The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio) - What Becomes of Cases Tied to Corrupt Officers?

Episode Date: May 7, 2026

When police officers are charged with alleged corruption, what happens to the cases they worked on? We examine how those investigations are reviewed and what it means for past prosecutions when an officer's conduct is called into question. Then, former Toronto homicide detective Hank Idsinga, who investigated more than 80 murder cases, joins us to reflect on the realities of policing, accountability, and trust in the justice system.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hi, I'm Nam Kiwanuka, host and producer of mistreated, a podcast on women's health. There just hasn't been a lot of money put into researching women's health issues. If women are in pain, it's hysteria, it's an emotional issue. And this is what you see consistently. Women's health is not taken seriously. How did we get here? Find us wherever you get your podcasts, and be sure to check out the video version of the show on the TVO Today YouTube channel. Hope to see you then. It was the biggest police corruption case in Toronto history. In 2012, five officers with the city's drug squad were convicted of attempting to obstruct justice.

It was all related to a warrantless search of a heroin dealer. They went all the way to the Supreme Court where their appeal was eventually rejected. But the consequences stretched way beyond those five officers. Because of this, more than 200 drug cases were tossed out. And that's because allegations of police misconduct have. have a ripple effect on other prosecutions. So what does that mean for probes like Project South? That's the current investigation into corruption

and organized crime ties involving police officers. We dig into what happens to their other cases when officers are charged with crimes. Then, he was with the Toronto Police for 34 years and served as commander of the homicide unit. He dealt with cases like Sarah Killer Bruce MacArthur. We talked to Hank Insinga about his career and his new memoir,

and its allegations about anti-Semitism and racism on the force. Welcome to the rundown. When cops are charged with crimes, the cases they've worked come under scrutiny. So what do police corruption probes mean for ongoing prosecutions? Leslie Pasquino is president of the Ontario Crown Attorney's Association. Adam Wiseberg is president of the Criminal Lawyers Association, and they join us both in studio.

Great to have you both here. Thank you so much. Thanks for having us. Adam, when there are allegations of corruption against an officer that's involved in various cases, what are the next steps for a criminal defense lawyer? So thankfully, in Toronto or Ontario, it hasn't come up that much in my career. Thankfully, obviously there's some recent high-profile allegations that are out there right now. The first thing we would do if we were aware that an officer was facing such charges on one of our cases, is start seeking disclosure.

That would be the first step. And the Crown also has an obligation as well if they are aware that a witness on their case has outstanding charges or has convictions related to corruption. And I'll let Leslie explain what their obligation is. Help me understand. There's something called the McNeil Report.

A McNeil Report is a report that will set out allegations of police misconduct and details of police misconduct. So what happens is if I am prosecuting a case and one of my investigating officers or an officer who's going to be a witness or a key part of the case has allegations of misconduct against them, that information will be given to me, provided to me in a McNeil report. I have a duty to disclose. Also, if I find out about allegations of misconduct as the Crown attorney, I have a duty to make reasonable. inquiries and I don't have the luxury of waiting until criminal charges or an internal

investigation have been resolved. Those misconduct allegations can be being investigated and while that's going on I still have to provide disclosure to Adam as that's happening and that will cause me to have to reassess my case continually throughout. All right. As much as we trust the Crown attorneys to do their job, whether they're federal or provincial prosecutors and disclose McNeil reports. When something hits the news where you know there's corruption charges, the officers are named. Defense lawyers are going to be very careful to check through the disclosure, make sure those officers aren't involved in their cases. And if they are, my office anyway, would be very proactive in seeking disclosure and probably seeking more disclosure than

just the McNeil report. Leslie, help us understand. We're going to take a step back away from sort of these allegations of corruption cases. But how do you, as a Crown Attorney, decide whether or not to prosecute an accused? First of all, you have to understand the role of a Crown. A role of a Crown is independent. We're independent ministers of justice, and our role is quasi-judicial. And the reason our role is quasi-judicial is because we make decisions whether or not to proceed with a case long before it ever gets to trial, long before it ever goes to a jury. If every charge that was laid ended up in a trial, the system would collapse. Doesn't have the capacity.

