Toronto police have arrested a 31-year-old man in connection with the fatal stabbing of a 28-year-old man outside a home near York University in Toronto early Tuesday morning.
Police responded to the scene at The Village at York University near Assiniboine Road and Boake Street around 1 a.m. and located a male with stab wounds.
The man, identified as Alpe Efe, was rushed to hospital without vital signs and was later pronounced dead.
Police say both men knew each other and the investigation is ongoing. The suspect was identified late Tuesday evening as Alijan Khan of Toronto and faces a charge of second-degree murder.
Police told Global News the victim is not a student at York University.
An area resident told Global News the stabbing took place at a rooming house after an argument broke out.
“It’s been going on for a couple of nights. Tonight for some reason they got into a physical fight and after a while I heard someone do something and then it went really quiet,” Fateh Sandhu said.
A neighbour across the street said one of the occupants of the home told him the argument was over religious views.
“I guess one might not have liked the others opinion or maybe didn’t want to be convinced of something,” Tevin Bramble said.
“And then it got to a point where one person left, went to a house, came back and after that moment he said it got quiet, like everybody was chilling. Everything calmed down and then that’s when the guy ended up swinging and stabbing the other man.”
Another area resident said she too overheard a heated discussion outdoors.
“I heard one guy say, ‘Oh no. It’s because you’re Arabic,’ and the other guy was like, ‘No. It’s not. It’s your people,'” Megan Griffith said. “It’s started out as a normal conversation and then it got really heated about religion. But I can’t tell you exactly what they were saying.”