BURST
A conspiracy to commit murder sparked an investigation that led to seven Toronto police officers and one retired Toronto police officer being charged, York Regional Police said on Thursday.
“It is alleged that these officers have demonstrated varying degrees of criminality and associations to criminal networks,” said Dep. Chief Ryan Hogan at a press conference.
The officers range in age from 24 to 57 years old. They have been suspended. For at least four of them, police are seeking suspension without pay. An additional 19 suspects have been arrested in connection with the investigation.
“The allegations of criminal corruption include bribery, obstruction of justice, drug trafficking, theft of personal property, breach of trust, and the unauthorized access and distribution of confidential information,” said Hogan. “We are alleging that some police officers who were collecting personal and private information unlawfully and distributing it to members of organized crime, which ultimately resulted in serious harm in our communities.”
The investigation started in June 2025 when a conspiracy to murder a member of corrections management who worked at an Ontario facility was uncovered. Suspects showed up at the man’s home three times over a 36-hour period. Police clarified that there was no evidence that the corrections member was involved in any alleged criminal activity. He may have been targeted due to his “commitment to integrity in his position,” said Hogan.
Three masked men can be seen on surveillance footage returning to the residence and armed with a loaded handgun, allegedly with the intention of murder. The suspects rammed a vehicle into a police cruiser, as officers were at the scene to protect the victim after learning he was being targeted. The suspects were arrested at the scene.
Piecing together the events that led to the crime, investigators discovered that a Toronto police officer had unlawfully accessed confidential information about the victim, said Hogan. Police allege that the officer gave the victim’s information to a key figure within the criminal network, who then disseminated the information. Three additional suspects who were also planning to harm the corrections management member were later arrested.
Criminals sought and obtained “confidential information from various Toronto police officers,” allegedly used to facilitate crime, said Hogan. “In some cases, police officers were offered bribes for this information.”
Police identified a number of serious criminal acts that occurred due to the confidential information being released, including seven shootings in York Region. In surveillance videos shared by police, a suspect can be seen shooting in residential neighbourhoods. The suspect has since been arrested and remains in police custody.
In another instance, information unlawfully shared by a police officer led to a suspect using it for an extortion plot. Police also uncovered a plan, led by a key figure in the criminal network, to “support the operation of illegal cannabis dispensaries by accepting bribes to obstruct any possible enforcement action to be taken at those locations.”
One of the criminals involved in the investigation had an affiliation to the tow truck industry, said Hogan. The industry has been plagued with violence and extortion amid a turf war in the Greater Toronto Area. It culminated in more than a dozen arrests last year and more than $4.2 million in assets seized .
Hogan also mentioned that police had surveillance footage of one shooting from the current investigation that was at a commercial complex affiliated to a tow industry. A tow truck can be seen in the background. “However, I cannot speak to motive behind shootings and whether the shootings themselves were a direct motive in the tow industry,” he said.
“In fact, some of the shootings that occurred right here in York Region, I’m confident in saying that did not have any connection to the tow industry… People that were residing in those homes had no connection to the tow industry in some cases.”
Toronto Police Service Chief Myron Demkiw said it was “a painful and unsettling moment.” He defended the Toronto police’s involvement in the investigation and denied it was a conflict of interest because it was led by York Regional Police. “I was not provided an opportunity to make investigative decisions impact the speed and flow of the investigation,” he said.
Officers charged were from 11 division, 12 division, 23 division and 52 division. The retired officer had previously been a member of the Emergency Management Unit.
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