Bruce McArthur /// Toronto’s Missing Men /// Part 2 | Forensic Files

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Welcome to True Crime Garage. Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, thanks for listening. I'm your host Nick and
with me as always is the man that chased the snakes out of Ireland. He is the captain. Thank you. Thank you. Thank
you. It's good to be seen and it's good to see you. Thanks for listening and thanks for telling a friend.
Tonight we are drinking Keith's Irish Stout by the great people at Granite Brewery in fantastic Toronto. Garage
grade four out of five bottle caps. If you can get your hands on this, make sure you do so because this is a rich
multi stout with roasted chocolate and coffee notes ending in a dry finish. And Keith's Irish Stout was brought to us by
first a big thank you to Megan down in beautiful Grapevine, Texas. Big shoutout to Lauren in Rockville,
Maryland. And thank you to Margaret in Dune End down in sunny Florida. A big we like your jib to Paige in
Cornish, New Hampshire. Let's give a shoutout to Morgan in Pataskala, Ohio. Also a long distance
cheers to Jill in South St. Paul, Minnesota. And last but not least captain, a big thank you to Gareth in
the forever mysterious parts unknown. Yeah, and if you'd like to be a member of parts unknown, you can do so by going
to our website, click on the store page and pick up one of those parts unknown t-shirts.
And thanks everybody out there for helping us to fill up the fridge for this week. That's enough of the business
captain. Everybody gather around. Grab a chair. Grab a beer. Let's talk some true crime.
The update was expectedly grim as investigators continue to scour the grounds of a Toronto home where a
suspected serial killer stored his tools. The exhausted detective in charge stopped by. This is a 24-hour operation
and a horrific one. We believe there are more victims on top of those five and as
we identify those victims, I can't give you any idea about a number, but I do expect more charges to
be laid. The ominous prediction comes after police seized more than a dozen planters from homes that hired Bruce
McArthur as a landscaper. We're not just grabbing every planter we see. If there's an indication from the canine
units that there's some decomposition around that planter, we'll grab it. The implication is chilling considering
police have found the remains of at least three people in just two planters they've examined. At the same home those
were taken from, the plan now to warm up the frozen ground with heaters and start
digging. He's retired now, but for 14 years Kevin Bryant was a forensic investigator. He
says the scope of the McArthur investigation is staggering and will be tedious. Only certain parts of the
remains will reveal key information. Typically the skull, ribs can can give you if there's broken ribs or if
there's ribs with cut marks in them, that can indicate a cause of death. Grizzly details. Peters Gromoll follows
them all with the horror of someone who might have ended up a victim too. Skromoll knew McArthur for years when
they met up in Toronto last spring. He says they had drinks at this bar, then McArthur offered him a lift to his
hotel. A friendly encounter turned intimate, then suddenly violent. He really grabbed
my neck violently, twisted it right to his crotch, and his pants were undone. And that's when I really was quite
disturbed. Scrumo managed to get away and never saw McArthur again. I have a 10 and 1/2 inch neck. My neck
is big. And for him to grab my neck with one hand, twist it like that, I literally thought one one more second
he would have snapped and broken my neck, and I was a dead man. Scrumo says he had no idea, but some of McArthur's
dating profiles suggest he was into violent sex. Today, a man posted how McArthur pursued
him on a gay chat app last fall. In online messages, he says when McArthur told him he was into asphyxiation, too,
he got scared and blocked him. Experts say violent sexual fantasies are common among serial killers. They
rehearse in their head for many years, and then eventually they begin to sort of experiment and flirt with the idea of
actually acting them out. If they know, police aren't saying how the five men McArthur is accused of killing died.
Only that it's a matter of when, not if, they'll find more. Ioanna Roumeliotis, CBC News, Toronto.
There are more than 30 properties being scrutinized by police. This investigation is big and it's getting
bigger. Dozens of tips continue to come in, and the search for remains and other
evidence has already expanded well beyond Toronto to properties in Peel, York, and Durham regions.
All right. Well, we kind of left you hanging yesterday everybody and we that's the magic of the garage right
Captain we can do whatever we want. No, but we we ran out of time there and there was
sinister. Smug even. Um, there was a lot to talk about in that little 3-minute news clip that we left you with
yesterday. And the thing here is regarding Bruce McArthur and what's come down the pipeline as of late. You need
to understand this is about as new of a case as you can get. This is pretty this
is like breaking news for the garage here because we have a a man that's arrested late January. Here we are the
beginning of March trying to figure out what happened here and how this thing's going to go down once it gets to court.
