07/21/2026
Two Toronto police officers racially profiled a group of Black and brown men sitting in a car waiting for a friend outside an apartment building, “completely invented a reason” for stopping them and then “tried to cover it up” in court, a judge has found.
In her decision critical of the “well-meaning rookie officers,” Superior Court Justice Tamara Sugunasiri excluded the evidence police said they found on a man sitting in the backseat — a loaded gun and fentanyl — and acquitted him of all charges.
“Race clearly informed the officers’ decision to detain,” Sugunasiri wrote in her decision last month.
“To admit the evidence would weaken the right to be free from arbitrary detention, signalling to the public that only some members of society deserve or enjoy the right, and it is up to each individual police officer to decide who is worthy.
“In this case, the police completely invented a reason to approach (the accused) and his friends and then tried to cover it up later by giving evidence at trial that was not credible.”
The Star is not naming the accused as he is no longer facing charges. His lawyer, Adam Weisberg, said that even in cases like this where the officers’ testimony isn’t believable, “it still takes courage for a judge to make a finding of racial profiling, because jurists know it will have an impact on the officers’ careers and the public’s perception of policing.”
On the night of Aug. 29, 2023, Toronto police constables Shivdev Ladher and Jake Bozanis — who had been on the force for one year and six months, respectively — were patrolling in Regent Park and St. James Town.
They decided to check out an Ontario Street apartment building where both had responded to a shooting two months prior, in which it was believed two suspects had come out of an SUV and tried to shoot an intended victim coming out of the building.
As they neared the building that night in August, they noticed a grey Toyota parked out front. Ladher testified they decided to turn their lights on and approach the vehicle after he ran the plate, learned the car was a rental, and wanted to check licence and insurance — “the pretext for detaining the car,” as the judge put it.
Once at the Toyota, one of the officers believed he saw a small bag of cannabis fall out of the front passenger’s hat, triggering a search that led to the discovery of the fentanyl and loaded gun in the cross-body bag of the backseat passenger, whose charges were stayed by Sugunasiri.
Weisberg argued that the officers illegally detained and searched the vehicle’s occupants because, as the judge summarized, “the three men, who were neither the subject of a police investigation nor doing anything out of the ordinary, were racialized.”
The officers denied being aware of the race of anyone in the car before deciding to stop the Toyota, but Sugunasiri wasn’t buying it, saying their testimony on this point “lacks credibility.” She said their denials were “troubling” in the face of objective evidence, and said it also meant they had been “dishonest with the court, which can never be condoned.”
The judge said the police cruiser headlights would have shone into the front of the Toyota when Bozanis turned onto Ontario Street. And she said Ladher would have the seen the race of at least the front passenger — a Black man — as the cruiser slowly passed within three feet of the Toyota. Finally, while it was late, the street “was well lit” and the Toyota’s windows were not tinted.
During cross-examination by Weisberg, Ladher “insisted that knowing that the occupants were brown and Black men or tied in some way to a gang would not have heightened his interest,” the judge wrote. “When it was suggested that he would not have been suspicious of an idling vehicle with two white clergymen sitting inside, PC Ladher disagreed.”
The shooting two months prior outside the apartment building was clearly “top of mind” for the officers, Sugunasiri said; they were discussing it that night and had decided to go take a look. The judge found that after having seen the race of at least the front passenger, the officers backed into a nearby driveway with their headlights shining into the Toyota, as they decided what to do next.
“They saw three racialized men,” the judge found. “They were concerned about another shooting.”
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And that’s when Ladher came up with the pretext of checking licence and insurance because he discovered the car was a rental, Sugunasiri concluded. The judge said it was “not believable” that Ladher would detain every rental car that was simply idling outside of an apartment building.
“The additional factor of race is logically what distinguished the vehicle,” she said. “When the police use race to any degree in suspect selection or treatment, there can be no reasonable suspicion or reasonable grounds to detain the suspect and the decision amounts to racial profiling.”
A Toronto police spokesperson declined to comment on the case.
“Anytime a judge makes findings or critical comments about police conduct, an investigation will be conducted into any potential misconduct,” said Nadine Ramadan. “We take judicial comments very seriously, and if misconduct is found, disciplinary action will be taken.”
