2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference
These moves were closely monitored by the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), which at the time was the only member of the Great West Conference that had not announced plans to join another league for the 2013–14 school year. With NJIT long seeking to join a conference with an automatic bid to the NCAA basketball tournaments, the school was expected to push hard for an invitation to either the NEC or the America East Conference.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference
The moves of Monmouth and Quinnipiac opened up potential NEC slots, while the America East was set to lose Boston University to the Patriot League in July 2013. According to a report by The Star-Ledger of Newark, the America East was more interested than the NEC in inviting NJIT. (NJIT would spend two years as a Division I independent before joining the Atlantic Sun Conference in 2015, and moved to the America East in 2020.)


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Missouri Valley Conference
As the Big East basketball schools re-formed as a non-football conference retaining the Big East name, they invited Missouri Valley member Creighton University to join them, along with Xavier and Butler of the Atlantic-10. The MVC courted several potential replacements including UMKC, set to join the WAC from the Summit League, and Valparaiso, Illinois-Chicago and Loyola-Chicago of the Horizon League. On April 15, 2013, it was reported that Loyola-Chicago would accept an invitation to join the Missouri Valley Conference in July 2013.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Great West Conference
The Great West had formerly been a football-only conference, but in response to departures in 2008 had added several schools moving up from Division II and become an all-sports conference. The year 2011 saw the departure of South Dakota State for the Summit League for all sports except football, which sport they took to the Missouri Valley Football Conference in 2012. The departure of the remaining football-sponsoring members North Dakota State and Southern Utah, and football-only members Cal Poly and UC Davis the same year led the conference to drop the sport. Houston Baptist then committed to join the Southland Conference in 2013, and the rebuilding WAC took Chicago State, Texas-Pan American and Utah Valley. The sole remaining full member, New Jersey Institute of Technology, was reported to be seeking a new home, effectively ending the Great West.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Horizon League
In May 2012, Butler University announced it would leave the Horizon League for the Atlantic 10 Conference for the 2013–2014 school year, but later reached an agreement with the Horizon League on departing early, with Butler starting A-10 play at the beginning of the 2012–13 school year. The loss of charter member Butler to a stronger conference, regardless of conference realignment activity elsewhere, had been expected by Horizon League officials due to Butler's rise as a national championship-contending men's basketball team under then-head coach Brad Stevens. Butler ultimately only spent one year in the A-10 before moving on to the reconfigured Big East Conference.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Horizon League
Initially, the Horizon League chose not to expand to replace Butler, as the school still had nine full-time members, including Valparaiso University within the state of Indiana, whose capital of Indianapolis is home to both Butler and the Horizon League headquarters. However, the split of the original Big East Conference, leading to the formation of the current Big East, had further fallout involving the Horizon League.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Non-football Division I conferences affected, Horizon League
Loyola University Chicago, the last remaining charter member from the Horizon League's founding in 1979, announced in April 2013 that it would leave the Horizon effective July 1 to join the Missouri Valley Conference, which itself had lost Creighton to the reconfigured Big East. Within a month, the Horizon had announced that Loyola would immediately be replaced by Oakland University, formerly of The Summit League. The addition of Oakland brought in a natural rival to the University of Detroit Mercy and kept the Horizon League at nine full-time members. Butler's spot in the Horizon League would eventually be filled in 2015 with the addition of Northern Kentucky University, which also served to expand the conference into the Upland South.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division II realignment, Great American Conference
Talks of creating a conference for the Oklahoma and Arkansas schools in Division II had been in the works since the early 1990s. In November 2009, representatives from East Central University, Southwestern Oklahoma, and Southeastern Oklahoma met to discuss forming a new conference. In April 2010, the presidents of the charter universities met to discuss the creation of the conference.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division II realignment, Great American Conference
On June 13, 2010, the above-named schools plus the University of Arkansas at Monticello, Arkansas Tech University, Harding University, Henderson State University, Ouachita Baptist University, and Southern Arkansas agreed to form a new NCAA Division II conference, leaving their conferences (the Gulf South Conference and the Lone Star Conference). On November 23 of that year, the league's council of presidents announced that the conference name would be the Great American Conference.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division II realignment, Great American Conference
On May 10, 2011, the GAC conference extended provisional memberships to two additional schools: Northwestern Oklahoma State University (which will join in 2013) and Southern Nazarene University (which joined in 2012).