Well, because there was so much information coming out from this, we're getting a lot of emails and a lot of
people on social media saying, "Hey, look into this or cover this case." Um, then you have to it's the balance of can
you cover this case? Is there enough to talk about? Yeah, well, the interesting thing too
Captain is that this kind of came on to our radar uh, middle to late of last year. When we started getting emails
from our good listeners that are saying, "Hey, there's something going on here in
Toronto. There's all these missing men." Right. And at the time you have these two different task force and we don't
know that anything's connected. It wasn't until the breaking news in in January that they had tied a lot of
these cases together and all the big thing here is that they all share the same suspect. So, let's talk about that
news clip a little bit here Captain. So, what does that tell us? That tells me some very
very scary stuff at the at the very beginning of that news clip is where the the man states that police saw a man go
up to the apartment with Bruce McArthur up to Bruce's place. And then they decide to kick in the
door. And when they get into the apartment, they find that this man that went willingly into Bruce McArthur's
apartment, that he's chained up to the bed. Yeah. So, what does that tell us? So, we know at that time that for some
reason in September of 2017, Bruce McArthur became he he came onto their radar onto police's radar.
Mhm. They go to this auto parts this auto body auto parts uh sounds more like a salvage yard type
thing to me. But, he sells them. Bruce sold these people his vehicle. His creepy van, yeah. This Dodge Caravan.
The rumor that I keep hearing the most is that there might have been dried blood in the back of the van. Yeah, my
thought on this was when they're looking into Bruce or or even this van is at some point they probably took cadaver
dogs and had them sniff around. And I'm I'm guessing that they got hits uh from these dogs and that's why they
do- took this van over. I would be willing to wager that you're probably exactly right.
Exactly right. Because here here's what my thoughts are, Captain, is that there was
something in that van, something in or on that van Mhm. that was enough for police We talked about gut feelings as
well. There was enough for police with their expertise and their years involved in in sleuthing and in homicide
investigations where these guys felt that this guy, this Bruce McArthur guy, this guy that sold this van,
he's guilty of probably murder. There's a chance he's linked to more than one of
these disappearances of these men. So, we have enough evidence to to stay on this investigation. We don't have
enough evidence to wrap him up to to arrest him and send this thing to court. So, what do we have to do here? This guy
is potentially very very dangerous. Yeah. We need to follow this guy. Maybe Here's what I wonder, too.
Do you Are you follow You're following the guy probably for a multitude of reasons. Right. But one is if you think
that he might be linked to more than one disappearance, are you following him with the simple
fact that let's see where he goes because we have no bodies. Mhm. We have all these guys
that have disappeared. We have no bodies. We have We don't even know where to start looking for bodies yet. Right.
Cuz possibly there's a dumping ground somewhere. I think the other possibility too is that, you know, he has a violent
past. He played guilty to attacking a man with a lead pipe. And so if you think that two of them are
connected and possibly more than two. Mhm. And then you start looking in the database of all the men that are roughly
40 to 60 years old that have gone missing in the gay village of Toronto, then you start going well, there could
be more than five. Right. And then you start going well, this is a possible serial killer
and if so, you want to stop him from having another victim. And could you imagine
the horror that you're tracking this individual and he has a gentleman with him.
Yeah. to go into their They're going to go into Bruce's you know, apartment and for all you
know, that's the that's his dungeon. Uh so Well, that that's the scary thing, Captain, because you know what happens
during that situation is you don't have I wouldn't imagine that you have the top
cops. You know, you don't have the the super detective out following around Bruce McArthur. That's kind of a uh a
tedious task that you give you give to some the rookie. That's right. So, you got these guys out following Bruce
McArthur around. There's there is a phone call. There's a cell phone call made at that time that says, "You know
what? Look, boss. I understand that we have an active investigation here. I understand
that our number one priority is to follow this dude around and see what he's up to. However, I have to tell you
a guy that that could potentially fit this dude's victimology just went into his apartment. What do we do, boss?
