It was after 11 p.m. on a Sunday in September 2023 when police said four young suspects parked their car on Danzig Street, near Morningside Avenue, in Toronto’s east end.
They got out of the vehicle and ran across the street to a nearby parkette, police said. When they made it across the street, police allege they opened fire at two people, sending one of them to hospital with life-threatening injuries.
Two weeks later, at the beginning of October 2023, the victim, who was identified as 21-year-old Joshua Bernard-Reis, died from his injuries and the incident became a homicide investigation.
For months, detectives with Toronto police say they worked to apprehend the four suspects and understand the motive for the brazen shooting.
A 19-year-old man from Markham was arrested and charged with first-degree murder at the beginning of 2024, along with a 16-year-old boy who was charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder.
Then, on Monday, police made another two arrests. A 21-year-old man from Toronto and an 18-year-old male from Brampton also both face first-degree and attempted murder changes.
Get breaking National news
The exact motive for the shooting, however, hasn’t been clearly defined.
Det. Sgt. Brandon Price, with Toronto police’s homicide and missing persons unit, said during a news conference on Thursday that the suspects have alleged links to gang activity in the city. The victim, he said, was not known to police in any way.
- Man accused of killing girlfriend, her father in Halifax was wanted in Toronto shooting
- Men convicted in death of family crossing Manitoba border seek acquittal, new trial
- Family of Menendez brothers meet with district attorney to discuss resentencing
- RCMP seize millions of dollars worth of equipment from alleged chop shop in Alberta
The location of the shooting, at Danzig Street and Morningside Avenue, has been on law enforcement’s radar before and police are considering the possibility the shooting was “randomly targeted.”
“There’s a number of theories that could explain this but Danzig Street has had issues in the past and it seems like there’s a high likelihood that this was a situation where it was a message to the street or something like that because there’s no reason why these two individuals would have been targeted themselves,” Price said.
“They’re not involved in any kind of criminal or gang involvement or anything like this. They’re two hard-working young persons who happen to live on Danzig Street.”
He said the four accused are the individuals police have been searching for in relation to the shooting.
“We believe we have all four shooters,” Price said.
The homicide detective said the people police charged “have affiliations” with a gang and that one working theory is the victims could have been caught in a broader battle.
“We see these kind of incidents over the years where a gang might try and send a message to an opposite gang by shooting an individual in their neighbourhood,” Price said.
“This kind of disgusting targeting of innocent people simply because of a neighbourhood they might live in is just a terrible circumstance. But we do see that type of thing happening sometimes and it appears that this is a possible explanation for this.”
The 18-year-old from Brampton and 21-year-old from Toronto recently arrested were both due to appear in court on Tuesday.
Comments