Canadian True Crime - The Zaman Family | Season Finale

Episode Date: July 1, 2025

*This is the final episode before our summer slowdown - thanks so much for listening!-----------------ONTARIO - It started with a shocking message in a private chat: “I’ve just slaughtered my entire family.” What was first thought of as a grim joke soon became a frantic race to uncover the truth… and prevent a real-life horror from getting worse.The intention of this episode is to take a look back at a shocking crime, how it impacted the community, and how it might have been prevented. Some names have been changed to respect the privacy of those involved.We want to know what you thought about this season!What cases stuck with you the most? Send us your feedback via www.canadiantruecrime.ca, or find us on Facebook or Instagram.Recommended listening: Casefile Case 50: Jennifer PanCanadian true crime donates monthly to those facing injustice.This month we have donated to Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of CrimeFull list of resources, information sources, credits and music credits:See the page for this episode at www.canadiantruecrime.ca/episodes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Canadian True Crime is a completely independent production funded mainly through advertising. You can listen to Canadian True Crime ad-free and early on Amazon music included with Prime, Apple podcasts, Patreon and Supercast. The podcast often has disturbing content and coarse language. It's not for everyone. Please take care when listening. Hi there, I hope you're well and thank you so much for joining me. The year has flown by and we've reached the end of another season. It was supposed to be 10 episodes and today makes 11. It's your support that makes it possible to keep this podcast sustainable, even if that sometimes means a slightly longer gap between cases, which I know can be frustrating. It's important to us to tell these stories the way they deserve to be told,

and with your support we can hopefully keep making a meaningful impact. So whether you've been listening on the ad-supported feed or if you subscribe to a premium feed to listen without the ads, just thank you for listening. Stay tuned over the summer slowdown for our annual case updates episode and a special project or two. There's a big one coming down the line and we'll be back with the next season in early September. We've covered a diverse range of cases this year so far and I'd love to know which stood out to you the most. The murders of Alfred and Rosemary Pogess in New Jersey was our first series, which began with an invite to a Nova Scotian teenager under false pretenses. The The The The

The The The The The The The The

The The struggled to make sense of it. Then two highly requested cases, the Shedden Massacre, which explored Canadian outlaw biker culture, and the Richardson family murders, a case of adolescent rebellion that became something unimaginably dark and tragic. And most recently was the heartbreaking murder of Minnie Callan in a coastal town in Newfoundland,

and a constable's vow to keep her memory alive. Which case stuck with you the most? We'd love to hear your feedback at canadiantruecrime.ca or via Facebook or Instagram. It'll help us decide what to cover next. Today, we have the final episode of The Season, a haunting case about the devastating consequences of unchecked expectations and lies. This case has been pieced together from court documents and the news archives, most notably the journalism of Mac Lammerow for Vice and Catherine Laidlaw for Toronto Life. Some names have been changed to respect privacy. And with that, it's on with the show.

Late one Saturday night, a man who we'll call Jack decides to message a friend to see if he's okay. They've never actually met in real life, but they're part of a group of online gamer friends that have known each other for years. Jack's friend goes by the handle Menhaz, and he's always active online, chatting, playing games, and frequently checking in with the group, but his account has gone quiet.

So Jack sends Menhaz a private message to casually check in. There's no response at first. But then he receives a reply from the account that stops him in his tracks. I've just slaughtered my entire family. Jack doesn't quite know what to say, but decides to assume it's a joke. A disturbing one, but not real.

Everyone knows Menhaz is a bit of an online troll, an edgelord. He likes to say things for shock value to get a rise out of people. But still, this somehow feels different. Jack is uneasy. He asks Menhaz if he's going to turn himself in, likely hoping that this is where the joke will be revealed. But the account replies, yes of course, I deserve punishment. Even then, Jack wants to believe it's not real. It can't be. He tells Menhaz he's selfish. He should have talked to someone, anyone, before doing something like this.

The Menhaz account agrees, then types, "'It's been my plan for three years.'" The account then posts a photo that appears to show two women lying lifeless on the ground, covered in blood. Jack is taken aback. This is deeply disturbing, but he has no idea what to do. So he reaches out to a group of mutual friends via Discord, a free online platform used by gamers to communicate with each other when they're not actually playing, a kind of green room away from the main event. And in these communities, typically composed of mostly young men, there's always someone

online looking for a challenge. Jack posts the graphic photo of the two women covered in blood and asks if anyone can help with a reverse image search. It's a simple and very handy tool that scans the internet to find out where else a particular image might have appeared. It's through reverse image searches that catfishes are often identified. People who use someone else's photos to create fake online identities, usually to deceive others into emotional or romantic relationships. If the same photo shows up under a different name

or on sketchy dating profiles, it's often a red flag that the person you're talking to isn't who they claim to be. But in this case, the goal is different. Jack hopes they can find the graphic photo elsewhere on the internet, because it'll mean that Menhaz has stolen the photo and is just trolling again, that his family is safe and well. The group scrambles into action, confident they can find the photo.