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division II realignment, West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference
On June 18, 2012, it was reported that the 9 football playing schools and Wheeling Jesuit (now Wheeling) would form a new conference, breaking ties with the remaining five non-football schools.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference
For many years, the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) had an unusually large geographic footprint by Division III standards. Traditionally, its primary membership criterion has been academics, with geography being only secondary—all of its members have been private, with admissions policies ranging from fairly selective to highly so. Travel issues have therefore been a major factor in schools' decisions to join or leave the conference, and this proved especially true in the early 2010s.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference
The first move within this conference in the 2010–12 cycle came on June 9, 2010 when DePauw University (located in Indiana) announced it would leave the SCAC for the North Coast Athletic Conference after the 2010–11 academic year, citing its desire for "a less strenuous and more environmentally friendly travel regimen for our teams." DePauw's place was taken by the University of Dallas, which announced on September 22 that it would join three other Texas schools already in the conference. These moves proved to be a harbinger of more extensive movement to come in 2011.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference
On May 4, 2011, DePauw's student newspaper, The DePauw, reported that four SCAC members – Centre College, Hendrix College, Rhodes College, and Sewanee: The University of the South – had notified the conference that they planned to leave after the 2011–12 school year, also citing travel concerns. Just over a month later, on June 7, seven schools (the four already named plus Birmingham–Southern College, Millsaps College, and Oglethorpe University) announced that they would leave the SCAC after 2011–12 to form a new conference. These schools were joined by Berry College, at that time an independent D-III program, to form what would eventually be called the Southern Athletic Association.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference
Despite the departures, the SCAC intended to remain a viable entity, enlisting other schools willing to subscribe to the conference charter. Commissioner Dwayne Hanberry remained with the conference to oversee that effort, which was complicated by the paucity of unaffiliated Division III schools in the SCAC's new region of Texas and Colorado. Reflecting that challenge, the conference sought new members from the American Southwest Conference (ASC), whose geographical footprint is similar to that of the "new" SCAC.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference
On September 28, 2011, Centenary College of Louisiana, which had used the ASC as its original partner in its transition from Division I to Division III, announced it would join the SCAC beginning in the 2012–13 season. In early 2012, two ASC schools from Texas announced plans to join the SCAC for the 2013–14 season: Schreiner University on January 23, followed by Texas Lutheran University on February 16.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Landmark Conference
On April 2, 2013, Elizabethtown College, located in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, announced that it had accepted membership in the Landmark Conference, with the effective move date of July 1, 2014. The college's move to the new league ended Elizabethtown's 63-year affiliation with the Middle Atlantic Conference, and more specifically the Commonwealth Conference since 1999 when the MAC split into both the Commonwealth and Freedom Conferences.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Skyline Conference
In late April, the Skyline Conference announced that it would be adding its 11th full-time member as Sarah Lawrence College accepted an invitation to join the league based primarily in the New York City area. The school, located in Yonkers, N.Y., had previously competed in the Hudson Valley Men's and Women's Athletic Conferences and would change leagues following the 2013–14 season.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Division III realignment, Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference
Earlham College became a member of the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference in 2010 after previously being a member of the North Coast Athletic Conference.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
Division I men's ice hockey traditionally maintained a structure of hockey-only conferences with no relationship to the other major, all-sports conferences. At the start of the realignment cycle, only 60 schools participated in men's ice hockey, with most concentrated in the Midwest, New York, and New England.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
However, the decision by Penn State to add varsity men's ice hockey starting in 2012, triggered by multibillionaire professional sports investor (and Penn State alumnus) Terry Pegula's financing of a new hockey arena for the university, triggered a series of changes in the conference alignment. Most significantly, the number of Big Ten universities with men's ice hockey programs reached six, the minimum number of teams needed by a conference to receive an automatic bid into the NCAA hockey tournament. Thus, the Big Ten member institutions voted to add men's ice hockey as a conference-sponsored sport beginning in 2013. The decision required the five existing men's ice hockey programs from Big Ten member schools to leave their current conferences – Minnesota and Wisconsin from the Western Collegiate Hockey Association, and Michigan, Michigan State, and Ohio State from the Central Collegiate Hockey Association.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
In response to the departures of those programs—with a total of 23 national championships among them—the members of the WCHA and CCHA feared a loss of national influence and conference strength. In an attempt to create a conference perceived as competitive with the Big Ten, five additional members of the WCHA, and one from the CCHA, decided to break away and form a new conference, the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC). The NCHC began play in the 2013–14 season.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
