Toronto Police have recovered the video that appears to show Mayor Rob For smoking crack cocaine, Toronto police Chief Bill Blair said Thursday.“The video files depict images that are consistent with what has previously been reported” in the media, Blair said at a news conference on the heels of a release of documents used by police to obtain search warrants during their summer investigation.“I have no reason to resign,” Ford said at a raucous 2:30 p.m. press conference despite calls from several councillors for him to step down.He said he would continue returning phone calls. Under a barrage of shouted questions from reporters, he left within two minutes.“I wish I could defend myself, unfortunately I can’t because it’s before the courts right now,” was his first statement.Ford has since May refused to comment on the video “that I have never seen or does not exist.”Blair also said alleged drug dealer and Ford friend Alexander “Sandro” Lisi, 35, was arrested Thursday morning and has been charged with extortion.The Star earlier reported that Lisi, who was arrested Oct. 1 on drug charges, was involved in attempts to recover the video.Ford himself has been the target of a police investigation that witnessed and photographed him in months of on-the-ground and airplane surveillance taking part in meetings with Lisi, according to the documents, released on orders of Superior Court Justice Ian Nordheimer.Only half of the 500 pages have been released. The other half will be the subject of legal arguments to be submitted by Nov. 8.Blair told reporters they recovered two videos from a computer hard drive on Oct. 29 that are relevant to their investigation. At least one will eventually be presented in court. The Star has been told by sources that the 90-second video its reporters saw was an edited version of the original.“It’s safe to say the mayor does appear in the video,” Blair told reporters.
Blair said he has seen the video. His reaction? “As a citizen of the city, I am disappointed.”The files had been deleted but were recovered by police. There is no indication that the video was doctored, Blair said.Based on the video, Blair said, there is nothing now that would support laying a criminal charge against Ford.
Ford emerged from his home around 9:45 a.m. Thursday morning and walked toward waiting reporters and photographers yelling “Get off my driveway” repeatedly before getting into his SUV and driving away.
The details of an extensive police investigation into Ford’s drug activities come six months after two Toronto Star reporters saw a video showing the mayor, obviously impaired, smoking what appears to be crack cocaine and making homophobic and racist slurs.In a heavily censored portion of the document, police said that the day after the world learned news of the video that appeared to show Ford smoking crack cocaine, top homicide detective Sgt. Gary Giroux was assigned to “investigate the existence of a cellular phone containing a video of Ford smoking crack cocaine.”The search warrant documents contain allegations that have not been tested in court. The only charges laid in the matter involve Lisi and dry cleaner Jamshid Bahrami, who were swept up in the Oct. 1 raid.“We continue to gather information,” when asked if the probe was still ongoing, Blair said.In the hour after news broke about the video, Lisi feverishly worked his phone, calling an alleged Dixon gang member and a resident of the now notorious 15 Windsor Rd. drug house where Ford was photographed with Anthony Smith, Monir Kassim and Mohammad Khattak.
Three copies of that photograph appeared in documents, described as information to obtain (ITO) a warrant.The newly released documents gave a detailed glimpse into Ford and Lisi’s activities on the evening of May 16 when online gossip site Gawker
and the Star wrote about the video.At 8:18 p.m. — just 10 minutes before Gawker published its story online — Mayor Ford called Lisi. They spoke for 40 seconds.
For the next 45 minutes, Lisi feverishly contacted an unidentified number, trading nine texts and four calls.
