Already an investigation of unprecedented scale, the ongoing probe into Bruce McArthur grew ever larger Wednesday as Toronto police announced they are now examining 15 cold cases reaching back to 1975 and will soon search 75 properties linked to the accused serial murderer.

Growing, too, is the list of McArthur’s alleged victims. Yet another first-degree murder charge was laid against the 66-year-old landscaper Wednesday, bringing the number of men he is accused of killing to seven.

Police now believe McArthur murdered Abdulbasir Faizi, 42, a quiet and kind immigrant from Afghanistan and father of two who went missing from the Church and Wellesley area in December 2010.

Two years later, his wife filed for divorce under the false belief her husband had simply abandoned her — a conclusion she drew after an extensive search involving family, friends, co-workers and police, and which was described in heartbreaking detail in divorce documents.

“I have been to the area where he was last seen, Church St. and Wellesley St. in Toronto numerous times,” Kareema wrote. “All attempts to locate Abdulbasir have been futile.”

News of his death — delivered to Faizi’s family last month but made public Wednesday — brings closure but not surprise. Faizi had been one of three men whose disappearances between 2010 and 2012 were the subject of a special police probe dubbed “Project Houston.”







The missing persons investigation ran for 18-months and briefly involved the Toronto police homicide squad, but closed in 2014 after police found “no evidence to suggest criminal activity.” After McArthur’s January arrest in the deaths of Andrew Kinsman and Selim Esen, police have since charged McArthur in the deaths of two of the men linked to Project Houston: Majeed Kayhan, 58, and Skandaraj “Skanda” Navaratnam, 40.

With McArthur’s charge in Faizi’s death, police now allege he killed all three men whose disappearances were the subject of the special probe closed years before McArthur’s arrest.

Read more:

Opinion | Rosie DiManno: Another charge, more questions in Bruce McArthur case

Key dates in McArthur investigation

How McArthur hid in plain sight for years

Investigators from that project “feel a sense of closure that all three men have been accounted for,” Det.-Sgt. Hank Idsinga told reporters at a news conference at police headquarters Wednesday.

But whether officers missed key evidence during Project Houston and could have arrested McArthur sooner — saving lives — is top of mind for some within the LGBTQ community and beyond. Police have faced increasing scrutiny about their handling of missing people from the Church-Wellesley community in recent years.

“They had leads, there were people they could have followed up on, there were things they could have done,” said James Dubro, who has spent decades writing about the LGBTQ community, and who is among a group of activists calling for an independent public inquiry into the handling of the McArthur investigation.

But Idsinga stated otherwise, saying there was “nothing left for the investigators to do” and that the probe had been “exhaustive.”

“Hindsight’s always 20-20. You can always go back and look at what you did do or didn’t do. All I can say is that I was familiar with Houston. I look back at those occurrences now and I’m quite content with the job that was done by (local police) 51 Division in this case,” Idsinga told reporters.

As the Star has previously reported, investigators spoke with McArthur around the time of Project Houston. Later, in 2016, he was questioned by police after a man reported McArthur attempted to strangle him during a sexual encounter. McArthur was let go.

The following year, McArthur is alleged to have killed Kinsman and Esen.

Two reviews are ongoing into Toronto police handling of missing persons cases — one internal and one conducted independently, commissioned last month by the Toronto police board.

McArthur, who was arrested on Jan. 18, is also charged in the death of Soroush Mahmudi, 50, who disappeared in August 2015, and Dean Lisowick, 47, who disappeared in April 2016. Since the arrest, investigators have scoured properties linked to McArthur and uncovered the dismembered human remains of at least seven people inside the planters of a Leaside home where the landscaper worked and stored his equipment.

Idsinga announced Wednesday forensic pathologists have now identified three sets of those remains as belonging to Faizi, Esen and Lisowick. Through fingerprint and dental records, forensic experts had previously matched the human remains of Kinsman, Navaratnam and Mahmudi. At least one set of human remains is yet to be identified.

McArthur’s alleged murders now span from September 2010 to June 2017 — but police believe they may go far further back.

Working in conjunction with the Toronto police cold case squad, Idsinga announced police are reviewing 15 homicide cold cases from 1975 to 1997. The list was drawn up after the cold case unit reviewed outstanding cases that may be linked to the Gay Village from the 1970s to 2010.

Read more:

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Police chief announces review of missing persons investigations

McArthur investigators not ruling out 1970s Gay Village cold cases

As investigators continue to dig back in time, they also plan to search upwards of 75 properties linked to McArthur, bringing search dogs out and digging at some properties as early as May. The list of properties has grown from the previous estimate of 30 as more people have come forward to police who earlier may not have wanted investigators on their property.

Idsinga reiterated his commitment to doing “whatever we can to protect your privacy.”

Idsinga said Wednesday that police believe Faizi and McArthur knew each other before the alleged murder. McArthur killed Faizi “on or about” Dec. 29, 2010, according to documents filed in court Wednesday — the day he was reported to missing to Peel Regional Police.

His last known location was in the Church and Wellesley Sts. area, and Faizi’s car, a 2002 Nissan Sentra, was found abandoned on Moore Ave., near St. Clair Ave. E. and Mount Pleasant Rd. — a short drive from where McArthur worked as a landscaper.

Described by those who knew him as quiet and down to earth, Faizi worked on and off for five years as a press assistant at a Mississauga industrial printing company now known as WestRock. According to a fellow employee, he worked right up until the day before he disappeared, clocking out at 3 p.m. on December 28, 2010.

To his fellow co-workers he often showed photos of his girls and was particularly proud when they were dressed well.

Court documents show Faizi and Kareema had been married since 1999, and had been living in Brampton since November 2007. The couple had two daughters who were 8 and 11 years old at the time of his disappearance.

Kareema had filed for sole custody, and cited adultery as the reason for divorce: “It was discovered after Abdulbasir’s disappearance that he had multiple adulterous relationships during his marriage with men and had used the family’s financial resources and home for these affairs without (Kareema’s) knowledge or consent,” the documents state.

In an affidavit, Kareema wrote of her belief that Faizi was “avoiding all responsibility to his family, both emotional and financial,” and “avoiding completing a divorce and seeing and supporting his children.”

The last time they spoke was on Dec. 29, 2010 at around 7:20 p.m., according to Kareema’s affidavit. Faizi told his wife he was at work and then out with coworkers — Kareema calls both details “false statements.” His phone, she wrote, was disconnected shortly after.

In the same affidavit, Kareema goes on to detail her attempts to find her husband: she contacted all of his living relatives, including his sister and brother in Iran. She reached out to all the friends she knew of, in Canada and around the world. “None of his friends or family members know of his whereabouts or were aware of his other life,” she wrote.

She sent email messages to every email address she had of his, and messaged him on Facebook. She went to the Church and Wellesley area where he was last seen multiple times to try and find him — her last visit was in December 2011.

Faizi’s brother, Farid, and Peel Police aided in the search, she wrote.

The Star couldn’t reach Farid or Kareema for comment.

Wednesday’s developments come one month after police took the rare step of releasing a photograph of a deceased man who investigators alleged was a victim of McArthur’s. The photo was released with the hope that a member of the public may be able to identify him.

More than 500 tips have since flowed in, and investigators received a total of 70 potential identities for the man in the photo, which officers have winnowed down to 22.

Urging anyone who may have more information to come forward, police re-released the photo of the dead man that has been retouched by Nikki Ward, a digital artist and member of the LGBTQ community. Investigators also released a sketch of the man created by Toronto police’s Forensic Identification Services.

McArthur is due back in court later this month.