They upload it to Google Image Search and other apps that perform a reverse image search, but it all comes up blank. They can't find any evidence of the photo on the internet. Then the Menha's account types a new message in the group Discord. I killed Mum and Granny so far, waiting for sister in 5 minutes and Dad in 1 hour. This causes panic among the players. This isn't something that happened, it's an event that was still happening. They have to do something, but what? This isn't something that happened, it's an event that was still happening. They have to do something, but what?

While they've known Menhaz as an online friend for the best part of five years, they have no idea what his real name is. They only have usernames and screen names, not real names or addresses. All they know is what he's told them, that he's Canadian, that he attends university and loves gaming. But they all had gaming in common. They're super fans of a 3D role-playing game called Perfect World with devoted players from all over the globe gathering together in online communities to play, chat about the game

and share details about their lives in general. That's how they met. Jack himself is from Minnesota in the US. He has no idea how to find a fellow gamer in Canada. Which police department would you even call and what would you say? department would you even call and what would you say? Then the Menhaar's account posts another graphic photo. It's similar to the last one except this photo shows a third lifeless woman covered in blood. As the group is reeling in shock, a third photo comes through.

This one is a family photo. There's a middle-aged couple happily cutting a cake together while two adult children look on. Jack recognises the young man at the back as Menhaz. He's posted a couple of real pictures of himself before. The young woman next to him has to be his sister. If Menhaz is to be believed, he's already killed her. He's also killed their mother and grandmother who isn't in the photo.

And he says he's going to kill their father next. In a panic, Jack creates a separate private Discord chat and adds a couple of gamers he knows are smart and trustworthy, several of them from Canada. Everything they know about Menhaz is made up of fragments of information collected over years of online gaming. But if they can work together, they might be able to track down his IP address, a unique string of numbers assigned to every device connected to the internet. They know it won't reveal Menhaz's exact address, but the IP address could help them narrow down his location in Canada to a specific city or region.

And if they can do that that they'll know which local police service to contact and hopefully prevent anyone else from getting hurt. But then the account posts another photo. This time it's an older man and it looks like his throat has been cut. like his throat has been cut. At around the same time, the administrator for the Perfect World Discord server is waking up for the day. We'll call him Maroon and he's living in Israel where it's about 6am local time.

When Maroon gets out of bed, he checks his messages. He's just received a new private Discord message. It says, I've just slaughtered my entire family and will most likely spend the rest of my life in jail if I manage to survive. I hope I made you laugh at one point or another. I hope you remember the good times. I will miss you all." The message is from Menhaz. He's known for sending inappropriate messages, but still. Maroon asks him if he's joking. Menhaz says no and offers to send photos. Maroon can't believe what he's seeing. He says, That's not your family.

The account replies, It is. Maroon asks why he's sending the photos around like this. Menhaz says he wants the images to spread quickly so he gets caught quickly. So this purgatory I'm in ends faster. But more than that, it's a courtesy. Menhaz says he's formed some good bonds with his gamer friends and he doesn't want them to think he'd suddenly disappeared.

He wants them to know what happened. Maroon logs on to the main Discord server and is immediately contacted by Jack, who confirms that it's looking like Menhaz has committed murder. Jack adds Maroon to the separate Discord chat of other players trying to track down the Canadian University student's IP address. By now, Maroon is just one of several other players who have received the same message from Menhaz, saying he killed all four members of his family, his mother, his grandmother, his sister and his father. One of the players asks Menhaz where he is now. The account replies, I'm at home, killed my dad last. The shaking has stopped.

It's now after midnight North American time, technically Sunday morning. Some of the players are still holding out hope that there's a remote possibility this isn't real. But Jack, Maroon and others are convinced that four people are dead. And they're the only people who know, a handful of online friends who don't know each other in real life, scattered across the globe.

One player decides to send Menhaz a private message and outright asks where he lives. The account responds, not yet. Another player asks Menhaz what he plans to do next. The reply says, eat junk food, visit my ex-girlfriend, drink, smoke, I've never drank alcohol or a cigarette. The mention of an ex-girlfriend stops the group cold. Maybe he isn't finished. Maybe he plans to hurt someone else. By this point, there are about 10 members in the private Discord chat working hard to track down an IP address for Menhaz.

They have resigned themselves to the fact that it's probably too late to save his family members but they're determined to prevent him from hurting anyone else. They try the usual options, email history, old forum posts. Tracing someone online isn't straightforward and they know there are limits. If Menhaz is using a VPN or virtual private network, it would be masking his real IP address behind layers of encrypted servers. And even without a VPN, tracing a person's IP address only gives a rough idea of their location,

usually just the city or region, not an exact home address. That's because IP addresses are tied to internet service providers, not specific people. And internet service providers will not give out private information about their clients, unless presented with a valid reason like a court order. But if this group can get lucky and find Menezes IP address it might just be enough to narrow down his location and the police can do the rest. One member locates an IP address linked to Menhaz's Discord account, but it points to New Brunswick.