He then called Fabio Basso, who lives at 15 Windsor Rd. The call lasted just eight seconds.Lisi also called Liban Siyad, an alleged member of the Dixon City Bloods arrested during the June 13 Project Traveller raids on Dixon Rd. The two spoke twice in a matter of minutes.The only other call police noted in its allegations was 24-second conversation apparently between Lisi and an anger management centre.Lisi worked late throughout the night, repeatedly calling Basso, whose home, according to several sources, was the setting of the alleged crack video.From 2:21 a.m. to 10:28 a.m., Lisi furiously texted and called people, specifically David Price, one of Ford’s top aides and long-time friend, police said in their allegations.Ford called Lisi for the first time nearly 21 hours after news broke about the crack video. The call lasted 22 seconds. Ford called back a minute later from his home phone and cell. The two talked three more times that evening before Lisi spoke to Mohamed Siad, the alleged gang member trying to sell the video. Lisi spent the next day talking to Ford, Siad and another alleged member of the Dixon gang.A day after the Star revealed that drug dealers were shopping around a video appearing to show Ford smoking crack cocaine, Price contacted the mayor’s then-chief of staff, Mark Towhey, and asked “hypothetically” what the mayor’s office would do if Price had been told where to find the video.“Towhey had suspicions that Sandro was a drug dealer,” the document said.Towhey asked Price to look into Lisi but Price not able to find out much about him. Both had concerns about Lisi; Towhey was concerned because Lisi was the driver the night of the Garrison Ball, the documents said.Police generated a “timeline of Rob Ford related information” during their investigation. In this heavily redacted section, it said: “On April 9, police surveilled 15 Windsor, believed to be a crack house. Looked like drug trafficking going on ... “No known persons observed.” No arrests that day.And later, “A unified search query of Mayor Rob Ford does not reveal that his phone was reported stolen.”The documents said: “Confidential source tells police Det. Const. Clarke that 15 Windsor Drive (sic) is a ‘trap’ house. The house belongs to a couple of crack heads but Dixon guys go there often to ‘chop’ crack or just hang out and get drunk.“The source advises that they have seen the following people at this address: Liban Siyad, Abdhullahi, Monir Kassim, Ahmed Dirie, Anthony Smith.”Kassim was also arrested during Project Traveller on weapons and drugs charges. Smith was shot dead on March 27. Khattak, who was injured in the Smith shooting, was arrested during Project Traveller.From March 18 to June 24, Lisi had phone conversations with Ford and two of the mayor’s special assistants — Thomas Beyer and Chris Fickel, according to the documents.On the same phone, Lisi also spoke with Fabio Basso, who lives at 15 Windsor Rd.
Between Aug. 7 and Sept. 13, Lisi had telephone calls with Ford almost daily, often multiple times a day.
In the 44 days, Lisi and Ford had 349 “points of telephone contact,” the documents said.Ford helped Lisi escape police surveillance at least once, letting his friend sneak into City Hall’s underground employee parking lot, according to allegations in the police’s ITO.On Wednesday, July 24, a detective sergeant with the force’s mobile support unit followed Lisi as he weaved his way through side streets near the Westway.
Lisi “was followed to the downtown core where he began to circle the area of Bay Street and Queen Street West, executing U-turns on several occasions,” the police said.Lisi eventually dipped into the underground lot at City Hall. Ford, waiting at the entrance, “swiped him into the controlled access area,” the police said.
That night, Ford and Lisi watched the Blue Jays lose 3-8 to the Los Angeles Dodgers, police said.
The documents included several images of Ford and Lisi at that game.The next day, police again used the plane for surveillance, the documents said. They saw Lisi and an unknown male passenger drive to the TTC Wilson yard and in to what appeared to be a fenced in and secure parking lot (signed “Authorized Person Only/No Trespassing).The unknown man got in a white Ford Explorer. Lisi was followed back to his home, the documents said.Lisi also had contact with members of Ford’s staff, including Price, current executive assistant Tom Beyer, current special assistant Xhesjo Hasko and former special assistant Chris Fickel.
During their June 15 surveillance of Lisi, police alleged in the documents they observed him drive a red Mustang to the Metro grocery store at Royal York Road and Trehorne Drive. Lisi parked, stood outside the main doors, “scanning the parking lot while on his cellular phone,” then met a man walking a dog. That man was later identified as Thomas Beyer, executive assistant to the mayor. Both men got into Beyer’s vehicle and drove to Lisi’s Mustang, which Lisi gets into.On June 28, Toronto police Det. Shertzer and Det. Const. Davey interviewed Fickel.According to the documents, Fickel told police that the mayor and Lisi spent a lot of time together until “media release events [crack video scandal].”“Fickel does not know where the mayor got marijuana from but has heard that ‘Sandro’ may be the person who provides the mayor with marijuana and possibly cocaine.”Fickel told investigators that Ford met Lisi through Don Bosco football coach Payman Abdoodowleh, a man with numerous convictions including three assault convictions, a break and enter and assault with a weapon.The former staffer added that Aboodowleh “said that he was mad at Lisi because he was fuelling the mayor’s drug abuse.”There are also multiple examples of on-the-ground surveillance in the documents, in which a pattern emerged of meetings at an Esso station just 350 metres from Ford’s home.
