Stories of Murder in Toronto's Gay Village
On Tuesday, November 28, 1978, Duncan Robinson failed to turn up for work for the second day in a row. His sister, Catherine, asked police to check on him. Officers forced their way into his apartment on Vaughan Rd. and found his body in the bedroom. Toronto police records give the time of the call … Read more
Early on Monday, September 18, 1978, Gerald Douglas White was found in a pool of blood in a 15th-floor apartment on Rosehill Avenue in Toronto. The apartment belonged to a friend who was away on holiday. White had been looking after it, the Toronto Sun reported, visiting every day to check the security and feed … Read more
Early on the morning of Sunday, August 27, 1978, in an apartment on St. Joseph Street, a man who had fallen asleep woke to find his room-mate unconscious and bleeding from a head injury. The injured man was Colin Nicholson, 41. That was how the Toronto Star told it after he died. The evening had … Read more
On Thursday, December 15, 1977, Neil Wilkinson’s employer called Metro Toronto police. He worked the midnight-to-8 a.m. shift at the Royal Bank, and he had not been to work for four days. Calls to his home had gone unanswered. Police went to his second-floor apartment on Charles St. E., near Church St. They found him … Read more
At about 9:40 a.m. on Tuesday, January 25, 1977, Toronto police answered a call to check an address at 141 Erskine Avenue. A young bank employee had not come to work, and the apartment superintendent had been asked to look in on him. Police found Brian Latocki dead in his bedroom. He was nude and … 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 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
On Wednesday, July 17, 1963, a black convertible carrying two youths went through a police speed trap on Lake Shore Boulevard West. Constable Grenville Dawkins chased it through Long Branch. He later testified that he was suspicious of the car. The driver turned onto a side street, pulled the keys from the ignition and ran. … Read more
At about two in the morning on Wednesday, July 27, 1949, three visitors from Montreal were walking along the boardwalk at Kew Beach, looking for shelter for the night. Ralph Cragg was with Marion Nelson and her brother Herbert. They came upon a man lying motionless by the boardwalk. A young man stepped out of … Read more