Because you run the risk of completely sabotaging your investigation here. Or you also run the risk of one not Your
job is to protect the public, protect and serve. You could You could be sending a guy to his to his to the death
sentence. Yeah. It's to Bruce Bruce McArthur's apartment. And then that's on your hands as a as a
department. And I'm sure that the chief or whoever says, "Hey, you got to go in because if if it gets out that they're
following this individual and he basically murders somebody underneath your nose. Now, you're going
to catch him for that crime. You're going to lock him away for that, but you got to get him on these other crimes as
well. But it's also going to come out to the public that you were watching him and
basically murdered somebody and you knew it. Right. You knew it. Under Under your watchful eye, this guy
was killed. Now, the thing here is what they do ultimately do decide to do is break down the door. They go in and they
find this this man um chained to the bed. Now, okay. Now, there's a lot of people out there going to go, "Okay,
well, he went into the apartment willingly." Yes. And he could have been He could have been involved in a
consensual act. Right. George Dstanzel. So So, what we're talking about here though
is there there are some wording within these news reports where we find out very quickly after them going into
Bruce's apartment that they start to search Bruce's apartment. They start to search areas and locations that are tied
to Bruce McArthur. Well, and a lot of a lot of homes are going to be tied to him
because he does work at a lot of homes. Yeah, and I want to be clear here because we are making some assumptions
in today's show, and we have to because this is such new information that once the police make their arrest and they
they announce to the public that we've made an arrest, guess what? You're not going to get much information after that
because we need this stuff for trial. Right. So, we have to make some assumptions here to kind of tie this
story together to tell it completely. And that being my suspicion is that when they kicked in that door and they found
that gentleman chained to the bed, Yeah. there's a good chance that he told police, "Look, yeah, I came in here
willingly. Mhm. At some point, this guy's doing something against my wishes without my consent." Well, he could have
pulled I mean, there's so many weird things here that Bruce's, to me, like it just reminds me of a lot of things.
One, the lead pipe, you know, attacking an individual out of nowhere with a lead pipe. Mhm. And then
having that attack where he apologized for it. That that is something that happened with Gacy.
Yeah. And then you got this situation where you have an individual that goes into your house willingly,
but now you get him handcuffed. Reminds me of Gacy, as well. Mhm. The old you know, the old handcuff trick.
And so, was he tricked? And then also, you know, preying on the gay community, bathhouses and bars, that's very
Dahmer-like to me. Yeah, and when you hear that this guy is charged with a couple of couple counts
of murder, you start to wonder, "Okay, well, if he did do this, and you know, me, I like to
I like to call him out on the show. He's looking very guilty even early on in this. Even with the assumptions that we
have to make, he's he's looking to be very guilty here. Well, maybe you can clear this up for me. The The guy that
they found handcuffed to the bed. Does he come out and state I I didn't want to be handcuffed?
Um I don't know that. I'm making a complete assumption there. I'm Here's what I'm guessing. Because they found
Some people are into that. Right. Of course. Of course. You just said it like that. Okay.
Anyway, um the thing here is though, my assumption is that this guy felt threatened or
concerned for his life or well-being at some point and was probably thankful that the cops had kicked in the door.
And my The reason why I say that is because I don't know exactly how the the rules
and the laws work up in Canada. Mhm. But here, okay, if they would have kicked in the
door, they can kick in the door on probable cause. But if that guy then says, "Look, I came
in here willingly and we're just we're two grown men, we're two adults doing adult things. Nobody's in trouble here."
Bruce McArthur has every right to tell the police get the hell out of my apartment. Yeah, we're just doing a
horizontal naked hug. Yeah. Adult hug. Uh toes to feet. Mhm. Toes to face. Mhm. What? No. Okay. Anyway, so the thing
here is though, Captain, if unless the police have probable cause to search his apartment. I think happened. They
witnessed something that they said, "Look, either we don't need Bruce McArthur's consent or this guy that was
chained to the bed, he's a potential victim. He tells us something is not right is going down. Now we have
probable cause to search Bruce McArthur's apartment." The reason why I say that is because they must have found
something. They must have found something in that apartment that led them from from where they were before, where they
were just surveilling him, to now we have enough that we are going to arrest this guy, charge him with two counts of
first-degree murder, and yet we have no bodies. Yeah. They found something in that apartment.
And like like you hear in the trailer earlier is is the idea that if you don't have any bodies, it's really hard to
convict somebody. Mhm. But they feel like they have enough evidence of such. Now, following Bruce's arrest, we have
other people coming out and we have other sources, and in fact, um that that start coming out and telling
stories about Bruce Bruce McArthur. Now, one story is about an alleged sexual assault. This is from as early back as
2016. Mhm. So, a police source, this is {quote} {unquote} a police source, told to I think it was the Global News, but
regardless, it was one of the news outlets, this story involving Bruce McArthur, and it goes like this, that
the source said that McArthur had agreed to meet a man. Again, this is from sometime in 2016.
