Unexpected victim may have revealed Canada's 'Gay Village' serial killer

Contents:

• BCE MCARTHUR: GAY VILLAGE SERIAL KILLER GETS LIFE SENTENCE
• SERIAL KILLER WHO STALKED AND TERRORIZED TORONTO’S GAY VILLAGE SENTENCED TO LIFE
• CRACKG THE TORONTO GAY VILLAGE SERIAL KILLER CASE: HOW BCE MCARTHUR WAS FALLY CGHT
• TORONTO'S GAY VILLAGE MOURNS DJ MURRED MIDTOWN APARTMENT
• UNEXPECTED VICTIM MAY HAVE REVEALED CANADA'S 'GAY VILLAGE' SERIAL KILLER
• “UNVER: THE VILLAGE”: A SERIAL KILLER, TORONTO’S GAY COMMUNY, AND A PODST THAT TRANSCENDS TE CRIME
• SERIAL KILLER DOCERI 'LAST CALL' RECKONS WH NYC'S HISTORY OF ANTI-GAY VLENCE
• MEN KEPT GOG MISSG FROM TORONTO’S GAY VILLAGE — WHY DID POLICE DENY THERE WAS A SERIAL KILLER?
• GAY HISTORY: “UNVER: THE VILLAGE”: A SERIAL KILLER, TORONTO’S GAY COMMUNY, AND A PODST THAT TRANSCENDS TE CRIME

BCE MCARTHUR: GAY VILLAGE SERIAL KILLER GETS LIFE SENTENCE

McArthur will not be eligible for parole before he is source, Toronto Police/BBCImage ptn, Clockwise om upper left: Selim Esen, Andrew Ksman, Majeed Kayhan, Dean Lisowick, Kishna Kumar Kanagaratnam, Abdulbasir Faizi, Skandaraj Navaratnam, Soroh MahmudiMost of his victims had ti to Toronto's Gay Village neighbourhood, as did McArthur were Selim Esen, Andrew Ksman, Majeed Kayhan, Dean Lisowick, Kishna Kumar Kanagaratnam, Abdulbasir Faizi, Skandaraj Navaratnam and Soroh Mahmudi.

For years, members of Toronto’s gay muny warned that there was a serial killer on the loose, that vulnerable men were gog missg, that the streets were not safe.

He plead guilty last a sentencg hearg that end Tuday, Canadians heard how he lured and murred men he met  Toronto’s Gay Village, then posed rps stum, keepg pictur of each victim labeled digal learned McArthur was stopped when police raid his home, fdg a man tied to a bed.

SERIAL KILLER WHO STALKED AND TERRORIZED TORONTO’S GAY VILLAGE SENTENCED TO LIFE

He was a potential nth victim, the urt heard, and McArthur had a folr a cy that pris self on beg gay-iendly and welg to new Canadians, McArthur sought out men margalized by their sexualy, ethnicy, immigratn stat or poverty.

CRACKG THE TORONTO GAY VILLAGE SERIAL KILLER CASE: HOW BCE MCARTHUR WAS FALLY CGHT

Some have argued that the police rponse was slowed by homophobia and racism — that the force might have acted more quickly if different men had disappeared.

Over the next three years, three more men lked to the cy’s gay neighborhood vanished, cludg Soroh Mahmudi, 50, Kishna Kumar Kanagaratnam, 37, and Dean Lisowick, 47. As officials Canada tried to track down a serial killer who targeted gay men Toronto’s Village, they were thrown off by a post on a nnibalism fantasy fom. Jt 22 years after clash wh police outsi the Stonewall Inn Greenwich Village opened a promisg new ont the ongog fight for LGBTQ+ rights, AIDS was cimatg the queer muny and hate crim were on the rise, no small part due to the tragilly wispread misperceptn of the vis as a gay disease and lack of unrstandg about how was transmted.

TORONTO'S GAY VILLAGE MOURNS DJ MURRED MIDTOWN APARTMENT

Last Call: When a Killer Stalked Queer New York, a four-part HBO seri premierg July 9, lv to the grisly murrs and a not-so-distant past when blatant homophobia was still the norm and queer bars, as one activist puts the show, "were one of the few plac the muny where we uld e and feel safe.

UNEXPECTED VICTIM MAY HAVE REVEALED CANADA'S 'GAY VILLAGE' SERIAL KILLER

"And even then, adds Bea Hanson, who served as a liaison between the NYC Gay & Lbian Anti-Vlence Project and police, "There was always this sort of 'you've got to watch your back at the same time too' sort of feelg. Tony Brooks, a 26-year-old ndidate for cy uncil at the time, told police he and Anrson had gone to Manhattan together the night of May 3 to attend a fundraiser at the Central Park Wt home of Robert Browne, a proment gay rights activist.

“UNVER: THE VILLAGE”: A SERIAL KILLER, TORONTO’S GAY COMMUNY, AND A PODST THAT TRANSCENDS TE CRIME

"Sometim he went for male pannship, " rells former New Jersey State Police Detective Nick Theodos, who not the seri that Mulhy's murr was the first se that brought him to close ntact wh the gay muny. Sakara, an openly gay 56-year-old who equented the Five Oaks piano bar the Wt Village, where he was last seen alive on July 30, 1993, acrdg to vtigators. Homici tectiv believe a well-known DJ Toronto's Gay Village, who was found ad wh obv signs of trma after a fire a midtown apartment buildg early Thursday morng, did not know his killer.

"There's a part of me that says Bce wanted to get ught bee he broke that pattern of preyg on the vulnerable, " said Haran Vijayanathan, a muny activist and the executive director of the Alliance for South Asian AIDS Preventn set up a special task force to look to the disappearanc of men the "Gay Village" area of Toronto shortly after Ksman went missg. Friends said McArthur employed and had a sexual relatnship wh Navaratnam, who was last seen 2010 leavg Zipperz, a now-closed gay bar.

SERIAL KILLER DOCERI 'LAST CALL' RECKONS WH NYC'S HISTORY OF ANTI-GAY VLENCE

Tryg to terme why, his Mlim fay accsed his puter and was shocked to disver he had been secretly gog to bathho the Gay Village and was on gay datg apps for olr and large men wh nam such as "SilverDaddi" and "Bear411" — s police later lked to McArthur as they then went to police, officers suggted he had probably jt left, the relative said. In what beme the largt forensic vtigatn Toronto police history, officers found the remas of eight men Fraser’s planters and a nearby Febary, McArthur, sixty-seven, was nvicted, a Toronto crimal urt, of killg those eight men, all of them gay and six of them immigrant men of lor, between 2010 and 2017.

MEN KEPT GOG MISSG FROM TORONTO’S GAY VILLAGE — WHY DID POLICE DENY THERE WAS A SERIAL KILLER?

It also reopened another, possibly related, set of mysteri, which “go back s, to a time when beg gay meant beg a target; to when the muny had to fend self, bee police wouldn’t; when the closet was, for many, jt a safer choice than g out; to a time when queer people were wdg up ad and their killers were gettg away wh . The re that Lg brgs to the story elevat beyond te crime; what’s beg unvered isn’t a culpr but a se of that history is Toronto’s Gay Village.

GAY HISTORY: “UNVER: THE VILLAGE”: A SERIAL KILLER, TORONTO’S GAY COMMUNY, AND A PODST THAT TRANSCENDS TE CRIME

In the third episo, Lg tak the narrative on a sharp turn—back to ld-se mysteri that he mentned at the begng of the seri and the tortured history between police and the gay muny Toronto.