A criminal profiler said she tipped off Toronto police officers about a serial killer terrorizing the city’s ‘Gay Village’ six months before he was arrested.
Police took 66-year-old Bruce McArthur into custody, accused of murdering at least six men, on January 18.
Sasha Reid, a PhD candidate at the University of Toronto, who has studied serial killers for over a decade, was a building a missing persons database as a project when she noticed a connection between three cases, reported CTV News.
PhD student Sasha Reid (pictured), who has been studying serial killers for 10 years , said she tried to warn Toronto police that she had built a profile of a suspected serial killer targeting gay men six months before he was arrested
She began to build a missing persons database as a project when she noticed a connection between three cases (Pictured, Reid with her database). She went to police in July 2017 and explained her methodology
The profile mostly matched Bruce McArthur, 66 (pictured), who was arrested on January 18 and is accused of having killed at least six men.
Reid determined that the killer was the same of all three victims who was preying on Toronto’s gay men.
‘At a certain point, you know that there is a serial killer operating,’ she told TKTK.
‘Studying serial homicide for over 10 years now, you learn not to ignore patterns.’
Using victim data, she created a criminal profile of the potential perpetrator and called police in July 2017.
According to Reid’s profile, the killer would be a man with a blue-collar job, a history of violence and no college degree.McArthur (pictured) is a landscaper who was convicted of assaulting a man with a metal pipe in 2003, and has no education beyond high school
Reid says that she spoke to a ‘very receptive’ detective for about half an hour explaining the database and her profile – which mostly matched McArthur.
According to Reid’s profile, the killer would be a man with a blue-collar job, a history of violence and no college degree, the Toronto Star reported.
McArthur is a landscaper who was convicted of assaulting a man with a metal pipe in 2003, and has no education beyond high school.
She even predicted the killer wold bury the bodies outside or somewhere near his home.
Police found the remains of at least six people on the property of a home where McArthur, 66, stored his work equipment.
However, she wrongly wrongly predicted that he’d be around 30 years old and a person of color similar to the missing people she’s identified – because serial killers tend to stick to familiar communities.
Police launched an investigation to the disappearance of two of McArthur’s alleged victims in July 2017 and called it ‘Project Prism’.
Police have been under fire for not doing enough to investigate concerns from members of the LGBT community about a string of disappearances.
On Tuesday, police Chief Mark Saunders told the Globe and Mail that the killer would have been arrested sooner if the public had been more cooperative.
Reid (pictured) even predicted the killer wold bury the bodies outside or somewhere near his home. Police found the remains of at least six people on the property of a home where McArthur, 66, stored his work equipment
He said ‘nobody’ came to officers with information in 2012 when police launched Project Houston to investigate the disappearance of three of McArthur’s suspected victims.
‘We knew that people were missing and we knew we didn’t have the right answers. But nobody was coming to us with anything,’ he said.
Toronto city councilor Kristyn Wong-Tam, whose district includes the Gay Village, said she was shocked by the comments and called them inaccurate.
‘I know for a fact the community rallied around asking for additional resources and attention to the missing men,’ she said.