Toronto weighs ban on guns, ammo
Toronto is horrified after the shooting Sunday that killed two people and injured 13.
TORONTO — Of all the things people in Toronto are horrified by in the aftermath of the shooting that killed two people and injured 13, this stands out: The man responsible had a handgun.
To mass shooting-weary America — where there are about 300 million guns of all kinds — possession of a handgun might seem commonplace.
But in Toronto, the very idea that someone would have a handgun, much less take it out in public and fire it, is nearly incomprehensible. Now, the City Council is considering a motion urging the federal and provincial government to ban the sale of handguns and handgun ammunition in Canada’s largest city.
“If anything, what’s happened in the United States is what not to do,” said City Councilman Joe Cressy, who was expected to propose the idea of banning handguns and ammunition on Tuesday.
Agreed Toronto Mayor John Tory: “Why does anyone in this city need to have a gun at all?”
It’s unclear how the shooter in Sunday’s tragedy obtained his gun. And officials haven’t discovered a motive for why 29-year-old Faisal Hussain targeted diners enjoying a warm summer night at restaurants and cafes in Toronto’s popular Greektown neighborhood, killing a 10-yearold girl and 18-year-old Reese Fallon. Hussain’s parents said he had suffered from severe mental illness his entire life.
Officials did not identify the 10-year-old or name any of the wounded, who included six women and girls and seven men.
Investigators searched the low income east end apartment that Hussain shared with his parents and siblings on Thorncliffe Park Drive.
Police Chief Mark Saunders said he would not speculate on a motive but did not rule out terrorism.
“We do not know why this has happened yet,” he said. “It’s going to take some time.”
Cressy acknowledged that banning handguns isn’t the only thing Toronto should do to combat gun violence, which is on the rise in the city. Crime prevention programs, helping those released from prison find jobs, mentoring kids and diversion programs are all initiatives that should be beefed up, along with meeting people’s mental health needs, he said.
Even before Sunday’s shooting, city leaders were concerned about an uptick in gun violence that had prompted the Toronto police to deploy dozens of additional officers over the weekend. The city has seen 23 gun homicides so far this year, compared to 16 in the first half of 2017.
Canada overhauled its laws after the country’s worst mass shooting in 1989, when gunman Marc Lepine killed 14 women and himself at Montreal’s Ecole Polytechnique college. It’s now illegal to possess an unregistered handgun or any kind of rapid-fire weapon. Canada also requires training, a personal risk assessment, two references, spousal notification and criminal record checks to obtain a permit.
Canadians have long taken comfort in the peacefulness of their communities and are nervous about anything that might indicate they are moving closer to their American counterparts.
“There isn’t a handgun culture here,” said Toronto resident Alison MacLean, shaking her head and wearing a T-shirt with symbols of a peace sign, a heart and a moose. “Handguns aren’t part of the common discourse.”
Before 2012, about 75 percent of illegal firearms in Canada were trafficked from the United States. By 2017, however, about half originated from domestic sources, said Detective Rob Di Danieli of the Toronto police guns and gangs unit.
Legal Canadian gun owners are selling their weapons illegally, he said.
The allure of a quick sell at a high profit margin is one reason legal owners sell their guns. One man sold 47 guns and made over $100,000 in a five-month period, Di Danieli said.
“A lot of people are so ready to blame the big bad Americans,” said Di Danieli, “but we had our own little problem here.”