With the departures of Denver, North Dakota, Minnesota–Duluth, Nebraska-Omaha, and Colorado College, the WCHA would have been reduced to five members (from their then-current 12), all of which were Division II universities. To avoid losing their automatic bid, the remaining members of the WCHA invited six of the seven remaining members of the CCHA to join the conference.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
On July 15, 2011, the NCHC was formed with the original 6 teams Colorado College Tigers, Miami (OH) University Redhawks, North Dakota Fighting Sioux (now renamed Fighting Hawks), Denver Pioneers, Nebraska–Omaha Mavericks (now athletically branded as the Omaha Mavericks), and Minnesota–Duluth Bulldogs.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
The situation finally settled out in autumn 2011, with one additional WCHA (St. Cloud State) and one additional CCHA team (Western Michigan) each joining the new NCHC and remaining CCHA members Bowling Green and Notre Dame joining the revamped WCHA and Hockey East respectively. As of May 2012, two Division I men's conferences neither gained nor lost members—Atlantic Hockey and ECAC Hockey.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
In that month, media reports revealed that Hockey East was in serious talks with Connecticut (UConn) that would see the Huskies move from Atlantic Hockey to become the conference's 12th men's member. From Hockey East's perspective at the time, a 12th member would ease scheduling problems. As for UConn, the move would place the school's men's and women's teams in the same conference. However, it required a significant upgrade to the men's program, which at the time did not offer scholarships and whose on-campus arena holds less than 2,000.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
Reportedly, the Huskies would play home games at the XL Center in Hartford (already a part-time home for the school's men's and women's basketball teams) until hockey facilities could be upgraded. The team would also award scholarships, and UConn would also add scholarships to some women's programs due to Title IX issues. On June 21, UConn and Hockey East officially announced that the school's men's team would indeed join the conference effective with the 2014–15 season. The UConn men would only play conference home games in the XL Center, with non-conference home games remaining on campus. This left the ECAC as the only men's hockey conference whose membership remained stable.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
On January 17, 2013, the WCHA admitted Alabama–Huntsville, who had been independent since 2010–11, to the league effective in the 2013–14 season.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Men's ice hockey
In a postscript to realignment, the CCHA would eventually be revived in 2020 by seven of the 10 then-current members of the men's WCHA; four of the seven schools had been members in the final season of the original CCHA, while a fifth was briefly a CCHA member. The new CCHA is set to start play in 2021–22.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Women's ice hockey
Women's ice hockey was almost completely unaffected by the numerous realignments involving the men's teams.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Women's ice hockey
Although the Big Ten then (as now) had six full members with varsity men's hockey (Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Ohio State, Penn State, Wisconsin), only four of those schools sponsor varsity women's hockey (the two Michigan schools have never sponsored the sport). Because the Big Ten has only four of the six teams required for an automatic bid to the NCAA women's hockey championship, it has not yet chosen to sponsor women's hockey.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Women's ice hockey
In addition, the original CCHA never sponsored women's hockey in its history, and in fact had only one member school with a varsity women's team (Ohio State, a departing member whose women's team is in the WCHA).


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Ice hockey, Women's ice hockey
The only change to the women's conference setup was in College Hockey America, which only sponsors women's hockey. CHA lost Niagara (which dropped the sport completely) and added Penn State, Lindenwood and RIT.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Softball
The realignment cycle had a significant effect on softball, leading to the demise of the single-sport Pacific Coast Softball Conference (PCSC) after the 2013 season. The conference, founded in 2002 with six members, had doubled in size to 12 in 2008. However, it lost all of its membership in two waves, each corresponding with the expansion of an all-sports conference which allowed that league to sponsor softball.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Softball
The first wave was due to Big Sky expansion. At the start of the realignment cycle, five Big Sky members sponsored softball—one fewer than the six required to qualify for an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. All five (Idaho State, Northern Colorado, Portland State, Sacramento State, and Weber State) had their softball programs in the PCSC. When North Dakota and Southern Utah, both of which sponsor softball, accepted invitations to join the Big Sky, that conference announced that it would begin softball competition in the 2013 season (2012–13 academic year). This led the five Big Sky members to withdraw from the PCSC after the 2012 season. The PCSC lost a sixth member when Seattle joined the WAC for all sports.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Softball
In the meantime, the BYU softball program entered a state of flux. Since it had just joined the WCC, which did not sponsor softball, BYU returned its softball team to its one-time all-sports home of the WAC for the 2012 season. After that season, it joined the PCSC, which was still home to the other four softball-sponsoring WCC members (Loyola Marymount, Saint Mary's, San Diego, and Santa Clara).