So when the police, it's like a law and order episode, the police investigate, they gather the evidence, and then they provide it to the crown. And independently of the police, and that's a separation that's really important for the judicial system, independently of the police, the crown will then review to see whether there's a reasonable prospect of conviction and it's in the public interest. So when there are corruption charges that impact may be key investigative officers or key witnesses, that will obviously impact our assessment. Adam, some of these allegations that we have been hearing, these officers have had pretty long careers. If we're talking about some current ones or we're talking in the past. So I am curious, are all the cases that are touched by an officer in a corruption allegations affected? That's going to be a Crown Attorney's assessment.

Obviously, we would be pushing for disclosure and pushing to get more facts and more information. What the Crown Attorney is going to have to do is assess whether or not their credibility is an issue on something that's material or relevant to the case. So, for example, I would suspect that most cases wouldn't be impacted where there's a civilian witness that is, say, for example, the complainant or the key alleged victim in a case. where an officer maybe, you know, has a tangential relationship in the case or guards a scene. So it's really going to depend on the officer's role that's facing the corruption allegations as to how the Crown assesses whether or not that affects their reasonable prospect of conviction. And what we mean by that is the Crown Attorney has to assess, will this case potentially be successful if I go to trial?

And if you have an allegation of an officer being corrupt and they fulfill a key, key role where their credibility is an issue on a key piece of the case that the Crown needs to prove, that's likely going to end the case in a lot of circumstances. Leslie, I want to look at a case that's more than 20 years old. From 2004, at the time, five officers at the Toronto Police Service Drug Squad were charged with various allegations, including illegally searching homes of alleged drug dealers and falsifying records to cover it up, among others. Five of the officers were convicted of attempting to obstruct justice.

three of those were also convicted of perjury. You're well acquainted with this case, of course. Would a case like that affect the criminal cases that these officers may have previously been involved with? It may. So, as Adam said, it really depends on the role the officer had in that other case. So if they were guarding the perimeter at 3 o'clock in the morning

of a scene of a crime, never touched any evidence, Never spoke to any witnesses really didn't get involved in the investigation. Probably not. But if they were the lead investigator who recovered key evidence, for example, on a gun possession case, if they're the investigator who executed a search warrant, found a gun, and their testimony is crucial at the trial, they're the person who's going to testify, they found a gun in X place. Beside the passport of the accused.

the passport of the Q's right. That's always helpful. Then that may the misconduct, dishonesty, corruption, allegations will obviously have an impact on their credibility. And so as the Crown, I would have to take a very close look at that. Even though there's huge public interest in keeping guns off the street and public safety, you also have to balance that against whether it would still be a fair trial. and the reputation of the justice system. These decisions are decisions. Crowns make every single day hundreds of times.

They have hundreds of cases, and they're really difficult decisions to make. Is there an opportunity for cases that are, you know, convictions have already happened? Could those be opened up versus, is it easier for something that's in pretrial or, you know, only a few years that a conviction

has been placed? It could happen. There's a period within which appeals can be brought, But, I mean, probably Adams better able to address that than I am when the defense counsel would consider trying to launch an appeal to get a case reopened. So that would be a lot more difficult than a case that's already in the system where that's working through. Once a person's found guilty, you generally have 30 days to launch an appeal. If you found out that an officer that was key to your case that had credibility issues later came up, you could potentially try to advance an appeal, but it would be very difficult.

And the reason why it would be difficult is a couple things. There is an interest in finality in cases. So in order to reopen the case, get the extension, then you'd have to file something called fresh evidence. And I don't want to overcomplicate things for your audience. but you'd have this fresh evidence of this corruption for the officers. So you'd have to show that even if you're duly diligent, you couldn't have discovered it at the time, that it'll impact the case, that it potentially could change the verdict.

And then you're going to have to show that there was potentially, in most cases, a miscarriage of justice. So you're going to have to tie that corruption or those allegations in some meaningful way to your case. And I would suspect it would be very difficult. There's a couple cases I've read in British Columbia. where this type of issue is raised and the defense lawyers or the appellant wasn't successful because it's really difficult.