That he had became acquainted with through an online dating app. The two agreed to meet for consensual sex at a
secluded North York parking lot. Mhm. During the date, the source told McArthur, allegedly
I'm sorry, the source said McArthur allegedly started to choke him while the couple were in the back of McArthur's
red van. The man was able to fight McArthur off and told McArthur he was going to call police.
McArthur reportedly then drove to the 41 Division Police Station in Scarborough,
where he told officers that he was going to be called that they were going to be
called about a sexual assault. And McArthur's telling the officers, you know, this wasn't true. This is not
going to be a true statement that you're about to receive from this person. I mean, we This act was consensual.
Uh-huh. And while this is all going down, we have the man who was allegedly choked. He did call the police like he
said he would. Good for him. And he talks to he talked to officers at the 32 division in Toronto's north end. Mhm.
So, at some point, the source then said told the news that McArthur was placed under arrest and was taken to the 32
division where he was investigated for this situation. Mhm. The problem here though is
whatever goes down, whatever McArthur tells these officers, he's not arrested and he's not charged with anything. And
now that they have Bruce arrested and he's being charged with these murders of these missing men, we're going to have
other people that were attacked, other men that were attacked by Bruce come forward and share their accounts of and
and and how they survived attack from this vicious guy. Yes, let's listen to this man's story.
Mr. McArthur was he looked like Santa Claus. Like um even on his profile, his pic had a picture of
him as the mall Santa. He didn't strike me as someone who's going to kill me. He strike me as someone
who was trying to push my limits, but then it quickly turned to this guy's not respecting my limits.
You don't go into these things thinking it's going to be you. You hear about them happening to other
people, but it's just it still blows me away today that this occurred to me. This this
happened to me. I was just the lucky one. Like that's all. It could happen to anyone.
I first became aware of Bruce McArthur. Um It has to go back probably over a couple
years of just ad hoc kind of one-off messages on various apps. That day it was a beautiful sunny day, clear
clear clear sky. I um it was a daytime meeting. I was supposed to be there about
to meet him about 12:00 noon I believe. Um I was running a little bit behind, but I was in correspondence on the app
saying, "I'm running behind. Just hold on for 15 minutes and I was getting my stuff together.
Um and then I went to the meet the designated meeting place and that's uh when I got in his uh truck. When I got
in the truck, I had a conversation with Mr. McArthur about a serial killer being at large. But when
I said there was a serial killer, he didn't respond. It was just like the conversation uh kind of went into
what he does for living. Which possibly could have been related, I guess in hindsight.
He did mention he had a roommate. He said it was just a roommate. Um that he was at work.
And uh that it would be a problem. And so I took that at face value. Um and I went uh to
put on the things that he um asked me to put on. And uh he makes me a drink. I was aware that um
there was GHB that was there. GHB is a drug that uh causes euphoria, um puts you at ease, and makes you
comfortable, and a little bit um um heightens the sexual encounter. Um that's why I would take it. Um if you do
there's a fine line with GHB cuz it is the date rape drug. If you go over if you know what you're doing, you can
certainly uh knock someone unconscious very easily. He he was going to mix the GHB up for
me. But I gave him instructions if he was not to do more than 5 mils because that would make me go to
sleep. Uh that day it was agreed that I would uh submit to his experience that had been
indicated on his profiles. His his big things as I know them were um he liked to find
submissives, find their um buttons that he could push, find what their edge was was, yes,
and then push them over it. The fear that I started to feel uncomfortable that day for the first time
was I couldn't breathe. Uh that's I have memories of of not being able to catch my breath
throughout the beginning um early on. And that um that made me uncomfortable and and put the
rest first red flag up that I that I wanted to go home because he wasn't I felt respecting my
limits. And the shortness of breath was from specific acts he was he was doing to me.
Um he was basically uh raping my throat. Um he was uh uh cutting off my airway. Um
and I was physically to the point where I was just giving panic and I was panicked.
But in that type of play there's some expectation of trying to find that area where it's it's close to the edge.
Um but at that point it was that's the only memory I have from it is that it just this overall I couldn't
breathe I couldn't breathe I couldn't breathe. How was he cutting off your airway?