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Softball
The second and final wave was triggered by Pacific's return to the WCC, giving that conference the six softball schools needed for an automatic NCAA bid. Accordingly, the WCC announced that it would begin sponsoring that sport in the 2014 season (2013–14 school year). The remaining two PCSC members, Cal State Bakersfield and Utah Valley, soon accepted invitations to become all-sports members of the WAC.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Wrestling
On September 19, 2012, the Mid-American Conference (MAC) announced that it would add three new affiliate members in wrestling. Two of the new schools moved as a direct consequence of realignment.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Wrestling
The wrestling programs of both the University of Missouri and Old Dominion University were forced to find new homes as a result of their announced all-sports moves. Both moved from conferences that sponsor wrestling (respectively the Big 12 and CAA) to conferences that do not sponsor the sport (respectively the SEC and C-USA). As a result, both moved their wrestling programs into the MAC. Missouri competed only in the conference tournament in its first MAC season of 2012–13, and started conference play the following season.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Wrestling
As Old Dominion did not leave the CAA until July 2013, it began MAC competition in 2013–14. The third new MAC affiliate was the University of Northern Iowa (UNI), moving from the Western Wrestling Conference (its all-sports conference, the Missouri Valley Conference, then as now did not sponsor wrestling). UNI's wrestling move was on the same timetable as that of Missouri—tournament participation in 2012–13 and conference play the next season.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Wrestling
The CAA would drop wrestling after the 2012–13 season as a result of further changes in conference membership; see the dedicated section of the CAA realignment article for more details.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Lacrosse
With the 2014 addition of Rutgers and Maryland, the Big Ten would have had six women's lacrosse teams and five men's lacrosse teams. Both sports were sponsored by Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, Rutgers and Maryland, while women's lacrosse was additionally sponsored by Northwestern.


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Lacrosse
In the 2015 season (2014–15 school year), the women's teams and the men's teams (with the addition of formerly independent Johns Hopkins for men's lacrosse only) started competing as Big Ten lacrosse, leaving their former conferences (the ECAC for Ohio State and Michigan, the CAA for Penn State, the Big East for Rutgers, the ACC for Maryland, and the ALC for Northwestern).


2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, Membership changes, Membership change statistics, Football
The following table is reflective of both football-only membership changes and full membership changes that include football.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis
The 2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis was part of the wider downturn of the Portuguese economy that started in 2001 and possibly ended in 2016–17. The period from 2010 to 2014 was probably the hardest and more challenging part of the entire economic crisis; this period includes the 2011–14 international bailout to Portugal and was marked by an intense austerity policy, intenser than in any other period of the wider 2001–17 crisis.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis
Economic growth stalled in Portugal in 2001–02; following years of internal economic crisis, the (international) Great Recession started to hit Portugal in 2008 and eventually led to the country being unable to repay or refinance its government debt without the assistance of third parties. To prevent an insolvency situation in the debt crisis, Portugal applied in April 2011 for bail-out programs and drew a cumulated €78.0 billion from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM), and the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF).


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis
Portugal exited the bailout in May 2014, the same year that positive economic growth re-appeared following three years of recession. The government achieved a 2.1% budget deficit in 2016 (the lowest since the restoration of democracy in 1974) and in 2017 the economy grew 2.7% (the highest growth rate since 2000).