It's much better if you catch it while the case is going, much more complicated and difficult if there's already been a conviction. Not impossible, but difficult. There's a lot of hours that are going into this. And I have to ask, give us a sense of how many Crown attorneys there are in this province? We have 1,400 Crown Attorneys. With our population, we have approximately one Crown Attorney for every 11,000 people. That ranks us third lowest in Canada.

It's not nearly enough. If I can take the opportunity to say that, we are desperate for resources. And it's a calling. If people go through law school, they go through articling, we're highly skilled, highly trained, and dedicated. If we were in it for the big bucks, we'd be on Bay Street. Do you think the backlogs in the court system would affect how cases are moved through the system? We know with the case from 2004, these are cases that are dragged on for quite a while.

We're talking years here. Well, the backlogs in the court system always play a factor. And like Leslie's mentioning about the resources that are required for the Crown Attorney, It's also very resource intensive for defense lawyers. The digital age has made our jobs much more complicated in the sense that what was a simple case 15 years ago is no longer a simple case because there's text messages, there's CCTV, there's cell phone towers, there's things that just didn't exist. So the Crown Attorney does face the challenge of gathering all that evidence and getting it to us

in a timely fashion to then proceed with the case combined with sometimes there's resource not enough courtrooms, not enough judges, and things can lag in the system. And it's in everybody's interest. And I say everybody's interest to have a trial as soon as possible. And I say that because you want as a defense lawyer witnesses' memories to be as fresh as possible. You want your client's memory to be as fresh as possible to assist you in your investigation and moving things forward. And as far as the complainants go, the alleged victims of the crimes, they have no

interest in sitting around waiting two, two and a half years for their day in court to see what happens with the situation they occurred. The same thing goes for an accused person. They don't want to wait on bail with the stress of a trial hanging over them. So everybody, I'd say crown and defense, want to move things through the system in a fast pace that's still fair and moves things forward for justice. Now we do have issues where there is too much time. That's passed and there are charter remedies that sometimes come into play and as you know that sometimes it's in the media that cases get stayed because they couldn't get prosecuted in a way that was fair or within a reasonable amount of time and that's in nobody's interest but it's also that kind

of sort of Damocles hanging over is what spurs the system forward and causes the system to make sure that we get more courtrooms, more judges, more prosecutors and are able to prosecute things in an efficient way where it's fair for both the alleged victims and the accused persons. Adam, Leslie, I know you guys don't have a lot of time, so I appreciate you both coming into our studios to have this conversation. I want to say thank you. This is very informative. Thank you. Thank you. For more than three decades, Hank and Singa served with the Toronto Police. In his new memoir, The High Road, Confessions of a homicide cop, he breaks down his biggest cases.

and the issues he saw during his time on the force. Hank Insignan is a former police inspector who led the Toronto Police Services Homicide Unit. He joins us in the studio. How are you doing, sir? Great. We have a photo of your dad, kind of like looking at you. You look quite, quite familiar there. And your mom as well. I'm wondering, what about their lives made you want to choose the career you chose?

Yeah, well, my mother was a Holocaust survivor. Her father, she was born in 1934 in Germany, and she was the youngest of three siblings, born to a Jewish father and a Catholic mother. So my grandfather, her father, was arrested in 1938 by the Gestapo in Germany and put into the concentration camp system, and he didn't survive. He was murdered in January of 1942 in the concentration camps. and my mother and her siblings were ultimately sent to orphanages in Holland to get away from the Nazi regime in Germany. So the trauma that my mother underwent through her childhood and obviously brought into her adulthood

really formed part of the motivation for me to pursue a career where I could catch the bad guys. It literally was when I was about 11 years old reading an article in time. magazine about Simon Wiesenthal's hunt for Joseph Mangala, where I said to my mother, that's what I want to do. And her comment backed me was, well, by time you're old enough, they're all going to be dead anyway. But it really steered me in that direction of wanting to catch the bad guys and getting into policing and ultimately into homicide investigations. You worked as a homicide detective and saw some of the most harrowing things imaginable in what you detail in your book. Do those moments still stick with you?