From the bits and pieces Menhaz has told them about his daily life, they're fairly certain he doesn't live in the Maritimes. It's slow going and there's a lot of troubleshooting involved, as the members check all other accounts Menhaz is known to use to see if there's any information that can help identify him. And then they find something promising. There's an IP address attached to his Skype account that strongly suggests Menhaz lives in the Greater Toronto area. One of the gamers on the search actually lives in Toronto, a female player named Bianca. She knows how big the Greater Toronto area is, how it encompasses the city of Toronto

plus a number of other cities and municipalities, millions of people. They could contact the Toronto police at least, but what would they say? Hi, we're a group of gamers on Discord and one of our friends told us he killed his family. We don't know his real name or where he lives, but we think his IP address might be somewhere in the Greater Toronto area. Go get him. It sounded ridiculous, like the the setup to a bad joke. But for Bianca in Toronto the knowledge that Menhaz was probably in or around her city is extra

motivation to keep digging to see if she can find out anything else about him. As she and the smaller group continue their recon work, the larger discord group tries to keep Menhaz talking, to keep him engaged in the conversation, to keep him at home where he can't hurt anyone else. Then some members start receiving private messages from Menhaz. He tells them that because they're good friends, he wants to send them some money from his PayPal. Quote, I won't need it where I'm going. This sparks a new idea.

Bianca has received PayPal notifications from Menhaz before. So she digs into them to see if there was ever a home address attached to a transaction. And then she sees a street address located in the Greater Toronto area, specifically the city of Markham, located north east of Toronto. The international group of gamers trying to locate Menhaz had spent four hours going from vague suspicion to full-blown crisis mode. But finally they have something real to pass on to the authorities.

By this point, it's about three in the morning in Toronto, Sunday morning. Both Jack and Bianca contact the police and they pass on everything they know about Menhaz, the messages and photos sent from his account, his IP address and what they believed was his home address. The group hopes that the police believe them and take swift action. They feel helpless and wish there was more they could do, but it's out of their hands now. All they can do is wait, nervously, and hope that no one else gets hurt.

There's something about abandoned places that makes the mind wander, the empty halls, the creaking floors, the sense that something or someone is still there. That's exactly where we find ourselves in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment in the hit Audible original series starring Joshua Jackson. And trust me, this chapter will have you questioning everything. Agent Nate Russo is back, and if you know the Oracle series from Audible, you know that means something is very, very wrong, and you're about to be taken on a wild, spine-chilling ride to get to the bottom of it. In Oracle 3, Agent Nate Russo is called to investigate a mysterious death at the Grand View, an eerie, long-abandoned resort on a remote island.

An old group of friends gathered there for a long-awaited reunion, but the trip quickly turned into tragedy. One of them has been found dead. Agent Nate Russo arrives, complete with the unwanted psychic gift he uses to help him solve crime. But his search for the truth quickly unravels into something darker. Was this death an accident? A betrayal? What secrets do these old friends harbor? As Nate digs deeper, he starts to wonder if something sinister and unspeakable might be pulling the strings, something no one is ready to face.

And then there's the performance, Joshua Jackson doesn't just narrate, he inhabits Nate Russo. You can hear the tension in his voice. It's haunting, immersive and impossible to stop listening. In that uncanny stillness, I felt something sucking at me. This horrible pull. I turned helplessly towards whatever it was. There in the darkest and loneliest corner, I saw something only I could have seen." What else is lurking at the Grandview? You can jump straight into Oracle 3 if you haven't listened to the first two, but if you start from the beginning, you'll get a fuller sense of Nate Russo's backstory

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Thanks for supporting Canadian True Crime by listening to these messages from our sponsors. We appreciate it. The gamer who went by Menhaz was actually using his real first name. His full name was Menhaz Zaman and he was 23 years old at the time. His parents were originally from Bangladesh. After they married in the late 1980s, they immigrated to Canada in search of a better life for themselves and the future children they

planned to have. Moniru Zaman was the quiet and reserved one, known as a man of few words but strong principles. He was also deeply devoted to his Muslim faith, according to a 2020 feature in Toronto Life by Catherine Laidlaw. Moni Rooz preferred to dress in traditional Bengali attire, which included long, loose-fitting shirts often made of cotton or silk called Punjabis. His wife, Mamata's Begum, was nine years younger, only about 20 years old when they arrived in Toronto. She was the friendly outgoing one. Mamata's had a warm and generous nature that came in very handy as the couple settled into their new country. At first they lived in Scarborough, an area east of Toronto that had become a hub for newcomers, with established immigrant communities and more affordable housing.

As Mamataz focused on making a home and integrating them socially into the community, Moniruze was the breadwinner, focused on earning money for them to save to set themselves up for the future. It wasn't easy. Canada was heading into a recession when they arrived, but by the mid-1990s, Toronto had rebounded and transformed itself into a bustling, multicultural city with many opportunities on offer. Money Roos had found steady work as a taxi driver and developed a reputation for reliability and a strong work ethic. He worked so much that he was awarded Driver of the Month many times.