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
Unlike other European countries that were also severely hit by the Great Recession in the late 2000s and received bailouts in the early 2010s (such as Greece and Ireland), in Portugal the 2000s were not marked by economic growth, but instead were already a period of economic crisis, marked by stagnation, two recessions (in 2002–03 and 2008–09) and government-sponsored fiscal austerity in order to reduce the budget deficit to the limits allowed by the European Union's Stability and Growth Pact.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
From the early 1960s to the early 2000s, Portugal endured three periods of robust economic growth and socio-economic development (approximately from 1960 to 1973, from 1985 to 1992 and from 1995 to 2001) which made the country's GDP per capita to rise from 39% of the Northern-Central European average in 1960 to 70% in 2000. Although, by 2000, Portugal was still the poorest country in Western Europe, it nevertheless had achieved a level of convergence with the developed economies in Central and Northern Europe which had no precedents in the previous centuries, a catching-up process which was expected to continue.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
Portugal still entered well in the 2000s, registering an almost 4% GDP growth rate in 2000, but growth slowed along 2001; that year's growth rate was 2.0% and the unexpected slowdown was one of the causes that made the government's (still led by António Guterres) budget deficit to slip to 4.1%; Portugal thus became the first Eurozone country to clearly break the SGP's 3% limit for the budget deficit, and thus, it was opened an excessive deficit procedure.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
The 2002 snap election brought to power the Social Democrats led by José Manuel Durão Barroso; his government was marked by the introduction of harsh fiscal austerity policies and structural reforms, mainly justified by the need to reduce the budget deficit, a set of policies designed by his Finance Minister Manuela Ferreira Leite. Portuguese economy grew a combined 0.8% in 2002, was in recession in 2003 (-0.9%) and grew 1.6% in 2004. Ferreira Leite managed to keep deficit on 2.9% both in 2003 and in 2004, but through one-off and extraordinary measures.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
Otherwise, the deficit would have hit the 5% mark. Meanwhile, the first half of the 2000s also saw the end of the downward trend in the government debt to GDP ratio that marked the 1990s: the ratio rose from 53% in 2000 to 62% in 2004 (the ratio overtook the SGP's arbitrary limit of 60% in 2003).


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
Socialist José Sócrates became Prime Minister in 2005; like his Conservative predecessor, Sócrates tried to reduce the government's budget deficit through austerity and tax hikes, but refused to use extraordinary measures for the consolidation of public finances. By then, economy was clearly lagging behind European partners and the 2005 budget deficit was expected to be above 6% if no extraordinary measures were used.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
In the Stability and Growth Programme for 2005–2009, the government of Sócrates proposed to let the budget deficit to be higher than 6% in 2005, but to structurally reduce it to below 3% until 2008, a plan which was accepted by the European authorities. A notable milepost in the crisis happened in 2005, when the Portuguese unemployment rate overtook the European average for the first time since 1986. In 2007, the government achieved a 2.6% budget deficit (one year before target), below the 3.0% limit allowed by the Stability and Growth Pact.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
That year, the economy grew 2.4%, the highest rate in the decade (excluding 2000). Nevertheless, also in 2007, the comparatively low growth rate made The Economist to describe Portugal as "a new sick man of Europe". From 2005 to 2007, public debt was stable at a ratio of approximately 68% of the GDP.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
The Great Recession started to hit Portugal in 2008; that year the Portuguese economy did not grow (0.0%) and fell almost 3% in 2009. Meanwhile, the government reported a 2.6% budget deficit in 2008 which rose to almost 10% in 2009. Austerity was somewhat waned in 2008–2010, as part of the European economy recovery plan and the resurgence of Keynesianism (which called for anti-cyclic policies), but was resumed in May 2010.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
In 2010 there was economic growth (1.9%) but the financial status remained very difficult (8.6% budget deficit); the country eventually became unable to repay or refinance its government debt and requested a bailout in April 2011; in 2011 the economy fell 1.3% and the government reported a 4.2% budget deficit. Meanwhile, government debt-to-GDP ratio sharply rose from 68% in 2007 to 111% in 2011.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
In the end, Portuguese economy grew less on a per capita basis in the 2000s and early 2010s than the American economy during the Great Depression or the Japanese economy during the Lost Decade. Despite government policies openly aimed to consolidate the Portuguese public finances, Portugal was almost always under excessive deficit procedure and government debt-to-GDP ratio rose from 50% in 2000 to 68% in 2007 and 126% in 2012.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
The causes of the stagnation are complex, as many potential causes also affect other Southern European countries and did not prevent them from growing in the 2000s, nor did prevent Portugal from growing before the early 2000s. Economist Ferreira do Amaral points to the accession to Euro in 1999–2002, which was too strong as a currency for Portugal's economy and industry and took away from the country the ability to direct its own monetary (rise or reduce interest rates) and cambial policy (currency devaluation).


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
Vítor Bento also thinks that the belonging to a currency union created numerous challenges to which the Portuguese economy was not able to adapt. Bento also points out that Euro was the root cause for many the internal macroeconomic disequilibria inside Eurozone – such as excessive external deficits in periphery countries (such as Portugal) and excessive external surplus in core countries – and that such disequilibria were the main cause of the 2010s European debt crisis (and were, to a great extent, more to important to explain the crisis than states' public finances).


