their cruiser, and confronted the man at gunpoint. At their direction, the man raised his hands and lowered himself onto his knees. The officers took hold of the man’s upper body and forced him fully onto the ground. With the man on his back, one of the officers punched him in the abdomen several times before he and the other officers rolled him over into a prone position. The man was ordered to bring his arms behind his back and then struck when he failed to promptly do so. The man was handcuffed behind the back. He was transported to hospital where he was diagnosed with a fractured nose.

With respect to the force used against the man, while perhaps at the upper end of what was reasonably necessary, Director Martino was not satisfied that it fell afoul of the limits prescribed by law. As there was no basis for proceeding with criminal charges in this case, the file has been closed.

 

Full Director’s Report (with Incident Narrative, Evidence, and Analysis & Director’s Decision): https://www.siu.on.ca/en/directors_reports.php.