Federal minister hints at ‘foreign entities’ behind Toronto shootings as arrest made in consulate probe

Months after the U.S. Consulate was hit with gunfire, Beatrice Vaisman has the details on the two suspects and the alleged ‘gun-for-hire’ connections.

Toronto police say a 19-year-old suspect wanted in connection with a shooting at the U.S. Consulate back in March has now been arrested as new details surface about a wider gun-for-hire probe into a series of shootings in the GTA.

Police confirmed Thursday that Zara Jabbi, the second suspect wanted in connection with the consulate shooting, had been taken into custody.

News of the arrest comes one day after Ruby Sahota, Canada’s Secretary of State for Combatting Crime, suggested “foreign entities” are believed to be behind recent gun-for-hire shootings at synagogues in Toronto.

Police have not confirmed a foreign connection to the shootings, but during a news conference earlier this week, Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw said the suspects in the consulate shooting are among a group of young people who have been recruited into “criminal for hire” networks, where “bad actors” hire individuals through encrypted messaging apps to carry out shootings at various targets, including synagogues and Jewish schools.

In a news release issued Thursday, Toronto police confirmed the arrest of Jabbi, who is facing several charges, including theft of a motor vehicle, possession of property obtained by crime, discharging a restricted or prohibited firearm at a place, and attack on premises of internationally protected persons.

The shooting occurred on March 10 at around 5:30 a.m. at the University Avenue building.

Police allege that a white Honda CR-V was heading west on Dundas Street when the driver turned south onto University Avenue, stopping in front of the consulate.

Two male suspects exited the vehicle, police said, and discharged firearms, damaging glass and the doors of the building. Police also allege that the suspects recorded video of the shooting on their phones. No injuries were reported.

The vehicle they were travelling in, which had been stolen shortly before the shooting, was later found abandoned in Scarborough, police confirmed.

The other suspect in the shooting, identified by police as 18-year-old Sheldon Tracy-Stewart, was previously arrested during the execution of five search warrants in the city on June 11.

Const. Marc Pinizzotto was fatally shot at a fourth-floor apartment building on Martha Eaton Way in North York while executing one of those warrants.

The suspect in the officer’s murder, identified by investigators as 19-year-old Nicholas Bennett, was shot multiple times by another officer who was standing behind Pinizzotto. Bennett, who was hospitalized with critical injuries after the shooting, will face one count of first-degree murder, police said.

Two firearms seized during the June 11 raids have been linked to 27 shooting incidents throughout the GTA, including the consulate shooting, Demkiw said this week.

‘Hired by a foreign entity’

The police chief confirmed that the suspects in the consulate shooting were among a growing group of young people who are being recruited in gun-for-hire schemes.

“What we are dealing with in this case and in other unrelated incidences, including shootings at synagogues and Jewish schools, is a recurring and similar modus operandi and that is criminals for hire,” Demkiw said Tuesday.

“Through encrypted messaging apps, young people are hired to carry out attacks against various targets and in order to get paid, they are required to film their attacks. Who is paying for this? This is what we are trying to determine.”

During a heated exchange with members of the opposition over Bill C-22, Sahota suggested that the recent gun-for-hire synagogue shootings were orchestrated by “foreign entities.”

“Canadians have questions. Victims have questions. The police chiefs have questions as to why it is taken so long for C-22, which was originally C-2, to get through the legislative process,” she said in the House of Commons on Wednesday.

“Mr. Speaker, every day that we wait, more and more victims are created in Canada. Take, for example, the shootings at the synagogues that have just happened recently. Those shooters were paid for hires, hired by a foreign entity.”

She did not offer any more details about what groups are believed to be responsible.

In May, the U.S. Department of Justice linked an Iraqi man accused of orchestrating 18 terror attacks in Europe to the U.S. Consulate shooting in Toronto.

Demkiw noted Thursday that police are still trying to determine exactly who is behind these gun-for-fire networks.

“As far as the organizers and orchestrators in the background, there are multiple dimensions to that,” he said. “That is very much a subject of ongoing investigation.”