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
A set of economists (including former Prime Minister and eventual President Aníbal Cavaco Silva) points to the excessive size of the Portuguese government, whose total expenditures overtook 45% of the GDP in 2005. Such hypothesis was eventually the basis for the austerity requested as conditionality for the 2011–2014 European Union/IMF bailout.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
For Ricardo Reis, the accession to Euro was a root cause for the 2000s crisis, but for different reasons than the ones put forward by Ferreira do Amaral: the low interest rates allowed an influx of foreign capital, which the country's weak financial system misallocated to the low-productive non-tradable sector, reducing the economy's overall productivity. Meanwhile, the Social Security system was demanding increasing public spending, and the constant tax hikes in the 2000s limited the potential for growth of the Portuguese economy.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, 2000s economic crisis
It is noteworthy that from 2000 to 2007, taxes as share of GDP increased 1.7% in Portugal but declined 0.9% in Eurozone. Another factor at the root of the stagnation may be that Portuguese economy faced increasing competition by Eastern European countries and China, which were economies also specialized in low wages and low-value-added goods. Other more structural problems identified were excessive corruption and regulation, which makes difficult for business to get bigger and achieve economies-of-scale, as also the low educational attainment of Portuguese adults, low total factor productivity, rigid labour market laws and an inefficient and slow judicial system.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Anxiety on financial markets
After the financial crisis of 2007–2008, it was known in 2008–2009 that two Portuguese banks (Banco Português de Negócios (BPN) and Banco Privado Português (BPP)) had been accumulating losses for years due to bad investments, embezzlement and accounting fraud. The case of BPN was particularly serious because of its size, market share, and the political implications - Portugal's then current President, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, and some of his political allies, maintained personal and business relationships with the bank and its CEO, who was eventually charged and arrested for fraud and other crimes. In the grounds of avoiding a potentially serious financial crisis in the Portuguese economy, the Portuguese government decided to give them a bailout, eventually at a future loss to taxpayers.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Anxiety on financial markets
In the opening weeks of 2010, renewed anxiety about the excessive levels of debt in some EU countries and, more generally, about the health of the Euro spread from Ireland and Greece to Portugal, Spain, and Italy. In 2010, PIIGS and PIGS acronyms were widely used by international bond analysts, academics, and the international economic press when referring to these under performing economies.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Anxiety on financial markets
Some senior German policy makers went as far as to say that emergency bailouts to Greece and future EU aid recipients should bring with it harsh penalties.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Anxiety on financial markets
Robert Fishman, in the New York Times article "Portugal's Unnecessary Bailout", points out that Portugal fell victim to successive waves of speculation by pressure from bond traders, rating agencies and speculators. In the first quarter of 2010, before pressure from the markets, Portugal had one of the best rates of economic recovery in the EU. From the perspective of Portugal's industrial orders, exports, entrepreneurial innovation and high-school achievement, the country matched or even surpassed its neighbors in Western Europe.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Anxiety on financial markets
However, the Portuguese economy had been creating its own problems over a lengthy period of time, which came to a head with the financial crisis. Persistent and lasting recruitment policies boosted the number of redundant public servants. Risky credit, public debt creation, and European structural and cohesion funds were mismanaged across almost four decades.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Anxiety on financial markets
In the summer of 2010, Moody's Investors Service cut Portugal's sovereign bond rating down two notches from an Aa2 to an A1 Due to spending on economic stimuli, Portugal's debt had increased sharply compared to the gross domestic product. Moody noted that the rising debt would weigh heavily on the government's short-term finances.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Austerity measures amid increased pressure on government bonds
In September 2010, the Portuguese Government announced a fresh austerity package following other Eurozone partners, through a series of tax hikes and salary cuts for public servants. In 2009, the deficit had been 9.4 percent, one of the highest in the Eurozone and well above the European Union's Stability and Growth Pact three percent limit. In November risk premiums on Portuguese bonds hit euro lifetime highs as investors and creditors worried that the country would fail to rein in its budget deficit and debt.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Austerity measures amid increased pressure on government bonds
The yield on the country's 10-year government bonds reached 7 percent – a level the Portuguese Finance Minister Fernando Teixeira dos Santos had previously said would require the country to seek financial help from international institutions. Also in 2010, the country reached a record high unemployment rate of nearly 11%, a figure not seen for over two decades, while the number of public servants remained very high.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Austerity measures amid increased pressure on government bonds
