A missed opportunity allowed a criminal to become a city’s worst nightmare
If only he had been stopped in 2003 and sentenced for his crimes the public would have been protected from an unassuming serial killer. If only that had been done lives could have been spared.
If only…
Back in 1970, after graduating high school, Bruce McArthur married his high school sweetheart, probably not because he was madly in love with her, certainly not because she was his soulmate, but because he thought that was what was expected of him.
It wasn’t easy to come out as gay back then.
For the next thirty years, they were a married couple, having two children, and living happily as husband and wife. Well, happily-ish.
From the early 1990s, McArthur worked as a salesman promoting the latest underwear fashions throughout northern Ontario, trying to find himself in local bars as well as customers in department stores.
His sheltered upbringing in a small farming town, Woodville near Ontario, wasn’t conducive to coming out as gay. Traveling in his job helped to open his eyes, and finally gave him the courage to admit to his wife that he was gay.
After separating, McArthur left for Toronto feeling freer than ever before, a weight lifted from his shoulders, now able to live his true life as an openly gay man.
The gay district in Toronto was like a new world for him to explore and he frequented it as often as he could, his new lifestyle funded by his new landscaping business. Being somewhat rotund with a white beard and a big belly, he was also a dead ringer for Santa and even got a gig at a local mall for the festive season.
But he also had a not-so-jolly ho ho ho side.
The incident happened in 2001 when he was still relatively new to Toronto, an argument turning very violent one night in the gay district that resulted in McArthur using a metal pipe to beat another patron, badly.
He was barred from the gay district for three years, arrested, and barely escaped a prison sentence in 2003 on the recommendation of a psychological report that evaluated him as being unlikely to commit any further violent attacks. After all, he was a family man, a seemingly upstanding citizen of the community. He had no previous criminal record and no past bad indiscretions to paint him as a bad guy.
So, based on his unblemished history, he was released to commit brutal murders in the not-too-distant future.
This was the point where Toronto’s most prolific serial killer could have been stopped.
Instead, he was freed as a nonviolent offender, someone who was harmless on paper but who was going to embark on a violent murder spree for the next 7 years and slaughter 8 innocent men.
His hunting ground was, surprisingly, the gay district. He would lure unsuspecting lovers back to his apartment, mainly immigrants who would not be reported missing and strangle them using a bar, a rope, and the strength of his burly arms to tighten the noose around their necks until he had squeezed the last drop of life out of them.
He would then have sex with their corpses. And take pictures of each and every one of them.
Like most serial killers, he liked to have mementos so he could relive his crimes at his leisure.
Disposing of the bodies involved dismemberment, callously hacking them into smaller pieces for easier disposal throughout suburban Toronto. What made this possible and for him to do so undetected, was the success of his landscaping business. The gardens of his unsuspecting customers were a perfect cover for him to bury the body parts where they would never be found.
Emboldened, Bruce McArthur continued in this fashion for years, living more than one life, a respected businessman by day, a cheery Santa Clause at Christmas, and a serial killer by night.
And then he made a fatal mistake.
His victims were normally the homeless and recently arrived immigrants who would not be missed. In 2017, he killed Andrew Kinsman, a prominent gay rights activist, someone who was reported missing quickly, his disappearance brought to the attention of the police.
They quickly realized, after opening a missing person file, that there were more disappearances, specifically from the gay district area; a larger task force was immediately formed to investigate further. As they delved deeper, the missing person list lengthening, a person of interest became their prime suspect — Bruce McArthur.
At this time, McArthur was completed unaware of the interest growing around his nighttime activities, of the surveillance tracking his every movement, going about his usual business of stalking gay men to find his next victim.
During the next few months, a video was discovered showing Kinsman entering McArthur’s minivan just before his disappearance, the last time he was seen alive. With this crucial piece of evidence, a search warrant was issued that allowed the police to enter McArthur’s residence.
The search was conducted surreptitiously when he was absent, and it unearthed a treasure trove of incriminating grisly photos of McArthur’s victims, including photos of Andrew Kinsman among them. The officers left the premises undisturbed, keeping it under surveillance until they had an arrest warrant.
Still, McArthur was unaware.
In January 2018, the surveillance team witnessed McArthur enter his home accompanied by another man. It was obvious what was about to happen. They had to act quickly.
Bursting into the apartment, they caught McArthur in the process of taping a black bag around the head of his latest potential victim who was handcuffed to the bed, struggling feebly but still alive.
Several of the officers pounced, forcing him to the ground and handcuffing his hands behind his back; other officers freed his intended victim at the same time.
Six months after the investigation had started, the task force had successfully caught the serial killer who had brought fear to the city of Toronto.
A sigh of relief across the city was followed by one of disbelief when McArthur’s face was plastered across all the newspapers. Many of his customers who recognized him were shocked that such a jolly-looking person, known throughout the city as the Gay Killer, had been their landscaper, had been in and around their homes. They were in for even more of a shock.
The following February, Bruce McArthur faced a judge and the disbelieving stares of a jury for his crimes.
They listened intently as the names of the 8 men he had killed and confessed to killing were read out loud.
They listened along with the homeowners present with horror in their eyes as the prosecution described in detail how he had discarded the dismembered remains of his victims in over 75 properties around Toronto.
They listened with anger when it was pointed out the exact moment when Bruce McArthur could have been imprisoned for a crime years ago that would have seen him locked away from society.
If only he had been sentenced accordingly for the brutal attack he had conducted then.
If he had, lives would have been spared and The Gay Killer would not have been given the freedom to choke the life out of his victims, would not have been free to destroy the lives of brothers, sisters, relatives, and friends.
They were the ones who were left behind to mourn a loved one who had been tragically ripped from their lives in the worst-case scenario imaginable, taken from them and leaving behind a gaping wound that would take years to heal.
Bruce McArthur was sentenced to life in prison for the murders he had committed over a 10-year period.
But if only he had been stopped in 2003.
If only…