The Star said that initially the police had said that gang ties were suspected in the killings which shocked Toronto but they later changed this position to say that the shooting appeared to be as a result of a private grouse between Christopher Husbands and Ahmed Hassan, the man who died.
A report in Friday’s edition of the Star said that new details have come to light that Husbands, Hassan and one of the six victims belonged to a crew from Regent Park called Sic Thugs. Hassan is believed to have stabbed Husbands months earlier.
Asked the Star “And if this was the retaliatory act of an indignant gang member seeking to restore his honour — committed brazenly in a public place, where innocent people were injured — aren’t those the hallmarks of gang violence?”
“Research suggests that, compared to non-gang violence, gang violence is more likely to occur in public spaces, involve weapons (especially firearms) and involve multiple victims (and) . . . more likely to result in the victimization of innocent bystanders,” the Star quoted a 2010 report called Youth Gangs and Violence, written by University of Toronto criminologist Scot Wortley for the federal Department of Justice as saying.
A leading Canadian gang expert, Wortley was among those who took note of the shift in the language used by police in the Eaton Centre case, the Star said.
If media reports are accurate, “clearly a rift developed” between the alleged shooter and victim and “it almost had to have been gang-involved or at the very least part of gang culture,” Wortley told the Star.
It said that debate continues on how to identify and define gang-related crime and violence.
