18 Year Old Syrian (Caucasian) Boy Shot 9 Times, Tased & Killed by Toronto Police

[BoxingSpecialist2]

I live in Toronto and this past Saturday in the Downtown Area (Trinity Bellwoods Area, I used to live there) we had an 18 year old male, Sammy Yatim shot 9 times by police, tased after being shot, and then immediately dying of his injuries on the scene. The 18 year old was armed with a 2 inch knife blade aboard an empty Transit Streetcar. He had no hostages, posed no threat or danger to anyone, but absurdly was killed by the Toronto Police. All 9 shots came from one officer who has since been identified as "James Forcillo", who has been a Toronto Officer for 6 years.

The 18 year old boy who was killed had recently immigrated to Canada from Syria, and had trouble speaking English, and seemed to not know his rights because he had only been here for one year. Here is a picture of the boy:

18 year old Sammy Yatim

Victim's sister, and 18 year old Sammy Yatim

To me, this case seems like extreme excessive force on part of the police officers. Here is a great article which points out some of the questions I have: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2013/07/30/f-toronto-streetcar-shooting-questions.html

Namely, why did officers have to resort to killing a boy when it seemes he posed no danger to anyone? Why did only one officer shoot all 9 shots into the boy? Why was he tased after being killed? Was it really necessary to shoot the boy 9 times? And since there more than 20 officers on scene, why didnt they attempt to wrestle him or even tase him first instead of resorting to gun use?

Here are some further articles;

Canadian Media: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2013/07/30/toronto-streetcar-shooting-fallout.html

Toronto Media: http://www.thestar.com/news/crime/2...ath_he_will_live_forever_says_his_mother.html

 

[BoxingSpecialist2]

My heart absolutely breaks after reading this story, and there was a protest planned in downtown Toronto earlier today to march in his support. Some people are saying the officer should be charged with murder. I feel so bad about this, and it really makes me sad to see a family immigrate here for a better way of life then something like this ends up happening.

I don't fully blame the officer, and we all make mistakes, but you really can't be trigger happy as a cop, and his actions were inappropriate and extremely excessive.

I wonder if this case will receive as much media attention as Trayvon Martin? It certainly should. If anything I believe it should receive more coverage because it has to do with excessive police force murdering an 18 year old boy. So far its been covered at a decent level but only in Toronto mainly.

I am sure that if the youth was black, there would be a lot more media coverage, and this would no doubt be on CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC by now. And the story would be recycled over and over nationally for the better part of 2 years.

I feel very sad for the boy and his mother. Maybe if I can attend any future protests I will do that and send some flowers or something to the family. This is heartbreaking. He probably had immense difficulty with the language and coming to a new country it can be hard to fit in.

Here is the video of the incident which was captured by someone's mobile phone;

[video=youtube;lG6OTyjzAgg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG6OTyjzAgg[/video]

I guess the cops in Toronto think its OK to kill 18 year olds with pocket knives on empty street cars who pose no danger to anybody. Talk about excessive force. Logically speaking, simply barricading the door closed until the boy had calmed down probably would have been enough to save his life. 20 officers and none of them seemed to know how to properly diffuse the situation. What a disagrace.

Watching the video, it appears one of the officers even kicks the boy's dead body after he's been killed. This is so disgusting and I have no respect for Toronto Police after this.

Toronto Police, 2 Big Thumbs Down. This is shameful.

 

[davidholly]

I don't have an opinion on this case but please stop calling an 18 year old a boy. We criticized the media for calling a 17 year old a child in the case of Trayvon.

 

[BoxingSpecialist2]

Well to be honest I didnt follow the Trayvon case that closely, other than to read what posters wrote here. So I was unaware of some of the particulars.

Maybe the term "young man" or "youth" is better then.

There was also a similar case involving Canadian police a few years ago where a Polish man was tasered to death. He couldnt speak english very well, just like 18 year old Sammy Yatim.

 

[Charles Martel]

Two sides to this:

1) If someone forces all the passengers and driver off a bus at knifepoint, then refuses to drop a knife he's brandishing after being repeatedly warned at gunpoint by a police officer, the chances are he'll be shot.

2) The first three shots should have been enough at close range, and it's irrational to taser somebody after he's already dead. So the policeman must have been so excited that he became irrational

 

[The Hock]

Suicide by cop. Still, there was no attempt to reason with the young man. They just went into Robo-Cop mode. I'm wondering if the trigger happy cop wanted to find out what it was like to use his gun on somebody. What a hero. No one else saw the need to shoot. At the least I think he should be off the street and behind a desk.

Keep us up to date on this one Boxing Specialist.