Like you said like with it with a um his penis. Um with uh his hands. Um with his body weight sitting on my
chest. When you play with someone in that this the proper environment it's built on
safe sane and consensual and there's safe words and he wasn't giving into the indicators
that I was not being able to catch my breath. Um and at this point I'd started to sweat quite
a bit which for me would be an indicator that I was drugged strong more um I had a larger dose than what I would
have noticed normally. When I started to feel uncomfortable I think at that point
that may have been the point where it was too late for me to to um know what was happening to degree
because I think I at that point I may have fall gone unconscious. Support for today's show comes from
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I know there um has been evidence that has been suggested by the police that um I was unconscious
and in that evidence there is definite signs that I was in a position bound and ready to be killed.
I don't know how long I was unconscious. So but there was at that point I could hear the roommate
was home. And the roommate was like like I didn't hear him come in the front door and that sort of noise. So
the roommate was well in the apartment for a period of time by the time I was aware of him.
And I did say to um Bruce I said, "Oh, your roommate's home." Like like and I was starting to use this as
my way to like end end this. And uh he's he said the words not until I come first. I have to go home. He said I have
one more task to perform. And then I gathered my stuff and I don't remember getting home that day.
I don't remember how I left. When the police detective brought to my attention the fact that
they had photographs of me because she she was asking if I saw cameras if I if I and I didn't remember
any cameras. Um but then when it was winding down and I knew at this point there were photos
of me. Um I asked her if um like how do you like how do you know? Like I still wasn't ready to believe that I was
that victim. And uh she said to me um that I was I was bound. I was in pretty much
for lack of a better term cuz he he can't disclose everything. Um a a kill position for him.
And I why it stopped I don't have all the information the police have. All I can go on is what I I
think and it's the roommate coming home interrupting hit whatever his process is
or his ritual. And uh thank god for me. It hadn't dawned on me till we got further along in the
conversation how much danger I was in that day and how close I was to not coming back.
Um and that is also um something that haunts me, gives me nightmares. This occurred in the summer
uh about halfway through the summer, and the police contacted me the day after his arrest.
The fact that they found me the next day um leads me to believe that they were all they were on top of it and they were
they knew who I was um because to go from his arrest did and um finding me took like less than 12
hours. I was with my partner and my I was in the bedroom and I had brought an article out without a picture
of Bruce and said, "Oh, they caught the serial killer." And then a few minutes maybe 15 20 minutes later, he comes down
to the bedroom with his tablet with full picture saying, "This is the man that did it."
And I went "Oh my god." And then I told my partner that um I'd been with it and I'd
been with him. When my partner brought in the picture and I said, "Oh my god, I've been with
him." That is not unusual for us to have a we have an open relationship and it works
quite well for us. The only thing that particular day, the rule that I broke was
I didn't tell him where I was going. And that's something that's very hard for me to today because
I would have uh had it gone through I would have just disappeared and I would think of my partner being here um
first of all um wondering where I wasn't home cuz I was always home when he got home
and then getting probably pissed off that I hadn't left a note or called and then going to
panic and then and then the worst case, which uh to put him through that would have been
hell. I am having some night terrors. Um I'm I'm seeing I'm afraid of the dark. I've never been afraid of the dark.
The fact that it happened in the daytime is quite um ironic, but now I see things in the
dark. I see shadows. Um Um my counselor told me it's to be expected. I've been through something traumatic.
And uh Um I don't want to live in fear. Um I don't want to become an asexual person
because I'm afraid of going forward and uh I he if he kills those personality traits in me,
he's won for me. Like he's got another base to take me yet further. And I'm not going to be that far over
it. I've been a victim once of his. I'm not going to be a victim twice. So that's a lot to unravel. Yeah.
Powerful stuff from that uh victim that decided to come forward and tell the media what had happened. Some
interesting things inside that story, Captain. He says that the police had found a photo of him on Bruce McArthur's
computer. Yeah. To which he states that he never saw any cameras. He does not remember his photo being taken. So So
remember he says he believes he blacked out or was choked out at some point. was also drugged. Mhm. So
Well, I don't know if drugged is the right term because he knew he was going to take these drugs.
