One year before the disappearance of two men alleged to have been killed by Bruce McArthur, a man reported to Toronto police that McArthur had tried to strangle him in 2016, sources have told the Star.

Two sources with knowledge of the incident told the Star the man escaped McArthur’s grasp and reported the assault to police, but McArthur was let go.

The incident took place during an otherwise consensual interaction, according to a police source.

As previously reported by the Star, homicide investigators who are now probing McArthur’s case were unaware of the 2016 incident until recently, only learning of it after McArthur’s arrest in January, according to sources who are familiar with the incident.

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Toronto police confirmed this week that they launched an internal investigation into what lead homicide Det. Sgt. Hank Idsinga called “concerning” information that he became aware of. Idsinga said he prepared a report last week and sent it to the Toronto police professional standards unit. That report, he told the Star, was related to “the actions of some officers in a previous occurrence (who), I am led to believe potentially did not do what they were supposed to have done, according to our policies and our procedures.”

For years, residents of Toronto’s Gay village speculated a serial killer may be at work amid numerous reports of missing persons. After three men — Skandaraj “Skanda” Navaratnam, Abdulbasir Faizi, and Majeed Kayhan — went missing between 2010 and 2012, police launched Project Houston to investigate their disappearances in late 2012. The probe ended after 18 months when police could find “no evidence to suggest criminal activity.”

Police are now facing questions about their handling of the project. It is unclear whether officers spoke to McArthur during the course of that investigation.

Ontario’s attorney general told reporters at Queen’s Park Thursday that he was reviewing Mayor John Tory’s call for a provincial public inquiry into the police handling of the McArthur case.

“We have indicated to Mayor Tory that we will consider the issue of an inquiry and we’ll have an open line of communication to them, but I think at this stage, we have to be very mindful in terms of the criminal proceedings and the criminal investigation,” Yasir Naqvi said.

Soon after Navaratnam vanished, police detected a pattern in the disappearance of two other missing men with similar ethnicity who were known in the area of Church and Wellesley Sts. Kayhan went missing in October 2012 and Faizi disappeared in December 2010.

Near the end of 2012, police came upon information suggesting that Navaratnam had been killed — prompting the shift from a missing person’s probe to a homicide investigation.

That is when Idsinga joined the project with investigators at 51 Division, and for six months, looked into evidence including a suggestion that Navaratnam had been the victim of a cannibalism ring. Police developed a suspect for Navaratnam’s death during that time, but the man was later cleared.

By June 2013, the case was no longer considered a homicide probe and its status returned to a missing person’s case. Anyone interviewed from that point on was interviewed strictly as a witness, Idsinga said.

Police launched Project Prism in July 2017 to look into the disappearances of two more men, Andrew Kinsman and Selim Esen.

In November 2017, police came upon evidence that identified McArthur as a possible suspect in the death of Kinsman. Two months later, on Jan. 17, police obtained evidence that pushed the investigation “over the edge” and led police to arrest McArthur, Idsinga said.

McArthur, 66, is now facing six charges of first-degree murder: He is charged in the deaths of Kinsman, 49; Esen, 44; Kayhan, 59; Soroush Mahmudi, 50; Dean Lisowick, 47; and Navaratnam, 40.

On Wednesday, Mayor John Tory called for an independent review of the way Toronto police handle handling missing persons cases, as well as the circumstances surrounding the investigation into McArthur. Tory said he would move a motion at the next Toronto Police Services Board meeting to support a request from Chief Mark Saunders for an external review that would look at Toronto police policies, procedures, protocols, and training, among other things, that relate to missing persons investigations. He also called for the review to examine “any systemic concerns” about any “differentiated treatment or bias” including but not limited to the LBGTQ communities.

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The mayor’s proposed independent review is separate from an ongoing internal review by the force into how its officers handle missing persons cases.

Meaghan Gray, a Toronto police spokesperson told the Star earlier this week that the chief has always said, “if we come across issues that need addressing, we would not wait. We would act as soon as practical.”

With files from Star Staff