Yes, very much so. It's always going to be part of who I am. It forms part of my memory and my and even my personality to some extent. Dealing with homicide cases over the years, dealing with a lot of death and trauma over the years, you know, especially some of the murders of children, which are very, very hard to deal with and very tough to write about in the book. And I appreciate that some members of the audience who are reading the book won't want to read some of those chapters, you know, especially about the Caitlin Sampson case in 2008, which was absolutely horrific and not an easy case to write about and really a case where not everyone wants to read about it, but it does form part of who I am and who I am to this

day and this is a memoir and so I really wanted to express, here's what I dealt with, here's what I went through during my career. And if you want to appreciate it from an autobiographical standpoint, that forms part of it. You mentioned Caitlin Samson. Is that a particular case or is there are other cases that still stick with you today? I think the Samson case as well as MacArthur case, it's kind of hard to isolate any individual case. I still maintain good relationships with some of the family and friends of some of the victims

that I dealt with over the years. Well, you mentioned Bruce MacArthur, so let's talk about that case. It's probably one of the biggest cases in Toronto's recent history, Project Prism. Would you give us a relatively quick synopsis of the perpetrator for Bruce MacArthur and his victims in that case? Yeah, Bruce MacArthur lived in the city of Toronto, and he was a gay male who killed, dismembered, and buried implanter's eight men from Toronto's gay community between the years of 2010 to 2017. So I was involved in the investigation at two points in time, number one, in 2000. 2012, 2013, when the original missing persons investigations were being handled by 51 Division. And they had a suspect that they had developed through some information that they received

from Swiss authorities that needed to be investigated. So I was brought on board to help without investigation. And once we excluded that suspect in 2013, I left and I went back to homicide and 51 Division continued on with the missing persons. That suspect was a suspect, there was allegations of cannibalism. Exactly, yes. There were allegations as fantastical as it sounds of cannibalism and online fetish forms and the original information that 51 Division received came from authorities in Switzerland.

And they had what they referred to as an informant who was telling them he had received an online confession from somebody from Peterborough who claimed he had killed and eaten a brown skin male from Toronto's gay village. And they linked that to one of the missing persons, Scanan Averatnam, which turns it into some evidence of a homicide. So I was in the homicide squad at the time. I got involved. We excluded that as basically fantasy. It never happened. And like I said, I left in June of 2013, and because they reverted back to missing persons investigations, 51 division carried on with that investigation. And it wasn't until 2017 when Bruce MacArthur killed his eighth and last victim, Andrew Kinsman, in the summer of 2017, where homicide was brought in again to assist 51 division. their investigation, but it wasn't until November of 2017 where some evidence was uncovered

that led investigators to believe Andrew Kinsman is a victim of murder and Bruce MacArthur is a suspect when the role of major case manager reverts from 51 Division directly to homicide, where I become involved again. And then, of course, once MacArthur is arrested in January of 2018, really my role became media handling a lot of the media interviews became a full-time job from that point. I want to show a photo of the victims. As you mentioned, there were eight in total. It's important that they have a moment to be remembered in all of this. As you mentioned, you know, the first three victims weren't initially part of Project Prison. They were part of Project Houston, which was, as you mentioned, there was a large gap in all of this.

why did it take so long for this to end with a conviction? Well, we can only deal with evidence, and that evidence was being followed up, and that was being followed up very, very diligently. And we can't manufacture things. MacArthur's name did not come up until 2013 when he was interviewed in November of that year by some investigators from 51 Division

to see if he knew anything about some of these missing persons. And again, at that point in time, that's what they were. They were missing persons. We didn't have any evidence that they had actually been murdered. So MacArthur was interviewed. He could offer no assistance, obviously now in hindsight to the investigation. But it wasn't until 2017 when Andrew Kinsman went missing, and the investigators were able to find some video footage from the neighborhood,

link it to a particular van, and then link that van to MacArthur. And then MacArthur's name comes up again, and the very officers who interviewed him in 2013 say, Bruce MacArthur, we interviewed him in 2013. There's some linkages between him and some of the first victims. Okay, let's look at Bruce MacArthur. But even then, it's not until November of 2017 when some blood belonging to Andrew Kinsman is identified in the back of MacArthur's van, where we can now say, okay, now we have some evidence to say that there's been a murder, not eight murders. one murder and Bruce MacArthur is a suspect, certainly not enough to lay charges at that point in time.