 

[Phall]

The remarkable thing about Toronto is that it's gone to hell in just 10 years thanks to Muslim immigration via airplane, whereas it took Mexicans over 30 years to make that same imprint on foot in the United States.

So, a belligerent, knife-wielding "young man" empties a trolley car with terroristic threats in a foreign language and gets shot by police after refusing to stand down. I'm about as outraged at this as I was by the Sean Bell story, which is to say, not at all.

The OP's phrasing is ridiculous, as usual. "He was just trying to make a better life for himself", blah blah blah. This is part and parcel of the black media apologia that every other poster on this forum no longer accepts as canon. In the off-chance that this alien intended to work menial jobs while paying his way through school rather than opening his palms to the public dole, obviously his psychological profile was unfit for the task. Let's ignore for now the tenuous proposal that everyone within a fortnight's ride by camelback to the Caucasus valleys is "White" by proxy of being "Caucasian".

Maybe if I can attend any future protests I will do that and send some flowers or something to the family.

I see you are already up to your old tricks, scheming over ways to chat up the cute little arab sister :happy:. I will give you a tip: when you cast your lot with the arabs and occupy protesters in this matter, you are not behaving like a conservative, and you are not aligning yourself with whites.

 

[BoxingSpecialist2]

The remarkable thing about Toronto is that it's gone to hell in just 10 years thanks to Muslim immigration via airplane, whereas it took Mexicans over 30 years to make that same imprint on foot in the United States.

The religion of the victim is unconfirmed at the moment. Personally, I suspect he is Christian. I say that is because of his first name "Sammy". A lot of Christian Arabs have Muslim sounding surnames, so with the surname you can't always tell. But his first name is a giveaway that he is most likely Christian. We'll see whether his religion is confirmed as time goes on. It is possible he is Muslim, but with his name, I suspect he is Christian. If anyone knows for sure feel free to post!

So, a belligerent, knife-wielding "young man" empties a trolley car with terroristic threats in a foreign language and gets shot by police after refusing to stand down. I'm about as outraged at this as I was by the Sean Bell story, which is to say, not at all.

I absolutely do not condone his behaviour in having a knife (which has been described by police as being 2 inches in length, a pocketknife, almost a toy knife). But at the same time, its important to acknowledge that the streetcar was empty and he posed a danger to nobody except himself. Why was he killed if he posed no danger to anybody and wouldnt it have made more sense to try and diffuse the situation (barricade the door, bring a psychiatrist etc?)

Don't the police have a responsibility to try and diffuse situations like this instead of immedaitely resorting to shooting a young man? Shooting him 9 times no less, also tasing and kicking his dead body.

As I said, this almost *exact* same case also occurred with a White Polish man who has tased to death by trigger happy cops in an airport I believe Vancouver some years back. There was a similar language and cultural barrier in that case, where you had recent immigrants being killed by trigger happy cops.

Let's ignore for now the tenuous proposal that everyone within a fortnight's ride by camelback to the Caucasus valleys is "White" by proxy of being "Caucasian".

Well he is Syrian, good chance he is Christian, and he looks White (say Italian) to me. Many Syrians and Armenians are considered white. Either way, I described him as "Caucasian", not white.

you are not aligning yourself with whites.

The 18 year old deceased is Caucasian and borderline white. If he is Syrian Christian, as I suspect, he would probably meet most people's definition of "white".

Also, as I brought up there have been similar cases involving Polish men in Canada being killed by the cops, and I was also outraged by those.

 

[BoxingSpecialist2]

Another reason that I brought this up is because I feel it should be getting more media coverage than it is. If the 18 year old had been black like Trayvon Martin, I think it would be more prevalent in the news and would probably be pushed nationally. Most likely this story will be buried in a few weeks, whereas Trayvon's story was pushed nationally for about 2 years.

The remarkable thing about Toronto is that it's gone to hell in just 10 years thanks to Muslim immigration via airplane

Oh by the way, just so you know, Blacks probably cause 70%+ of murders in Toronto despite making up only like 10% of the city. Whites, Asians, Muslims, Browns, Latinos are pretty much peaceful here. All the murders in Toronto occur in black neighbourhoods.

Toronto doesnt have a Muslim problem as you are saying. I should know I live here. We have a black problem and they account for the vast majority of our murders.

Toronto has gone to hell because of the Jamaicans in this city. Their neighbourhoods are filthy and crime ridden and nobody goes there except other Jamaicans. Even at that, Toronto has 6 Million people and only about 55 murders per year, which is much better than any American city. Probably 35 of those murders are perpetrated by blacks.

