Rappers guilty over gunfire at vigil
Judge rejects self-defence claims in 2020 incident where shots were fired toward Highway 401
A judge has convicted two men for recklessly discharging firearms toward Highway 401 while attending a vigil for a slain Toronto rapper, rejecting the claim they were acting in self-defence after a roadside ambush.
“Discharging a firearm into one of Canada’s busiest highways risked harming people, even if no one (on the highway) was harmed. Further, there were approximately 50 people in the parking lot at the time the shooting started,” Superior Court Justice Jane Kelly said, reading her decision Friday.
On June 9, 2020, soon after the funeral and burial of popular rapper Dimarjio Jenkins, who performed as Houdini, mourners were gathered in a parking lot behind a Downsview bar situated immediately north of the westbound lanes of Highway 401, near Highway 400.
Just before 11:30 p.m. a dark sedan pulled onto the highway shoulder, sending attendees running for cover. At the time, Toronto police said the occupants of the car opened fire on the crowd.
In the chaos that followed, and was captured on surveillance video, Traequan Mahoney and Gaddiel Ledinek — tried and convicted separately by the same judge — ran behind a large green dumpster. They, and others, fired in the direction of the 401 where the car had stopped. Both men testified.
Kelly said that while she accepted that Mahoney, himself a popular underground rapper, believed his life was in peril, “there is little evidence to support that the occupants of the car were discharging a firearm or firearms at those attending
at the celebration of life.”
She gave as examples the fact the surveillance footage showed no muzzle flashes in or around the area of the car, and that there was no evidence of bullet strikes on the dumpster. Meanwhile, more than 60 bullet casings were found in the parking lot.
“Although Mr. Mahoney believed that the threat was imminent, the imminence of it certainly diminished when the car moved from the shoulder of the 401 and out of the frame of the video,” Kelly said, reading parts of her 24-page decision.
Further, Mahoney agreed that before he fired the last two of five shots, he looked towards the 401 and he could see that the car was no longer there. “Despite that, he discharged the firearm anyway.”
Kelly said she did not agree with defence counsel Hilary Dudding’s argument that Mahoney had no other means available to respond to the use of force. “The dumpster did provide some protection.”
And the judge said rather than shooting toward the 401, Ledinek could have shot directly into the air — “In my view, his conduct was not reasonable.”
Ledinek himself was shot when he was behind the dumpster and in front of others discharging firearms, showing “that those discharging firearms in and around the dumpster, including Mr. Ledinek, were being reckless to the safety of other persons who were in front of them.”
The judge concluded Ledinek knew there was a risk that his conduct could endanger the life or safety of others “and acted with indifference to that risk. The risk was both substantial and unjustified.”
She also convicted Ledinek of possessing a loaded firearm — rejecting his evidence that he found it on the ground — and failing to comply with a court order not to possess weapons.
Kelly acquitted Mahoney of bringing a firearm to the gathering, which he attended while on bail. He testified he did so because he could not miss the memorial for his best friend and frequent collaborator.
On Friday, Mahoney appeared in a downtown Toronto courtroom in custody. Since his trial in Toronto, Mahoney received a four-year prison sentence after being convicted in Norfolk County of break and enter and robbery with a firearm.
Ledinek, who rapped as G.D., and Mahoney, who performs as Burna Bandz, made music with the same North York collective as Jenkins.
Sentencing for the pair is set for later this year.