Yeah. Yeah. A heavier dose than what he claims he had asked for. And so at some point we can assume that these photos
that were taken of this gentleman were after he was either blacked out or choked out by
Bruce McArthur. Right. He doesn't remember seeing cameras. He doesn't remember seeing any cameras set
up or having his photo taken. And the police contact him within about 20 within about 12 hours of them
arresting Bruce McArthur. The thing here that we learn from this captain, this very detailed account of
this attack on this poor man, is that this gives us a lot of insights into Bruce McArthur and what kind of monster
this guy is. And furthermore, his MO. Because you know, I was wondering when we first when we first took on this case
and we hear that there was a potential romantic relationship between the potential offender and some of the
victims. You wondered if it was like a um I don't know, maybe a something similar
to a Jeffrey Dahmer situation where when asked, you know, Dahmer had certainly had many crazy levels of perversions
that was going on within him and his apartment. Right. However, when it boils down to it, sometimes Dahmer's saying,
you know, I I killed because I didn't want to be alone because I didn't want this person to leave. I didn't want them
to ever leave me. And the only way that I could guarantee that was for me to make them my victim, keep them there
with me, and then ultimately consume them. Right. Now, what I mean by that is when I hear
of some types of romantic relationships between Bruce McArthur and these victims, you wonder is
was this some kind of in the heat of the moment attack where it's a bad breakup or he gets jealous
and he attacks these people? No, what we see here is that we have a guy that has some some high perversion
levels and these are sexual oriented killings that are going on. Some of them could be when you're talking about and
the police won't come out and say this, you know, they won't tell us how these these poor people have
died and been killed. But we can assume from the the stories that we're hearing from these different
victims that had survived and come forward, we can assume that these are strangulations,
asphyxiation, these are are things along those lines. This is how these men were
killed. Yeah, I think it's almost like, you know, uh, he would take his perversions a little
too far where like he's he's getting uh, a willing partner to have a sexual experience with
and then he's taking whatever fantasies in his head because it's just like this survivor said, he said,
"Well, I put on what he told me to put on." And so it's on some level they're acting out this fantasy, but then Bruce
is taking it too far and I think as he's taking it too far, it's either that he it's either that Bruce is losing
control or the fact that these uh, individuals felt attacked that maybe he felt like, "Okay,
well, they felt like that's an attack, so now I have to kill them to cover up that
attack." If that makes any sense. I see where you're going with that, but what I think
we have here is I think we have a a man that wanted to kill, that that has a sexual perversion
towards killing. That's part of the sex act for him is the actual murder, the actual death of the his victim.
Okay. And the reason why I feel that way is I I see an evolution, let's say, in this this individual, where this
first attack that we hear about that occurred in 2001, this is more of like a caveman style attack, where okay, I want
a victim, I have some some sexual perversions that I need to act out, and the only way I know to to do this, to go
about this, is I'm going to club this dude, and once he's knocked out, I'm going to be
able to do what I want to him. He has He has elevated his his his killing game, let's say, Right. by
by at some point he learned, you know what's easier? Rather than having to trick someone and attack them, why don't
I Why don't they not find out about the trick until they're already handcuffed, until they're already tied up? Or
drugged. And drugged, yes. So now what I can do is I can get on these different dating apps, or I can meet people and I
can say, "Look, I'm into I'm into bondage, I'm into these types of games, are you willing to play?" And the vibe
that I get from some of these surviving victims that we hear is that it sounds like
maybe that wasn't their thing so much as it was his thing, but they were willing
to play along. You know, they were willing to play along to the point where at some point they're they're going,
"Crap, this is no longer fun anymore. We are not We are no longer having a good time. This guy tricked me. This guy did
This guy put me in this situation, and now I've been tricked, and I'm I'm helpless, or I'm defenseless. Yeah.
And yeah, so he you know, he's he's raping the these victims, but that's where I believe um or at
least my gut feeling is saying because he took that too far that the murder is to cover up from that. I don't know if
the murder is actually um part of the sexual experience. You know, I'm not ex- expert at, but this is
what my gut is telling me. Well, there's another unique thing that we see Bruce McArthur do twice is on two occasions
he's involved in attacking an individual, and the individual defends themselves to the point of telling him
that they're going to contact the police, and Bruce McArthur he does he gets the upper hand by going to
police first. Yeah. And that's a that's a unique strategy there, and people go, "Well, why the hell would he do that?"
Well, because he's hiding a lot of stuff. This guy would much rather drive right to the police department, walk in
with his hands up, and go, "Look, I'm guilty of this, and you're going to find out about it very soon." The reason why
he does this, he doesn't want them digging into his personal life too much. Yeah, it's one thing to say that you
assaulted somebody, or even sexually assaulted somebody, and you can fess up to those crimes, and
take accept the punishment that you get from those crimes, easier crime to defend as well. And also especially in
this community, I mean, this is a community that uh I think a lot of times law enforcement kind of stays out of.
Um you know, where there if there was a attack in the heterosexual community uh of this nature, they would take them a
little more serious. Now, I know that's very generalizing everything, but we see
this time and time again. Well, specifically regarding this case, we have the two incidences where I
personally believe the victims didn't didn't come forward or they weren't fully cooperative with law enforcement.
