Stories of Murder in Toronto's Gay Village
On October 9, 1976, friends went to the Prince Arthur Avenue apartment of Hugh Thomas Armstrong after he failed to show up for work. The Toronto Sun reported that they found his body on the bedroom floor, in a bathrobe. The Globe and Mail reported that he lay face down and that the apartment had … Read more
On the morning of Monday, September 20, 1976, John Fretz, the superintendent at 262 Jarvis Street, went into a sixth-floor apartment. Another tenant had complained that its door had been open since Sunday. It was unlocked. Inside was the nude body of the man who lived there, James Stewart Kennedy. “When I found him he … Read more
On the afternoon of Saturday, September 4, 1976, a man from Cooksville was walking through the bush near Enterprise Hill, looking for mushrooms. The spot was on the east side of Highway 115, north of Newcastle and about 60 miles east of Toronto. He came upon two garbage bags and ripped one open. Then he … Read more
In Canada, until 1961, all “murder” convictions resulted in the sentence of execution. Murder was then divided into non-capital and capital murder, but still included the death penalty. On July 26, 1976, Canada formally abolished the death penalty from the Criminal Code, when the House of Commons narrowly passed Bill C-84.
On the morning of Wednesday, February 11, 1976, a young man went to a rented bungalow on Elmhurst Avenue in Willowdale. He had lived in the house himself until about seven months earlier. He found James Douglas Taylor dead in the bedroom. The Toronto Police Service file records a call at about 10:20 a.m., and … Read more
At about 8:50 on the evening of Saturday, December 20, 1975, police responded to a 911 call at the St. Charles Tavern, 484 Yonge Street. The Toronto Police Service recorded that the victim was inside the tavern, suffering from blunt trauma. Homicide detectives later told the Toronto Star that he had been found in the … Read more
At 3:43 a.m. on Tuesday, February 18, 1975, Toronto police headquarters took an emergency call. The caller, a man, would not give his name. He said there was “trouble” at 286 Borden St., near Bloor Street West. Police later traced the call to a phone booth about a mile away. A squad car went to … Read more
On June 27, 1969, the federal government enacted the Criminal Law Amendment Act (also known as Bill C-150) which decriminalized homosexuality, meaning you could no longer be arrested and jailed for being queer in Canada.
Early on Sunday, June 15, 1969, a man’s body was found in a parking lot on Eastern Avenue. He lay between a parked car and a truck, behind an auto lubricating firm at Eastern and Empire Avenues. He had been struck repeatedly on the face and head. The lot was part of a block owned … Read more
On Saturday, July 15, 1967, a farmer named Antonio De Freitas found a body in one of his fields near Markham. It was a young man, naked, lying in grass three feet high. The coroner, Dr. Ralph Johns, examined the body where it lay. He said the death “might well be a murder,” the Globe … Read more
On May 15, 1968, a man ploughing a field near Schomberg, Ontario, found a human skeleton lying against a wire fence in a hedgerow. The spot was on the west side of Sideroad 17 in Tecumseth Township, about two kilometres north of Highway 9. The Ontario Provincial Police later described what was there. The body … Read more
Shortly after midnight on Sunday, June 25, 1967, people living in the apartment building at 100 Maitland Street heard a man yelling. The sound came from the 10th floor, through an open door to a balcony. Police later said at least half a dozen people heard him. No one phoned the police. At about 12:45 … Read more
On Sunday, December 17, 1967, Donald Alton was driving a sideroad by Balsam Lake Provincial Park, near Coboconk, when he saw a partridge. He stopped the car, climbed a fence and followed the bird’s tracks through the snow. About 40 feet from the road, on a bare patch of ground, he found bones. A pair … Read more
At about 10 a.m. on Friday, January 20, 1967, Toronto police answered an emergency call to a rooming house at 103 Hamilton Street, near Broadview Avenue and Dundas Street. A fellow roomer had found Bruno Max Seidel dead in his room. Police at first thought the three knife wounds in his chest were self-inflicted, the … Read more
At 1:40 p.m. on Sunday, July 17, 1966, a room clerk at the Walsingham Hotel, 321 Jarvis Street, found a body in Room 114. The room was at the end of a corridor at the back of the hotel, near the rear exit. The Globe and Mail reported that the dead man was nude and … Read more