 

[Matra2]

The 18 year old was armed with a 2 inch [COLOR=#009900 !important]knife blade[/COLOR]aboard an empty Transit Streetcar. He had no hostages, posed no threat or danger to anyone

He was no longer a threat to passengers as they'd been released but he might have been a threat to the police as when he was told to put the knife down numerous times he instead moved in the direction of the police (D'oh! I don't think Canada lost a future rocket scientist here). Killing him does seem excessive and that's why there will be an investigation and that's why the police officer has been suspended.

BTW you left out the part about this Syrian pulling out his penis. So he was holding a three inch knife in one hand and his penis (precise inches unknown:icon_lol in the other.

The 18 year old boy who was killed had recently immigrated to Canada from Syria, and had trouble speaking English

Diversity is strength!

and seemed to not know his rights because he had only been here for one year.

He seemed to know he had more rights than he would've had back in some Muslim totalitarian country so perhaps that led to his bravado? (What is the punishment for hijacking a public bus/tram in Syria?)

I feel so bad about this, and it really makes me sad to see a family immigrate here for a better way of life then something like this ends up happening.

Perhaps Canada should be more selective about the immigrants it lets in.

I don't fully blame the officer, and we all make mistakes, but you really can't be trigger happy as a cop, and his actions were inappropriate and extremely excessive.

His actions seem inappropriate and excessive but let's wait until the no doubt soon to be well-publicised investigation is done before jumping to judgement. That adherence to established rules is one of the things that made Canada and other Anglo-Saxon societies more successful (and thus attractive places to move to) than, say, Syria, Saudi Arabia, or Yugoslavia.

I wonder if this case will receive as much media attention as Trayvon Martin?

Judging by the main Canadian media such as the CBC, CTV, the Globe & Mail, Toronto Star, and talk radio, it is getting just as much attention in Canada that Trayvon/Zimmerman got in the US.

I am sure that if the youth was black, there would be a lot more media coverage, and this would no doubt be on CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC by now. And the story would be recycled over and over nationally for the better part of 2 years.

I shudder to think of how big a story it would've been if he'd been black. But as we saw in the Trayvon case even non-whites like Zimmerman rank below blacks in the US media victim hierarchy.

(BTW in Canada Arabs are classified as non-Caucasians and are thus eligible for certain benefits at the expense of the founding peoples of Canada, the British, French, and other Europeans. So they don't hesitate to play the victim when it suits their interests).

He probably had immense difficulty with the language and coming to a new country it can be hard to fit in.

According to some reports he fell in with the "wrong crowd" (why else would he carry a knife in Toronto?) and his father, disapproving of his son's drug-taking, threw him out. But we don't know his full story just like we don't know the cop's side of things so let's wait until we get all the facts.

 

[Matra2]

The religion of the victim is unconfirmed at the moment. Personally, I suspect he is Christian. I say that is because of his first name "Sammy". A lot of Christian Arabs have Muslim sounding surnames, so with the surname you can't always tell. But his first name is a giveaway that he is most likely Christian.

My suspicion is that he is of Christian background. I met a number of Syrians when I lived in Toronto and all but one were Christian, with the exception being of Jewish background. Same goes for most Lebanese in Canada. It's harder to get into Canada (legally) based on your educational/professional qualifications than many other Western countries due to massive competition from applicants virtually everywhere in the world so having family connections (ie 'chain migration') is an easier way to get landed immigrant status. If most Syrians already in Canada are Christian most new ones accepted will likely be related to them in some way.

 

[Awake in America]

Obviously, a deeply disturbed young man, but the cop must have been a bit trigger happy. I thought tasers were for this exact type of thing.

I suspect he was a Syrian Christian. He doesn't look the least bit Arab, nor does his sister. Those societies didn't mix with the Arab invaders (who are part enwurd) very much. The Christian populations in Syria and Lebanon (and even Egypt) are quite interesting from a racial and sociological standpoint. Diversity has not gone well for them at all. Many have made themselves productive in the U.S. and other places, and the rest have to wonder why they are still there. Probably has something to do with the fact that their people have inhabited those places for a few thousand years. They are being exterminated. The Obama regime is helping fund the effort. I'd take a million of them coming here over 10,000 Mexicans.

 

[white is right]

Another reason that I brought this up is because I feel it should be getting more media coverage than it is. If the 18 year old had been black like Trayvon Martin, I think it would be more prevalent in the news and would probably be pushed nationally. Most likely this story will be buried in a few weeks, whereas Trayvon's story was pushed nationally for about 2 years.



Oh by the way, just so you know, Blacks probably cause 70%+ of murders in Toronto despite making up only like 10% of the city. Whites, Asians, Muslims, Browns, Latinos are pretty much peaceful here. All the murders in Toronto occur in black neighbourhoods.