And that's not to blame them for anything. They don't know what else Bruce McArthur is out there doing.
Right. Um but what I mean by that is law enforcement in in its own way has their hands tied behind their backs
if they have victims that won't cooperate with the investigation or testify against this individual. Now,
the thing here is too that we have the computer that was found. Ultimately, to kind of to kind of sum up this story
for you, Bruce McArthur, once they decide that he's probably linked to the disappearance of the several of these
guys, they they start finding body parts. They find body parts of individuals that have been dismembered
and they are in planters, these large planters. Remember we said Bruce is a landscaper. He's an independent
contractor or self-employed, whatever you want to call it, and he works for many different people. Well, some of
these properties that he's worked for, he's distributing these body parts amongst these planters at different
people's properties. Now, they were able to to do many searches. This has been a a concerted
effort, a big-time effort to try to locate these missing men. And what they've ultimately found, I believe I
believe, I could be wrong, Captain, I believe Bruce McArthur to this date, March 13th, has been charged with seven
counts of homicide. Yeah, and law enforcement believe there's more. I think one of the houses that he did work
at, um they found some at least DNA, and it was it was three different victims. All all scattered through like, you
know, flower like you said, flower pots and flower beds and and things like that. I mean,
I mean this guy is beyond sick. Well, from my understanding is this. That they recovered
body parts or they recovered better to say the remains of seven individuals. My understanding is that
they have identified six of these seven, that we still have one male victim that
remains unidentified to this day. Yeah, they actually uh took uh a picture and and and gave this
to to uh the people of Canada to try to help out with. Well, that's That is a good topic to discuss because
we don't know that that is in fact the case. So, what we do know regarding this photograph, there was a photograph like
the captain said released to the public in hopes that people could identify the man in the photo.
Yeah. Police have stated that the man in the photo is is believed to be deceased.
Right. Now, where I call into question that is we don't have anybody saying that the photo belongs to the
unidentified remains that we have found. So, where we have a situation where we recovered the remains of seven
individuals and we now have a photo of a man that we're trying to identify. Yeah.
The reason why I say that we don't know that the photo is of the unidentified remains is because police have stated
that photo was taken from McArthur's computer. And that they took that photo and they
had to clean it up a little bit. They photoshopped it to take out {quote} artifacts that would have been seen
inside that photo and the police really didn't want to release this to the public. However, it
was like a last resort. We have to identify this man. And so, the the big question here with Bruce McArthur is
ultimately how many people do they think that he has killed? How many how big could this number go? And the reason
being is you have an individual that we he remained under the radar for so long.
He had victims that were missing. He's he's a He's Well, and if he's putting the remains in
flower pots, then you got to hope that somewhere you can find a list of clients and you're talking about years
of working as as a landscaper that you have to then go back and check all those properties.
He's a sophisticated organized killer is what he would be classified as when people would be investigating this as
far as the FBI's concerned. Yeah, aka piece of [ __ ] The thing So, how far back can we trace this
thing? How high could these numbers go? I'm hoping my suspicion is that the photo is not of the unidentified
remains, that they're not one in the same. Mhm. My suspicion is we're probably looking at eight
murdered victims here. We we will only we will only find this out as the court proceedings continue.
And you know, we're here recording these episodes on the 13th. I believe Bruce McArthur is scheduled to be back in
court either on the 14th or the 15th. Yeah, I think like we said based off what information they had and
they were running surveillance on this guy for a while, so they were collecting evidence as they're doing that. And then
you basically catch him him in the act. And then on top of that, you have all these other survivors coming out and
they're giving you information and evidence. And on then you have this computer evidence and what else other
evidence that they find that we're not going to know about until the trial. I mean, this guy
it seems like a pretty open and shut case. Yeah, I think we're looking at a very
strong guilty conviction here. Um I You know, the police have taken some scrutiny because the gay community
around Toronto has said that Bruce McArthur has been interviewed years ago regarding some of these
disappearances and the gay community have said that it's one of the best, {quote} {unquote}, best kept secrets.
Now, I don't know about that and and you know what, here's the thing, he is so tied to a couple of these victims, it's
very likely that he was in fact interviewed. Yeah. I don't know where police slipped up. I'm It's hard for me
to say that they did. Um what I see here on the outside looking in is I do see some victims that were leading living
somewhat secretive lives, which makes any investigation a little bit harder. difficult.
