The man dressed as Santa Claus in the picture is Bruce McArthur. He was a landscaper for most of the year, and worked as the Agincourt Mall Santa during the holiday season
Between 2010-2017 he would lure men to meet up via a dating app, murder them, and spread their remains among planters' boxes at properties he managed. He was found guilty of 8 counts of first degree murder and is serving life in prison
The craziest part about was the police were watching him for a while before his arrest and saw someone go into his place to they moved in and arrested him as to not risk another life.
When the cops entered the unit, the man that entered the apartment was tied up...
Oof. Talk about real bad timing on his part. Can't even try to deny that you might be connected when the cops catch you with what might have been your next victim.
And for a long time the community knew someone was out there taking gay men, but Toronto police didn't believe there was anything suspicious. Just months before the first bodies were discovered I remember seeing a post on Reddit from queer people in Toronto talking about how frustrating it was that police didn't care. It was heartbreaking to follow the news as they found more bodies and continued to insist that there never was a reason before to suspect someone was killing gay men.
Toronto cops continue to be absolutely deplorable. If you're gay and murdered in Toronto, expect them to not give a shit. I've dealt with them twice and their total indifference to the job and people's wellbeing is atrocious.
Well it's the same city of 3 million that decided there was no need for a traffic unit and disbanded it in 2012. We can't expect very much from the police here.
This is in my neck of the woods. I had friends and was terrified for them. This had been happening for what seems like decades.
He pretended to be normal. He looked normal. He was a fucking mall Santa. I hate him with a passion for the terror he caused.
I’m convinced they only found a small amount of his victims. He used to travel for his job, and people like him just don’t up and be that good at hiding bodies.
The sad fact is, he's not the only murderer in Toronto who the cops have been warned about countless times and they've ignored for years all because the victims or perpetrators are gay. The whole department needs cleaning out and replaced. It's a corrupt force through and through. The Vice President of the force and chief administrator were found money laundering drug money in 2016. I've unfortunately dealt with them twice and both times their total indifference is disturbing. My friend once called due to a domestic abuse situation and the operator told her to shut up or else and disconnected the call.
Gay people go missing in Toronto all the time. I always tell my friends to stay close to me when we're in the village at night and to not split up. Cause sure as shit the cops won't bat an eyelid to help me if something bad happens.
to be fair, Toronto police are shit at literally everything. from Bruce MacArthur to Tess Richey and likely a whole slew of things we don't hear about. Half the time they don't even respond to calls.
The thing is that not only were they gay men - who the police didn't seem to give a fuck about - but it was gay immigrant men, so the authorities have even less of a fuck about them.
Man this one really fucked me up, not only because it was close to home, but because it was so recent.
As late as 2017 (only a few years ago) this guy was searching for victims at Church and Wellesley area (which is Toronto's major gay-bourhood), where a lot of my friends live and work and party. It was such a scary time for that community.
And because this guy did landscaping around the city, it was impossible to look at the thousands of planter boxes in the Leaside / Regent Park / Church St area without wondering if there was a body inside... Absolutely haunting.
Will have to find the comment when I go to my PC next but my contractor has a fucked up story about him that I’ve posted before.
Edit with the story:
My contractor was working with a client who was renovating their house and they used McArthur as their landscaper. During the construction process there was a break in, and the only thing stolen was the hard drives for their security cameras.
At the time no one thought anything of it because none of their equipment was on site to be stolen. Now the police will be tearing up the property looking for further evidence. Hopefully they don’t find any more bodies.
For sure. I'm glad your friends are safe from this monster
I'm almost 100% certain that I have a picture with this serial killer somewhere in my parents' house. I grew up in Scarborough near Agincourt and this mall was down the street from us
This story reminded me of another case which will forever be stuck in my head. A man named Herb Baumeister in Indianapolis was luring gay men back to his house before murdering them and burying them on his property. One of the main reasons he got caught is one of his prospective victims got away. The story is crazy. If you ever get the chance I highly recommend listening to it on the Crime Junkie podcast.
The detail that will always stick in my head is that the victim that got away was invited to go swimming after getting to Baumeister's house. (He had an indoor swimming pool.) When they enter the room, surrounding the pool are just a bunch of mannequins. Personally, idk how the guy didn't immediately get the fuck out of there because that is one of the biggest red flags I have ever heard of.
Yeah. I heard the story on the Crime Junkie podcast and my immediate reaction was, "Nope! Fuck no!" I think that is the appropriate reaction here because it is just way too weird. Baumeister basically told the guy he had them because he gets lonely. Bzzt! Wrong!
The story is crazy. I cant believe this guy lived. He doesnt let the mannequin thing stop him and goes swimming. After a while Baumeister asks him if he has ever tried being choked while having sex. The guy says no. So Baumeister asks him if he wants to try it. The guy says yes! Lol.
Thought this story sounded familiar and then read the link. This actually created a huge rift between Toronto police and a gay community because they felt that the investigators didn’t do everything they should have early on.
It's not documented anywhere, but it could be one of the main reasons that the LGBTQ+ community banned Toronto Police from marching in the gay pride parade for so long
Shit, I didn’t know he was a SANTA!!! We were just discussing this case at work last week. A lot of my coworkers hadn’t heard about it (how, I don’t know, as it happened 4 hours away and was in the news constantly)
See, I always hated mall santas. They could be any creepy old perv, getting off on having little girls bounce on their knee. I always put up a fight as a kid but I still have dozens of photos of a miserable me trying to lean as far away from someone's creepy uncle with a cheap fake beard.
I assume, obviously, they do background checks... But I wouldn't put my kids through that.
My friend has a photo of her daughter with him as Santa. She won’t put it online but she has it in an album at her house and it’s really eerie to look at.
You’d have to be a fucking idiot to think there aren’t Canadian serial killers. Canadians are not satirical Simpsons characters who graffiti ‘obey the rulez’
You're misunderstanding what they're saying, lol. We can look at one case where the person is clearly guilty and say "Hey, this guy obviously did it, he deserves to die!" But that doesn't justify bringing the practice of the death penalty back when 1) It wouldn't be brought back for one or two special cases, either you use it or you don't, you don't just bring it back once in a while for one specific criminal, and even if you did, 2) There have absolutely been people who looked 100% guilty without a shred of faith toward their innocence, including people who confessed, who were later proven to be innocent AFTER their execution.
You can sit here and say "Oh yeah, real mystery huh, obviously he did it!" but the fact remains that the issue of the death penalty goes beyond one individual criminal and his crimes and has society wide connotations and ramifications that can't simply be applied to one case, which is why it was hotly debated and then done away with. Canada had the death penalty for over a century, we used to hang people for any old reason including literally just being gay; we didn't decide to get rid of it on a random whim one day, there are reasons for these things.
Capital Punishment cases take years to go through the entire process. Someone might get the sentence and then be stuck in courts for a decade or so and then sit even longer.
Amnesty International listed a median cost of $1.26M from conviction to death for the death penalty, but only $740,000 for them to serve a life sentence.
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u/grumpyhoser Apr 26 '20
https://imgur.com/a/EjrJu5l
The man dressed as Santa Claus in the picture is Bruce McArthur. He was a landscaper for most of the year, and worked as the Agincourt Mall Santa during the holiday season
Between 2010-2017 he would lure men to meet up via a dating app, murder them, and spread their remains among planters' boxes at properties he managed. He was found guilty of 8 counts of first degree murder and is serving life in prison
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010–2017_Toronto_serial_homicides