He also managed to save a lot of money. Through that and careful budgeting, the Zaman's had enough money in the bank for their first home in Scarborough. Then they were able to purchase two investment properties which they rented out. While Moniru's continued to drive a taxi and save money, Mamutas took care of the property management. After about eight years in Canada, it was time to start a family. Their first child, Menhaz, was born in 1996,

followed by a daughter named Melissa two years later. With Moniru's continuing to work long hours as a cab driver and Mamata's managing the kids, the household and the rental properties, they realised they needed some help. So Mamata's convinced her mother, Feroza, to move over from Bangladesh to help with the children. They continued saving money and by 2006, the family had upgraded to a spacious four-bedroom detached home in Markham. They rented out the basement suite to tenants, another sacrifice they made on their journey towards long-term financial

security because soon they would be paying for university. Moni Rooz and Mamataz Zaman were ambitious and driven, immensely proud of the life they'd built so far. And they were especially proud of their eldest child Menhaz, who was described as a dutiful kid with a boyish, bespeckled face. At school, he was a solid student, someone who showed up, listened and did what he was supposed to. Menhaz spoke quietly and often avoided eye contact. And socially, he kept a low profile. He was shy, reserved, and introverted like his father, a massive homebody.

He never went out with friends and was never seen dating anyone. His mother doted on him. Mamataz often went out of her way to care for her eldest child, reportedly picking him up for lunch each day and making sure she was at his beck and call. Menhaz never caused trouble for his parents and lived up to every expectation.

The Zaman's were deeply invested in their children's future and had high expectations for them. They believed in hard work, discipline, and the power of education to secure a stable career and happy life. It's a common focus in immigrant households. When parents effectively leave everything behind to start over in a new country, often with a new culture, the stakes feel impossibly high. As a taxi driver, Moni Rouse was part of a workforce made up

largely of overworked immigrants, doing the jobs that others thought were undesirable. It's a necessary sacrifice they hope will pay off in the future. But with that there is often some pressure, the weight of unfulfilled dreams projected onto the next generation. For many families that pressure often helps fuel success but it can also create quiet strains that build up at home. Father Moniruze had high hopes for his son to become an engineer. So when Menhaz was accepted into York University's Lassonde School of Engineering, he was thrilled. His wife, Mamataz, proudly regaled everyone she knew with stories of her son's good grades and future plans. Friends would say they started feeling inadequate

about their own children. But while Menhaz was the golden child, his younger sister, Melissa, rebelled. She was bright and ambitious, but also headstrong and far less willing to conform than her brother. Melissa often found herself caught between her family's traditional cultural values while also trying to navigate the realities of teenage life

in a more modern Western country. Her antics sparked regular tension at home. She was once suspended from high school for flipping off a teacher. She was caught drinking alcohol and smoking cannabis as a minor before cannabis was even legal. She also dated people her parents wouldn't approve of behind their back. Melissa fought with her mother about the clothes she wore and her curfew. If she came home late, her father Moniru sometimes hit her, according to Toronto Life. On a couple of occasions he

actually locked her out of the house to teach her a lesson. Occasionally, older brother Menhaz would step in to try and defuse fights with their mother, but if their father was involved, Menhaz stayed right out of it, retreating to his room and disappearing into his computer. Then, Melissa started going out with another boyfriend that Moni Rooz and Momotaz didn't approve of, and they certainly didn't approve when she moved out to live with him. they certainly didn't approve when she moved out to live with him. But it was temporary. Melissa was soon back under the family roof.

Her grades had been excellent all along and the family celebrated once again when she was accepted into a science program at York University. She dreamed of becoming a neurosurgeon. Moni Ruse and Mummataz were so proud of their children. Melissa had a part-time job at a grocery store and was going to become a doctor, and Menhaz was getting excellent grades in his engineering program. All their efforts and hard work were surely paying off. their efforts and hard work were surely paying off.

The summer of 2019 was a season of celebration for the Zaman family. In late June, Moniruze and Mamataz marked their 25th wedding anniversary and hosted two events to celebrate, a casual backyard party and a larger, more formal reception at a local convention center. They beamed as their eldest child Menhaz gave a speech to commemorate the occasion. As a slideshow of family photos played on a screen, Menhaz told the crowd that he was lucky to have been raised by such kind and wonderful parents. It was a symbol of all the Zaman family had accomplished, proof

that they had made the right decision in moving to Canada. But perhaps the biggest celebration was coming up next. Menhaaz was preparing to graduate from York University's Lassonde School of Engineering with his degree, and he'd even been talking about returning to school to get his master's degree after that. Moniruze and Mamataz were of course thrilled, but they weren't looking that far ahead. There was one specific moment they were greatly anticipating, seeing their eldest child cross the stage wearing his academic regalia to receive his diploma. It was something they'd always dreamed about. They had noticed Menhaz had become a bit more withdrawn in recent months. He didn't have a part-time job or a bustling social life like his younger sister, Melissa.