On 23 March 2011, José Sócrates resigned following passage of a no confidence motion sponsored by all five opposition parties in parliament over spending cuts and tax increases.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Causes, Austerity measures amid increased pressure on government bonds
In the first half of 2011, Portugal requested a €78 billion IMF-EU bailout package in a bid to stabilise its public finances. [ 128] After the bailout was announced, the Portuguese government headed by Pedro Passos Coelho managed to implement measures to improve the State's financial situation and the country started to be seen as moving on the right track. This also led to a strong increase of the unemployment rate to over 15 per cent in the second quarter 2012 and it is expected to rise even further in the near future.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Re-access to financial markets
A positive turning point in Portugal's strive to regain access to financial markets, was achieved on 3 October 2012, when the state managed to convert €3.76 billion of bonds with maturity in September 2013 (carrying a 3.10% yield) to new bonds with maturity in October 2015 (carrying a 5.12% yield). Before the bond exchange, the state had a total of €9.6 billion outstanding notes due in 2013, which according to the bailout plan should be renewed by the sale of new bonds on the market.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Re-access to financial markets
As Portugal was already able to renew one-third of the outstanding bonds at a reasonable yield level, the market now expect the upcoming renewals in 2013 also to be conducted at reasonable yield levels. The bailout funding programme will run until June 2014, but at the same time require Portugal to regain a complete bond market access in September 2013. The recent sale of bonds with a 3-year maturity, was the first bond sale of the Portuguese state since requesting the bailout in April 2011, and the first step slowly to open up its governmental bond market again.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Re-access to financial markets
Recently the ECB announced they will be ready also, to begin additional support to Portugal, with some yield-lowering bond purchases (OMTs), when the country regained complete market access. All together this bodes well for a further decline of the governmental interest rates in Portugal, which on 30 January 2012 had a peak for the 10-year rate at 17.3% (after the rating agencies had cut the governments credit rating to "non-investment grade" -also referred to as "junk"), and as of 24 November 2012 has been more than halved to only 7.9%.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Rejection of Austerity Conditions and Political Crisis
In the parliamentary elections of October 2015, the ruling right wing party failed to achieve an operating majority despite having won the elections by a solid margin. An anti-austerity post-electoral left wing coalition was formed achieving 51% of the vote and 53% of elected MPs, however, the President of Portugal at first refused to allow the left wing coalition to govern, inviting the minority right wing coalition to form a government. This was formed in November 2015 and lasted 11 days when it lost motion of confidence.


2010–2014 Portuguese financial crisis, Rejection of Austerity Conditions and Political Crisis
The President eventually invited and asked the Socialist Party to form a government supported by 123 of 230 MPs in parliament from all parties except the former right wing coalition which broke into two parties. The new government (of the Socialist Party and independents) took office in November 2015 with a parliamentary majority thanks to the support of the Left Bloc, the Green Party and the Communist Party and the abstention of the Animal Welfare Party (PAN). In 2017, the IMF saw a 2.5 percent growth rate and an unemployment rate below 10 percent, but the European Commission expected Portugal's Government debt to reach 128.5 percent of GDP.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides
Between 2010 and 2017, a total of eight men disappeared from the neighbourhood of Church and Wellesley, the gay enclave of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The investigation into the disappearances, taken up by two successive police task forces, eventually led to Bruce McArthur, a 66-year-old self-employed Toronto landscaper, whom they arrested on January 18, 2018. On January 29, 2019, he pleaded guilty to eight counts of first-degree murder in Ontario Superior Court and was subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment with no eligibility for parole for twenty-five years. McArthur is the most prolific known serial killer to have been active in Toronto, and the oldest known serial killer in Canada.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides
The criminal investigation of McArthur became the largest ever conducted by the Toronto Police Service (TPS) and also called on the resources of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and other police and forensic services. Criticisms of the TPS's handling of the initial missing persons investigations have led to several internal reviews, an external review called by the civilian Toronto Police Services Board (TPSB) and the formation of a dedicated missing persons unit.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Early life
Thomas Donald Bruce McArthur, or Bruce McArthur, was born on October 8, 1951, in Lindsay, Ontario, and was raised on a farm in Argyle, near Woodville in the Kawartha Lakes region. In addition to raising McArthur and his sister, his parents fostered troubled children from Toronto, often with six to ten in their care at any given time, and had a good reputation in the area according to a family friend.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Early life