For example, just before 4 p.m. on Sept. 8, after calls were placed to Lisi from the mayor’s Deco label business and his car’s On Star system, the pair met at the Esso gas station near Ford’s home.Police watched as Ford entered the gas station, bought a newspaper and a Gatorade, then waited in his car. When Lisi arrived at 4 p.m., Ford went into the gas station again to use the washroom without speaking to Lisi, who backed his Range Rover up besides the mayor’s vehicle.Ford got back in his car, the pair rolled down their windows, talked briefly, and then left.The documents detail another meeting at the Esso station around 5:40 p.m. July 1. The gas station’s security footage shows Ford arriving in his black Escalade heading straight to the station’s bathroom. Lisi drove up, apparently texting someone on his phone while holding an envelope.
Lisi entered the Esso and “searches around the refrigerators,” police said, before picking up a few Gatorades and a bag of chips. He left and was caught on security cameras standing near the mayor’s vehicle, holding the envelope.“Lisi appears to be looking around, possibly scoping out the area,” the document said.“He walks along the passenger side of the Mayor’s Escalade and walks out of (the security camera’s) frame. He is not seen again.”Around the same time, Ford left the washroom and bought a Gatorade and pack of gum. He spent about 10 minutes in the store.On July 11, Lisi put a package or envelope in Ford’s car at the Esso station at 5:44 p.m. Three minutes later, Ford leaves the gas station, gets into his Escalade and drives away. Ford had made two short calls to Lisi before the encounter, the documents said, and Lisi called Ford on his OnStar car phone at 5:56 p.m. They spoke for less than four minutes.The documents detailed a police background search that revealed Lisi had been charged but not convicted of 10 other offences between 1997 and 2009. They ranged from mischief and harassment to possession of a schedule II substance.
“Lisi is related to someone that went to high school with (David) Price and (Rob’s brother and city councilor) Doug Ford. Lisi’s relative, a cousin, is Joe Malfera,” the document said.In a letter submitted to the courts June 13 as part of Lisi’s sentencing for threatening to kill a young woman, Mayor Ford submitted a letter of reference to the court as did Joe Malfara (as it is spelled in the letter). In his letter, Malfara said he owns and operates a garage and gas station at 165 Rogers Rd. and has employed Lisi part-time between 2001 and 2009 and that Lisi has “conducted himself professionally and respectfully during his employ.”Surveillance on the ground and in the air on June 26 tracked Lisi and an “unknown male” as they drove a red Mustang from Lisi’s house to a soccer field at Renforth Drive and Centennial Park Gate.Lisi met Ford, who was watching a soccer game, the police documents said.Lisi returned to the Mustang and retrieved a white plastic bag from behind the driver’s seat. The bag “already contained items in it, as it appeared to be weighted,” the documents said.Lisi grabbed some cans of Minute Maid from the trunk and put them in the same plastic bag, walked to Ford’s Escalade, put the bag in the front and walked back to Ford, the documents said.
Police surveillance also included following Ford and Lisi to a local park.On Aug. 13, police followed Lisi and Ford to Weston Wood Park, where the pair “met and made their way into a secluded area of the adjacent woods,’ according to details in the documents.Police watched the two men for about an hour, then Lisi and Ford left the park and both got into their vehicles and drove away.Police entered the park and a “vodka and juice bottle were seized from this spot. So as not to reveal that the original bottles were seized replacement bottles were left behind.”Before the meeting, Lisi had received a call from a cellphone “associated” with Deco Adhesive Products, according to the documents.Under the section called “Biography/Background of Mayor Rob Ford,” the document notes Ford’s political history and philosophy, community service, volunteer work, football coaching career and football foundation.The documents quoted a police source as saying, “Whenever the Mayor gets Leaf tickets or something similar in nature he takes Lisi. Lisi normally drives the Mayor to these events.“Nico Fidani (a former junior staffer of the mayor’s) had brought up concerns that Lisi was providing the Mayor with illegal drugs. Fidani thought that Lisi would drive the Mayor around to ‘hot spots’s and facilitate getting drugs for the Mayor.“Fidani thought Lisi was addicted to drugs,” the police documents alleged.Outside his home Thursday morning, a visibly angry Ford shouted at reporters: “What don’t you understand? Get off my property.”Ford only said “thank you” in response to questions about whether he is the focus of a police drug investigation.As journalists backed onto the sidewalk, Ford yelled “Get off my property” several times and waved a handful of dress shirts he was carrying, as if to shoo them away from his black Cadillac Escalade. He also pointed at his roof, warning reporters there was a camera installed.The documents suggested police Project Traveller wiretaps also picked up details of meeting between Gawker’s John Cook and tipster who claimed to have an “associate” in possession of the video.