It was totally normal for him to be at home when he wasn't on campus. But Menhaz had gradually stopped eating meals with his family as well. He no longer joined them when they hosted social events. He preferred to stay in his bedroom all the time with his computer and his video games. It's just how he liked to relax. Menhaz's grandmother, Feroza, shook her head when family friends asked what was going on with him, according to Toronto Life. But Moniruze and Mamataz gave their son some grace. He still attended the mosque with his father and he was in the very final stages of an engineering degree after all. They could see light at the end of the tunnel. The graduation ceremony was scheduled for Sunday, July 28th of 2019.

While Menhaz Zaman appeared to be an introverted homebody devoted to his university studies, he actually did have an active social life and a whole personality. It was just online where his family couldn't see. Over the years, Menhaz had become especially active in a 3D multiplayer role-playing game called Perfect World that had built up a cult following online. Players from all over the globe gathered together and when they weren't playing the game they were hanging out on the game's discussion forums and discord groups. That's where all Menhaza's friends were. His in-game character was an elf priest and he had a decent reputation as a player, but in chat he was quite divisive, often dropping hot takes and inappropriate comments to get a rise out of people. It wasn't

uncommon in that crowd. The discord group Menhaz was part of reflected a certain kind of online culture, mostly young men, often anonymous, often pushing boundaries. Dark jokes, edgy memes and offensive language were part of the environment. Menhaz fit right in. In his forum bio, he described himself as the most famous autist in the game, autist being a niche term for a person with autism. There's no evidence he was ever formally diagnosed, but obviously thought it was an appropriate label for himself. Menhaz had been a member of the Perfect World online community since before he finished high school, and for the most part his trolling had been playful, mostly harmless, more annoying

than actually offensive. But in 2019, during his final year of university, his online friends had noticed that his jokes became darker. He suddenly announced that he was no longer a practising Muslim and declared himself to be an atheist. He changed his screen name to Allah, another trolling move. He started ranting about his former religion, complaining that it was not modern enough and arguing with fellow players about it. Eventually, he was told to stop with the disparaging religious talk.

He was offending too many people. That spring, Menhaz messaged one friend to say he was thinking about leaving the game Perfect World. His friend was surprised. Menhaz was the one who gamed the most. He was always online. Where would he go instead? Menhaz told him, Perfect World J jail, gonna kill my parents and go to jail y'all. It seemed like just another weird dark joke. The 23 year old started to mention suicide as well but always in a slightly humorous way. As his personality continued to take a darker turn, his online friends were unsure whether to laugh or be concerned. Menhaz changed his online handle from Allah to subhuman, and then he changed it again. His latest handle was don't deserve life. life. More gallows humor, his friends decided. Clearly he was just putting more effort into finding more and more shocking things to say to troll them. But

when Menhaz started to throw around racial and homophobic slurs, the Discord mods put their foot down. He was temporarily suspended from Discord for violating the platform's content policies. His account went quiet for longer than it should have, and a fellow Perfect World player, Jack, noticed. So the evening of Saturday, July 27th of 2019, Jack sent Menhaz that message to check in. Then the reply came that he'd just slaughtered his family, followed by the graphic photos.

As Jack, Maroon, Bianca and the others in the smaller group tried to track down Menhaz's IP address, the larger Discord group kept him talking so he wouldn't hurt anyone else. They asked him questions about why he did it, why he didn't confide in anyone, why he felt like murder was the only way out. The reply was so casual. Menhaz said he'd been planning to kill his family for three years. He

couldn't have delayed it any longer because Menhaz Zaman had been living a double life and his lies were about to be exposed. The Zaman family believed Menhaz was close to graduating from York University with his engineering degree, but he'd been living a lie. He never attended York. He never studied engineering. He'd been accepted to a much less prestigious career college to study electronics, and he couldn't cope with that. By the end of his first semester,

Menhaz had started skipping classes. By second semester, he was spiralling. As Menhaz explained to his online friends that night, it is here in the second semester I started getting depressed, became an atheist and ultimately created this plan. He dropped out of college before he finished the first year. Now he had nothing going on in his life. No education, no job, no future prospects and the weight of his family's expectations for him. Menhaz had no idea what to do, but he knew he couldn't face his family's disappointment, so he just decided not to tell them. Every morning he would leave the house like any other university student, boarding the bus to campus.