Yeah. If you're If you're having um relationships with different men and you're married that
you know, to a woman that you might not want that information out and so then there's probably times that um
victims could have came forward to give them more information or when they were questioned they could have been
uh um more truthful from the beginning and maybe that would have stopped this, but
uh but this guy was a cold, calculated killer, so I I you know, I don't want to throw them under the bus, uh law
enforcement. I agree and from from the outside looking in, Captain, I I I applaud their efforts from late last
year up until the present. Before that, I don't know much about the investigation to make a determination or
shame anybody either way. Well, and I don't and again, I don't know this for certain, but I think the gay
community has a right to say, "Look, you know, as far as our community goes, they're at more risk." Now, some would
uh say that you're putting yourself at more risk. I mean, you're putting yourself at more risk if you're going
home with individuals that you don't know, if you're letting individuals tie you up, or if you're letting individuals
handcuff you, if you're letting individuals drug you. This puts you at higher risk.
But but I do side with the idea that um a lot of times uh homosexual communities
are not protected as much as heterosexual communities. Well, the the only people I believe deserve any shame
in this story as it unfolds is, you know, when doing the research for this case, came across
several websites, and I won't name them by name cuz I I didn't actually look at them long enough to care to know their
name, but Right. I'll just refer to this grouping of websites as the haters, and it was
you don't have to use your imagination too much to to get where I'm coming from, but it was a lot of victim
blaming, a lot of people saying, "See what they get for this, that, and the other thing." Um you know, serves them
right, sort of thing. Look, we are on what? Episode 190, 191, something like that.
that. We've We've talked about victims from every walk of life. Nobody Nobody, regardless of who they are,
any regular citizen that's not walking around harming anybody or or infringing on anybody else's rights
Right. deserves to be victimized in any form or fashion, whe- whether it be theft, rape, murder, nothing like that.
The things that happened to these individuals are horrible. They're unspeakable acts that were committed by
a monster. This episode of True Crime Garage is brought to you by Unsane. It's a new
movie. It's a new psychological thriller from the director Steven Soderbergh. And
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order, use our promo code garage20 at checkout. First off, I want to thank all the
listeners for suggesting this case as early as the middle of last year. Thank you for being aware. Thank you for
bringing it to our attention. We do listen to you. That's right. to you. This weekend is St. Patrick's
Day. Everybody enjoy the basketball games. Everybody enjoy some time with friends and family. Uh toast a drink.
Yeah, and but look, we talked a lot about these dating apps and any listener out there that is using one to meet
people, that's a great thing, right? Build a relationship, whatever. But when you're going to meet somebody
from these apps, make sure you send a friend um some information of the person or send a
picture of the person. So, then if your friend goes missing or or if you went missing, that your friends would have
information to give to law enforcement. Take precautions. That Don't be stupid. That's right.
Right. All right. And until next time, everybody. Be good. Be kind. Don't litter.
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Bruce McArthur /// Toronto’s Missing Men /// Part 2

Part 2 of 2

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Episode 192 - We first became aware of this case in the second half of last year. Loyal Garage listeners were emailing and bringing attention to the strange situation up in Toronto. For nearly eight years men had been practically disappearing right off of the streets of Toronto. This didn’t go unnoticed by police. In fact the police opened two major investigations to address the situation. The problem, neither investigation provided any answers. Until January, 2018 when the cases of Toronto’s missing men broke wide open. This week we discuss the continuing investigation into Canada’s most recent and very prolific serial killer.Beer of the Week - Keefe’s Irish Stout by Granite BreweryGarage Grade 4 out of 5 bottle caps

Beer Fund: https://truecrimegarage.com/home

Brief Summary

Bruce McArthur, a suspected serial killer in Toronto, is discussed along with survivor accounts and police investigation details.

Key points

Madison Reed's Hair Color Revolution. Madison Reed offers salon-quality hair color delivered to your door for under $25.
Chilling Discovery in Toronto. Investigators find remains linked to a suspected serial killer, Bruce McArthur.
A Survivor's Close Call. A man recounts a terrifying encounter with Bruce McArthur, narrowly escaping violence.
Survivor's Harrowing Account. A survivor recounts a terrifying encounter with Bruce McArthur, revealing the close call with death.
The Moment of Realization. The survivor discovers the identity of their attacker, leading to a shocking revelation.
Living with Trauma. The survivor discusses the lasting impact of their experience and the fear it instilled.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I literally thought one more second he would have snapped and broken my neck.

6:25WatchNov 26, 2022

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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