For Ford, the tough campaigner who leads Ford Nation, it remains to be seen whether the fact that police surveillance teams spent the summer watching him consort with drug and weapons dealers will have an impact on the former Scarlett Heights football player’s popularity. Olivia Chow, John Tory, Karen Stintz, and other potential mayoral candidates are waiting in the wings. Ford, who proudly says he has never given up on anything, has warned the election will be a “bloodbath” and that his fellow candidates will “bring up everything.”It all began with news of a video shot somewhere near the Dixon Rd. apartments, site of the Project Traveller raids.Ford is pictured alone in the video, shot on a drug dealer’s iPhone. A voice off camera goads the mayor into making comments. Justin Trudeau’s name is mentioned, and Ford calls him a “fag.” The use of Trudeau’s name gives a hint to timing of the video, which is also still a mystery. Trudeau was in the news for the Patrick Brazeau boxing match in early 2012, and in the news in early fall 2012 for his leadership battle.Intensely loyal to family and close friends, Ford has surrounded himself with a group of yes men who are equally loyal. When Lisi was arrested, Ford made a point of saying he does not “throw my friends under the bus.”But it is a small group, and it was unclear from Wednesday’s court hearing if Lisi is still a Ford ally.What is clear is that Ford and Lisi spent a terrific amount of time together. They met four times a week outside Lisi’s home just east of the Dixon Rd. apartments that were the epicentre of the Project Traveller guns and drugs raids.We now know that Lisi and Mohamed Siad, who wanted to sell the crack video, were close. Did Siad supply drugs to Lisi? That was likely a question police tried to answer.
We also know that a six-man Toronto police “spin team” spent hundreds of hours watching and following Lisi and Ford. They used cameras mounted on telephone poles, tracking devices on cars, listening devices and even a Cessna airplane flying low over Etobicoke, so low that people the Star interviewed said there was no doubt the cops were watching.A “pole camera” installed around July 18 on Madill Street to monitor Lisi’s home could be accessed remotely online by officers, the documents said.On July 23, the camera caught Ford arriving outside Lisi’s house around 9:30 p.m. in his Escalade and walking toward Lisi’s house. At 11:10 p.m. Ford and Lisi are filmed walking together toward the Escalade. The mayor drove off.
Ford may have known he was being watched during an Aug. 18 meeting with Liso in the parking lot of Scarlett Heights Entrepreneurial Academy, the documents said.The meeting ended when a police surveillance vehicle in the area was “spotted.” The mayor and Lisi drove out in their vehicles at a “high rate of speed.”
Lisi also displayed counter surveillance techniques (frequently stopping his car, turning into random parking lots and driving the other way, etc.) while police followed him.On Sunday June 16, police documents said they observed Lisi leave his home in a red Mustang, “performing counter surveillance measures” before returning home on Madill Street.Police said they saw a black Cadillac Escalade circle the streets around Madill. Officers traced the licence plate to Deco Adhesive Products, a business owned by the Ford family. Officers followed the black SUV as it headed away from the Madill Street area and identified Ford as the driver.A day later, police watched Lisi leave home and go to nearby townhouse complex at Islington Ave. and Dixon Rd. Several minutes later, Lisi was seen leaving the backyard of townhouse on Sweet Pea Path.
Lisi was followed to Richview Plaza, where he was seen entering Richview Cleaners and leaving carrying a pizza box. Police followed Lisi back to his neighbourhood.The police document notes wryly, “Through the research I conducted I conclude that Richview Cleaners only specializes in dry-cleaning and is not in the food industry.”The Ford family’s black Escalade pulled into Lisi’s driveway. Officers followed the Escalade when it left and identified Ford as the driver.After that June 17 surveillance, police discussed the difficulties of seeing “where Lisi is going or what he is doing” and the possibility of getting a “tracking warrant and or the plane.”The documents note a CCTV camera appeared to have been installed over the garage doors of Lisi’s home. The camera faced the driveway but police weren’t sure if it was recording.olice obtained a warrant to search a house and detached garage at 82 Thirty-Ninth St., the documents said. Tony and Celia Lisi, Sandro’s parents, bought the property last year.With files from Kevin Donovan, Robyn Doolittle, David Bruser, Jayme Poisson, Jesse McLean, Emily Mathieu, Kenyon Wallace and Mary Ormsby