But once he arrived at York, he didn't attend lectures like the others. He wasn't an enrolled student, so he would wander around campus every day But once he arrived at York, he didn't attend lectures like the others. He wasn't an enrolled student, so he would wander around campus aimlessly for hours, and in the afternoons he would head to a nearby gym before catching the bus home again. He allowed his parents to believe he was one day closer to getting his engineering degree. Menhaz's family also had no idea that his core beliefs had shifted. While he continued to attend the mosque with his father, he had been questioning his faith for quite a while. During this time, he told his friends that he'd started dating someone and he longed for a more independent life. But he couldn't bring himself to tell his parents that not only was he not going

to university, but he'd now wasted extra time lying to them about it. They would never forgive him. As time went on, Manhaza's daily routine shifted. He stopped catching the bus all the way to campus. What was the point? The bus route also went past the mall, so he got off there instead. He would sit in the food quarter on a bench, open his laptop and log on to the perfect world universe. That night in July of 2019, he explained to his online game of friends, So for three years I've been telling my parents I go to university when I was actually hanging out at the mall four days a week. But there was a problem approaching, a big one.

The lies Menhaz had told his family about earning an engineering degree had bought him three years. But his story came with an expiration date. There was no avoiding the high profile graduation ceremony scheduled for July 28th. Menhas told his family he was thriving at York, earning top marks at engineering school on a full scholarship.

And because he'd always met his parents' expectations and had never caused them any problems, they believed him without question. But the approaching graduation ceremony marked a hard deadline, the day when Menhaz's entire web of lies and deception would come crashing down. And the fact that his parents were so looking forward to it as a symbol of everything they'd worked and sacrificed for, made it exponentially worse. Menhaz knew the truth.

There would be no degree, no stage, no future. What was supposed to be a joyful day of celebration his parents had been dreaming about for years would certainly unravel into a nightmare of shame and humiliation for him and them. And he couldn't let that happen. Menhaz explained that he didn't want his parents to feel the shame of having a son like him and coming clean was not an option, so he began to fantasize about how he would eliminate the problem. As Menhaz continued to speak to his gamer friends, he had no idea that a small group of them had been communicating separately, tracking his IP address by going through all his various accounts. When

they found what they believed to be his physical address, they contacted the Toronto police. It was around sunrise and they'd been up all night by this point. As they waited and hoped for the police to take action, they continued to keep Manhaas engaged in conversations so that he couldn't leave, asking him questions about his family and why he did what he did. He told them quote, I chose to kill them instead out of cowardice. I believe this is the only life we get. I'm sorry if this makes you upset. Please try to remember the good times. To another friend he admitted, I'm a pathetic coward and a subhuman. I was scared to die and I wanted them to die so that they didn't suffer knowing how much of a pathetic subhuman I was. It's all very selfish. I'm just pathetic. As the hours passed and Sunday morning became Sunday lunchtime, the tired gamers started to wonder if anything was going to happen.

Was what they reported even taken seriously? Would the police do anything about it? Menhaz was still active online, talking occasionally. At one point, he spoke about taking one last group picture of his family. Menhaz mentioned moving the dead bodies of his family members around the house so he could take better photos of them according to later reporting by Mac Lammerow for Vice. The whole conversation was disturbing. Then he sent a final message. Police are here, goodbye. The small Discord group had tracked down

what they believed was Manazza's address through his past PayPal transactions. The Toronto police had certainly taken the call seriously. But they had to try and independently verify the information before they showed up at the house. The Toronto Cybercrime Unit swiftly linked the IP address to Manhaza's internet service provider, who confirmed his physical address. The gamers had gotten it right. Because Markham is in the York region, the Toronto police contacted the York police,

telling them they had received credible information that someone at that address claimed to have killed their family. That Sunday, July 28th, York police arrived at the Zaman home at around 3pm. Ironically, at almost the exact same time a short drive away, York University's graduation ceremony for engineering students was about to begin, the same ceremony Manhaaz had told his family he'd be part of. But he wouldn't be crossing the stage. He was upstairs in his bedroom, watching out the window as police officers approached the house. And they saw him too. Manhaaz came down and opened the front door and was immediately detained while police conducted an initial search of the house. They found a disturbing scene. Inside the house were the bloodied bodies of two older females, one younger female and

one older male. Everything Menhaz had told his online friends was true. Later that day, the news broke that four people had been found dead in a home in Markham and that a 23 year old had been arrested at the scene and charged with four counts of first-degree murder. Bianca, the Toronto gamer who had the idea to check the PayPal transactions, caught the news and felt relieved. A few days later, the Discord group would send screenshots of all the messages they'd received from Menhaz that night to Vice magazine.

But those who knew the Zaman family personally felt anything but relief. As headlines and information spread quickly and photos flashed across TV screens, they tried desperately to reach the family. Calls to Moniru's and Mamata's went unanswered. So concerned relatives and family friends began to arrive in Markham, some driving from locations over an hour away to check in for themselves. They found the home surrounded by yellow police tape and police combing the scene for evidence. They gathered outside the house. It was

only a matter of time before they would learn the true horror of what happened inside it. This episode of Canadian True Crime is sponsored in part by the OCS Summer Pre-Roll Sale. Sometimes when you roll your own joint, things can turn out a little differently than what you expected. Maybe it's a little too loose, maybe it's a little too flimsy, or maybe it's a little too covered in dirt because your best friend distracted you and you dropped it on the ground. There's a million ways to roll a joint wrong, but there's one roll that's always perfect, the pre-roll.