Toronto doesnt have a Muslim problem as you are saying. I should know I live here. We have a black problem and they account for the vast majority of our murders.

Toronto has gone to hell because of the Jamaicans in this city. Their neighbourhoods are filthy and crime ridden and nobody goes there except other Jamaicans. Even at that, Toronto has 6 Million people and only about 55 murders per year, which is much better than any American city. Probably 35 of those murders are perpetrated by blacks.

Look up the Toronto Police website and do a rudimentary search and you will see more than half of thuggish muggings, sexual assaults and random quality of life crimes are committed by Blacks. Then when you go into more violent armed robberies and drug gang rip offs and killings it's probably even higher. Like Boxing Specialist said Blacks are a small minority that keep government red tape bureaucrats employeed by the thousands. For every Donovan Bailey there are hundreds of these boderline morons.

 

[BoxingSpecialist2]

My suspicions have proven correct: Sammy is a Syrian Christian.

As evidenced in this picture, taken at the protest for Sammy, the woman is his mother, and the two boys surrounding her are Sammy's cousins. You can clearly see one of his family members wearing a cross (the boy to the right of his mother):

So, you can be certain that Sammy was also a Christian, just like the rest of his family.

By definition, the vast majority of Armenians and Christian Syrians and Lebanese are considered white.

So, what we have here is a case of excessive police force involving an 18 year old white male who was shot 9 times by the police, tased after being killed, and kicked after being killed.

Already it seems this story is being ignored by the national media. Toronto media continues to cover it, but Canadian media has stopped and only covered it for about one or two days.

Contrast that to the similar example involving a 17 year old black Trayvon Martin, which was propogated and pushed endlessly for the better part of 2 years.

Had Sammy been black the media would have pushed this case for years and pushed as a form of propaganda. Had Sammy been black The officer would already be in court defending himself from murder and hate crimes charges.

There is an investigation set to take place. But I don't expect to hear anything remotely objective from that, as it is essentially the police investigating themselves. Conflict of interest. How can the police be responsible for their own investigation and evaluation?

It should be a non-governmental, independent panel that conducts the investigation.

Excuse my "French", but what a **** up in Toronto.

 

[Kaptain]

I often take the side of cops especially when the PC police start crying. However, this was a bit ridiculous. Why not tazer him first and then handcuff him? What if the Syrian was black or Indian? I can pretty well assume the cop would have thought twice before shooting because of the public outcry that would most definitely result. He may be Syrian and not completely white, but the guy looks 90% white - nearly as white as Johnny Manziel. Scientist/Paleontologist look at skull and facial features to decide race in absence of DNA. By those standards he looks pretty white.

I've had a couple of relatives flip out before and I'm glad the cops never took the liberty of shooting them the first time they had a weak excuse to do so.

 

[white is right]

I often take the side of cops especially when the PC police start crying. However, this was a bit ridiculous. Why not tazer him first and then handcuff him? What if the Syrian was black or Indian? I can pretty well assume the cop would have thought twice before shooting because of the public outcry that would most definitely result. He may be Syrian and not completely white, but the guy looks 90% white - nearly as white as Johnny Manziel. Scientist/Paleontologist look at skull and facial features to decide race in absence of DNA. By those standards he looks pretty white.

I've had a couple of relatives flip out before and I'm glad the cops never took the liberty of shooting them the first time they had a weak excuse to do so.

There about a half dozen things they could have done and the suspect would have most likely survived. As long as they know he doesn't have a gun armed force isn't necessary. They could have tear gassed the street car, or got police to wear riot gear and bum rush the street car and subdue the suspect, they also could have used bean bag guns or stickem type guns or a taser. This was poorly thought out and I suspect the co of the unit is getting chewed out by the brass of the police department. As for the policeman he will never work again as policeman and will be lucky to get no charges. Of course because of the powerful police union this could drag out for a few years and the policeman will get full pay and benefits until he is washed out.

 

[PhillyFanatic]

Am I the only one who has a problem with this thread calling a freaking Arab a White person?

If I was the Admin, I'd ban the OP and warn everyone on here to never make pro-Islam or pro-Arab thread.

 

[whiteathlete33]

Hey punk

DNA test prove Ashkenazi Jews are related to Arabs. Your pretty much saying Jews are White too.

It reveals your mind set when you say an Arab is White. I question whether your even White.

Looks like you are on another of your benders Matt`

 

[davidholly]

Am I the only one who has a problem with this thread calling a freaking Arab a White person?

If I was the Admin, I'd ban the OP and warn everyone on here to never make pro-Islam or pro-Arab thread.

Assyrians aren't Arabs, learn anthropology. Their whiteness is debatable but they most certainly aren't Arabs.