Woman seen in terrifying video found safe
Police are seeking Jonathan McLennan, 27, after an incident Thursday.
The porthole nighttime view is eerie in itself. Wee hours stillness. Inside the oval of a security camera, a woman wearing a hoodie, small purse slung across her chest, is seen looking fearfully over her shoulder towards a car.
It is 2:50 a.m., Thursday, and this female has been ringing the doorbell of a house on Grasslands Ave.
Depressing the bell would have activated the surveillance system.
And that’s all police had, pretty much.
The chilling scene as it unfolds for 35 seconds:
A man gets out of the vehicle, its lights a glare in the dark. He approaches the porch, strides purposefully up the steps as the female stands there, trapped. He is holding what appears to be a handgun. “Stop!” she says. Inaudible. Male: “Stop?” The female has edged to the left, pursued by the male, both temporarily out of sight. Male: “You *****. “You gonna stop? Slam one in your head right now.
“Yo yo. You think you get in the ***** car right now. Female: “--- I’m like …” They move back within camera range. The man is dragging her down the steps by the hood or by the hair, pulling her towards the vehicle. Male: “Get in the ***** car.” Female: “I think I’m gonna die.” Male: “Good.” Inaudible. Female: “I think uhh …” Male: “Good, good. I’m gonna kill you, you wanna …” Female: “No!” Who is she? Who is he? What is going on, apart from the obvious, a woman manhandled into a car against her will?
York Regional Police finally got at least some of the answers late Friday night — on a tip from the public.
The victim, a 28-year-old woman from Richmond Hill, was located by investigators, although her name has not been released. The suspect remains at large.
“We’ve identified the victim and the suspect,” Const. Andy Pattenden told the Star. “The woman is safe. Our focus now is to find out where this guy is.”
The suspect has been identified as Jonathan McLennan, 27, of Toronto. He is being described as “armed and dangerous.”
Star archives show that McLennan — his photo now on the police website — matches the picture of a Jonathan McLennan who was sought by police in the attempted murder of a man who was shot and pepper-sprayed by three men in July 2014. That victim had been lured to the back of a building in the Keele St. and Wilson Ave. area “under false pretenses.”
It is unclear whether McLennan was charged in that incident.
A Google map view of Grasslands Ave. shows a tidy, peaceful residential neighbourhood in Richmond Hill, lined by trees and typical suburban double-storey houses.
Last place in the world one might imagine a gunpoint abduction taking place, if that’s what this is.
Given the location and the hour, it’s unlikely the woman had come from a great distance to knock on this door. But that’s just speculation. Everything is speculation.
A domestic? A human trafficking situation?
Did the occupants of that corner lot house hear the bell and ignore it? It’s understandable, if so, that someone would not open the door in the middle of the night to a stranger.
The Star was unable to reach the homeowner. But CP24 did. He was shocked by the incident.
“It’s unbelievable that it happened in my neighbourhood,” said John Vuong. “I have no idea who it was that came to the house. So for me, I hope for the safety of the lady. That was very life-threatening.”
He took the video to police Thursday morning.
Investigators worked around the clock to make heads or tails of it. The footage was posted to the York Regional Police website immediately, the public urged to watch and listen carefully, in the hope someone would recognize a voice, a face. Somebody clearly did. “There’s a significant level of violence here,” Pattenden had told the Star earlier in the day. “This woman appears scared for her life.
“It all seems very odd. We don’t know what happened before or what happened afterward.’’
The homeowner, Pattenden emphasized, had “zero” involvement with the incident.
On Friday, police released a second video that shows the car — a dark-coloured SUV — driving away. “We’re not going to get a licence plate number off that video,” said Pattenden.
“We’re particularly interested in dash-cam video from anyone who was driving in the area between 2:45 and 3:00.”
Middle of the night in a sleepy suburb, they weren’t likely to obtain much more useful material.
Nearby residences and businesses, however, may have captured either the woman or the vehicle on surveillance cameras.
Small pieces of a big puzzle and the larger picture is alarming. If the male was this insistent on collecting the female, dragging her away, it’s unlikely he would have let her go free once he became the suspect in a crime.
Pattenden would provide no further details on where the woman was found or what she’s told police about McLennan, the what and why of that creepy early Thursday morning altercation.
If anybody spots McLennan, they are advised not to approach him.
But anyone with information should contact York Regional police at 1-866-876-5423 ext. 7241 or anonymously through CrimeStoppers.