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How's business looking now? Sweat is pouring and so are the installs. Spread the word about your business with podcast ads on Acast. Start today at go.acast.com slash advertise. Almost a year later in September of 2020, Menhaz Zaman pleaded guilty to murdering his parents, sister and grandmother in their home on July 27th, 2019. The court heard that Menhaz had no prior criminal record, and according to an agreed statement of facts, he began thinking about killing his family three years before he followed through.

The reason was simple. The graduation ceremony was going to expose his double life. On July 28th of 2019, his family would discover there was no engineering degree and no university, just lies and wasted years. And Menhaz couldn't bear the thought of his parents discovering that they'd raised a failure. The court heard that on Saturday, July 27th, Menhaz was at home in his bedroom as usual. His father Moniruz and sister Melissa were both working that day and wouldn't be home until much later that night. His mother Mamataz was at home and grandmother Feroza was there as well.

By this point, Feroza had long since moved into her own apartment in Toronto, but she was visiting the family that weekend. After all, it was supposed to be her grandson's graduation on Sunday. When the two women decided to take a nap that Saturday afternoon, Menhaz waited for them to fall asleep and then grabbed a crowbar. It was time to put the plan he'd been thinking about for three years into action. At about 3pm, he attacked his mother, Mom mother Momotaz first by striking her on the head with a crowbar. When the 50-year-old fell to the floor he slit her throat. He then waited for an hour before returning to his 70-year-old grandmother for Rosa. He killed her in the exact same way. grandmother for Rosa. He killed her in the exact same way. It was now about 4 p.m. and Menhaz knew he had a long stretch of time before his father and sister arrived home. Melissa would be finishing

her shift at the grocery store at 11 p.m. and Moniruz was driving his taxi on a long shift that wasn't scheduled to finish until about midnight. So, Menhaz spent all those hours playing video games and napping with the bodies of his mother and grandmother lying in the house. That evening, he received the private Discord message from his gamer friend Jack, checking in. Menhaz replied that he he killed his mother and grandmother, then showed a photo of their bodies lying on the floor, covered in blood. A photo that couldn't be found anywhere else on the internet.

Shortly after that, Menhas ambushed his 21-year-old sister, Melissa, as she arrived home from work shortly after 11 p.m. He also hit her with a crowbar and then slit her throat. He returned to his laptop and posted a new photo showing Melissa's lifeless body, followed by the happy family photo from his parents' 25th wedding anniversary celebration. As panic ensued among his online gamer friends, Menhaz waited for the final member of his family

to return home, his father, Moniruz, the one who held high hopes for his eldest child to become an engineer to get the education he never got. When Monty Roos arrived home Menhaz attacked him with the same crowbar and slit his throat in the same way he did to his other family members. Then he returned to his computer and posted a final photo into the Discord chat of his father's dead body. I just slaughtered my entire family. In the aftermath of the murders of the Zaman family, Weiss reported that some of the people who had tried to alert police were still reeling in shock days after the murders, unable to eat and having trouble sleeping.

Even those who had only exchanged messages with Manhaj during the night and saw the photos he posted were haunted by what they'd seen and by the thought that maybe they could have done more. Members of the Perfect World Discord group rarely spoke about what had happened after that. The server administrator, Maroon, told the Toronto Star that they only wanted Menhaz truly believed that his family dying is better than them meeting his reality, which only existed in his head. At sentencing, Justice Michelle Fuerist said that the word slaughter was as well as the wider community. Words like brutal, cruel and callous don't even begin to convey the enormity of his violence, the judge said. It wasn't just that Menhaz had killed four members of his family,

it was also how he had been treated and treated in the past. convey the enormity of his violence, the judge said. It wasn't just that Menhaz had killed four members of his family. It was also how he did it, methodically, over a span of nine hours, slitting each of their throats in turn. And how, while his mother and grandmother lay dead upstairs, Menhaz spent hours playing video games and napping, apparently untroubled, the judge noted, as he waited for his sister and father to return home from work. Then he killed them in the same way. Because Menhaz pleaded guilty, he wasn't required to provide detailed information about what he did or why he did it,

why he chose to kill his grandmother and sister as well, or what he planned to do afterwards. The judge cited a victim impact statement submitted by members of the extended Zaman family, who described the murdered family members as loving, vibrant and ambitious. They spoke with admiration about how Moniruza and Mamataaz came from Bangladesh and endured many hardships to build a new life in Canada for themselves and a good future for their children. How Faruza moved over to help out and did whatever she could to keep her grandchildren happy, and how Melissa, at just 21 years old, was a shooting star with high aspirations to become a neurosurgeon. The family members spoke of being traumatized, betrayed and haunted by what before sentencing, the judge asked Menhaz Zaman by this point 24 years old if he had anything to say.