But these things don't happen overnight, right? Some of these investigations can take years and this evidence can't be manufactured and on a whim. We have to deal with what we have. And we had really made a front page news in June of 2013 that we've got these three missing persons from the village at this time. And it was front page news. It was the lead story on the 6 o'clock news. news. And yet even with that, we had no evidence whatsoever and very, very scant information

to actually even link MacArthur to those individuals. You write a lot about the challenges that are part of the police force. And you're quite critical of some people and how they conducted themselves while you were on the force. But you still stayed 34 years, two years over what you originally planned on staying 32. Why did you stay? I loved it. I loved every minute of it. I loved doing the work. I am critical of some of the structure of the police service, some of the culture of the police service, but it's still a fantastic job. I'd highly encourage anybody who's interested in the job to join the police and enjoy their career, but there are pitfalls. And there are pitfalls from

day one at the police college all the way up to the chief and the command structure. So where do we begin, right? I talk about an incident even when I was a new recruit at the police college with some of the instructors and really what would be classified as tyrannical behavior. And you will constantly read about police officers getting themselves in trouble for such as racism, corruption, obviously in 2026, there's been huge issues around corruption. And what I really want people to be aware of is

that's not just the rank and file. It stretches all the way up into the executive levels of the police service. And the police service is always going to be a reflection of society. So if there's racists in society, you're going to have racist in the police service. If somebody behaves tyrannically towards the recruits, those recruits are going to behave tyrannically towards members of the public. We absolutely need to have tight, tight systems of checks and balances and good leadership

and good supervision. you're never going to eliminate all of this stuff, but you definitely have to keep it in check because when somebody calls 911, they don't have a choice. It's going to be the Toronto Police Service that responds. You have to be able to have faith that the person who responds, they may have biases, right?

But they still have to respond effectively, properly and professionally to whatever it is you're calling them for. and that has to stretch all the way up, like I said, to the command level. I should mention that we do have a statement from Toronto Police Service, and it reads, Mr. Idsinga is free to share his perspectives during his media tour for his soon-to-be-published book. The Toronto Police Service will not comment on the allegations made. We cannot substantiate these claims, particularly where no complaint was made at the time. We have clear mechanisms in place for members to report concerns, allegations of misconduct,

especially those involving discrimination or bias are taken seriously and reviewed through established processes, including external oversight where appropriate. Our focus remains on the work our members are doing every day to serve a diverse city, work that includes significant, ongoing efforts to support public safety and community confidence. Particularly coming out of the Bruce MacArthur case, a lot of people throughout your career had looked up to you as a leader. When you talk about leadership, did you ever file a complaint? Did you ever say anything during your time there?

I did, but I think I also articulate in the book that the system within the police service is one where it is virtually impossible to file a formal complaint against a member of the police service who is higher ranking than you, who is in that position because they've been put there by a command or in a executive level officer. And the very person that you would complain to is that command or executive level officer. It's going to have a detrimental effect on you. It's going to have a detrimental effect on your career. And it's going to have a detrimental effect on everybody who's part of that complaint or a witness to that complaint. It's a terrible structure like that. And even an anonymous system, and I talk about the lack of anonymity sometimes within the police service amongst the senior officers ranks, that lack of anonymity really, really hampers the ability to complain. So did I do something about it? Yes, I did do something about it. But the complaint processes that

are in effect that they talk about and their response are completely inadequate and ineffective. Hank, we're going to leave that there. I really appreciate your time. Thank you so much for it. A really great book, really great insight as well. Awesome. Thank you very much. I'm Jay-Anne. Thanks for spending some time with us on The Rundown. We want this show to reflect you and what you care about. So what should we cover next? Let us know at rundown at tbO.org, or you can always drop us a comment.

Until then, I will see you tomorrow. If you're enjoying this series, please consider supporting TVO with a donation to make more insightful and thought-provoking podcast possible. TVO is a registered charity, and you will receive a tax receipt for your gift. Visit tv.org slash giveTVO to make your donation today.