He did. Quote, have impacted negatively with my actions and especially to the people who knew my family and friends and loved ones who I know could never have seen something like this happening. I'm sorry." In sentencing, Justice Michelle Furist rejected the idea that Menhaz's fear of his lies being exposed could ever explain why he chose to kill his parents, sister and grandmother. There was no justification, no explanation that made sense. And the fact that he saw murder as a reasonable solution in the first place and then acted on it was described as cold, calculating and deeply disturbing. It seemed Menhaz agreed. He had instructed his

defence lawyer to agree with the Crown's suggestion that he be sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 40 years. And that's exactly what he got. Menhaz Zaman was originally charged with four counts of first-degree murder, but as part of his guilty plea, one of those charges was reduced to second-degree murder, which means it was intentional murder, but not necessarily planned in advance. That was the charge related to his mother Mamataz, the first person he killed that day. The Crown explained that if the case had gone to trial, there would have been a legitimate legal question about whether the first murder met the threshold of being deliberate and planned. But there was no question after that. For killing his mother, Mamataz, Menhaz was sentenced to life in prison

with no chance of parole for 15 years. This would be served as a punishment for the murder of his mother, Mamataz, Menhaz was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 15 years. This would be served consecutively with his sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years for the first degree murder of his grandmother, Feroza. With those two sentences added together, Menhaz would serve life in prison with no chance of parole for 40 years. He also received life sentences for the first degree murders of his sister, Melissa, and father, Moniruz. But they would be served concurrently or at the same time as the first two sentences. Menhaz Zaman won't be eligible for parole until the year 2059. He will be 64 years old. Two years later in 2022, the Supreme Court of Canada

released a landmark decision that consecutive parole and eligibility periods were a violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Canada's top court found that life sentences without a realistic possibility of parole leaves offenders with no incentive to rehabilitate themselves. Since this decision, several convicted murderers

have appealed their sentences and had their parole and eligibility periods reduced, including the Quebec mosque shooter, the perpetrator of the Toronto van attack, and Jason Klaus and Joshua Frank in Alberta. There has been no announcement about whether Menhaz Zaman will appeal his own sentence. The case of Menhaz Zaman was eerily similar to another Canadian tragedy that happened in the exact same suburb of Markham, but nine years earlier. It's the Jennifer Pan case. Like Menhaz, Jennifer Pan grew up in an immigrant family under the weight of intense expectations. She lied to her parents about school, about her future, about who she really was, and when the truth threatened to come out, she turned on the

very people who had sacrificed everything for her future. A final, irreversible act of violence carried out within the walls of her family home. If you're not familiar with the case, there's a link in the show notes to listen to Casefile True Crimes' excellent episode. Sorry about the spoilers. While Jennifer Pan tried to cover her tracks and hide her involvement, Menhaz Zaman confessed almost immediately. To some, that's evidence that he wanted to be caught, that he couldn't bear the shame of being exposed,

but also could not live with what he'd done. But the end result was the same. Two families who believed they were on the brink of celebrating their children's success were instead blindsided by lies that had been quietly building for years. Two families left in ruins because their children believed murdering them was a better

option than facing their disappointment. But if there's any small piece of meaning to be salvaged in these cases is that they might serve as a wake-up call. As parents we try our best to raise confident independent kids while carrying the financial and mental load of setting them up for the future. Most of us are juggling full-time work, paying the bills, managing a household, and doing it all while trying to be present and emotionally available. clear rule book. We're just expected to get parenting right in a world that's quick to point fingers but slow to offer real support. And sometimes without realizing it, our expectations can turn into a monster for our children. A standard so high it leaves little room for mistakes or for a young person to admit they're struggling. And in that daily struggle,

we can miss what they actually need most. Connection, understanding and the space to be honest. Cases like these are a reminder to stay truly connected, to ask questions, to check in about how the kids are really doing. What Menhaz Zaman did to his family was on his shoulders alone, but it didn't come out of nowhere. It was years in the making, quietly growing in the cracks that no one wanted to look at too closely. And maybe if someone had known what Menhaz was really going through, things might have been different.

Thanks for listening and once again thank you so much for your support and for your kind messages and comments. I read them all and wish I could reply to more. Please send any feedback you have about which case this year has stuck with you the most to canadiantruecrime.ca or via Facebook or Instagram. We'll be slowing down for the summer but look out for case updates episodes and some other projects I have in the works. If you found this episode compelling, we'd love for you to tell a friend, post on social media or leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts.

Word of mouth really helps. For the full list of resources and anything else you want to know about the podcast, visit CanadianTrueCrime.ca. Canadian True Crime donates monthly to those facing injustice. This month we have donated to the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime. Learn more at crcvc.ca. Audio editing was by Crosby Audio and Eric Crosby voiced the disclaimer. Our senior producer is Lindsay Eldridge and Carol Weinberg is

our script consultant. Research, writing, narration and sound design was by me and the theme songs were composed by We Talk of Dreams. I'll be back later with another Canadian true crime story. See you then. You