A young McArthur attended a one-room schoolhouse outside Woodville. A classmate recalled him trying to be the teacher's pet and informing of mischief by the other boys, with whom he did not fit in. He was also known for winning singing contests. McArthur's mother was Irish Catholic and his father a Scottish Presbyterian; both were devout, causing arguments in which McArthur supported his mother. This led to derision from his strict father, who McArthur later felt may have sensed his homosexuality. McArthur had trouble accepting his sexual orientation which would have been seen as abnormal in rural Ontario at that time.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Early life
McArthur was bussed to nearby Fenelon Falls Secondary School for his secondary education, where he met and began dating Janice Campbell, both graduating in 1970. McArthur later graduated from a program in general business and married Campbell when he was 23.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Married life
McArthur began working for Eaton's department stores as a buyer's assistant around 1973, in a downtown Toronto building later demolished for construction of the Eaton Centre. A few blocks north of where McArthur was working, a gay village was forming on Yonge Street between College and Wellesley streets, same-sex adult sexual behaviour having been decriminalized in 1969. McArthur left Eaton's in 1978 and began working as a travelling salesman for McGregor Socks, soliciting department stores to carry his merchandise. He later worked as a merchandising representative for Stanfield's, a garment company.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Married life
In the mid-1970s, McArthur's father was diagnosed with a brain tumour and was sent to a nursing home. McArthur became disappointed when his mother took interest in another man and grew much closer to his father at this time. His mother died of cancer in 1978 and his father died in 1981.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Married life
In 1979, McArthur and his wife moved into a house on Ormond Drive in Oshawa; by 1981 they had a daughter, Melanie, and a son, Todd. In 1986, the McArthurs bought a home on Cartref Avenue in Oshawa. He became very active in his church, keeping himself busy to avoid examining his homosexual feelings.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Married life
McArthur began having sexual affairs with men in the early 1990s. More than a year later he came out of the closet to his wife but they continued living together. Sometime after 1993, McArthur's employment in the clothing trade came to an end and the couple faced financial difficulty, in part due to legal issues connected to their then-teenaged son, Todd, who was obsessively making obscene phone calls to women he did not know. The couple mortgaged their home in 1997 and declared bankruptcy in 1999.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Married life
McArthur separated from his wife in 1997 and moved to Toronto, as there was no gay community in Oshawa at that time. He frequented the bars of Church and Wellesley, Toronto's gay village, and moved into an apartment on Don Mills Road while pursuing a four-year relationship with another man. When they broke up and his divorce was being finalized, McArthur saw a psychiatrist and was prescribed Prozac for several months. At about this time he was attempting to gain work as a landscaper.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Halloween assault
Just after noon on October 31, 2001, a few weeks after his 50th birthday, McArthur followed actor and model Mark Henderson into his apartment building after being invited into Henderson's apartment to see his Halloween costume. McArthur struck Henderson several times from behind with an iron pipe that he often carried. Henderson fought back, before losing consciousness. He called 9-1-1 when he awoke and was taken to St. Michael's Hospital. He had suffered injuries to his head and body and needed several stitches on the back of his head and his fingers as well as six weeks of physiotherapy.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Halloween assault
McArthur, who turned himself in after the attack, said he did not remember the incident or why he might have done it. He pleaded guilty to charges of assault with a weapon and assault causing bodily harm, and on April 11, 2003, received a conditional sentence of 729 days (two years less a day). A further charge of carrying a concealed weapon was withdrawn at the time. The Crown Attorney had earlier believed jail time was warranted but agreed to a conditional sentence after psychiatric and presentencing reports suggested McArthur was a low risk to reoffend.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Halloween assault
The victim, said by the Crown to have been traumatized by the incident, did not provide a victim-impact statement for the sentencing, and there were concerns that McArthur's unexplained behaviour may have been due to the combination of his anti-seizure medication with amyl nitrite, a muscle relaxant which is sometimes taken recreationally before sex.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Halloween assault
McArthur avoided prison, spending the first year of his sentence under house arrest, followed by a six-month curfew and three years of probation. During the sentence, he was barred from Church and Wellesley except for work and medical appointments, had to stay at least 10 metres (33 ft) from the victim's home or workplace, and could not spend time with "male prostitutes". McArthur was forbidden to possess firearms for ten years. He was not to purchase, possess or consume drugs without a medical prescription, and specifically not to possess poppers.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Halloween assault
He also had to submit his DNA to a database and was compelled to undertake psychological and psychiatric counselling including anger management. A criminal defence lawyer found the list of conditions uncommon and suggested that the judge was concerned that McArthur was a danger to all male prostitutes. A retired homicide detective noted that parole conditions were unenforceable, were not published or made public knowledge, and that parole violators were caught only if they come to the attention of police.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Halloween assault
In 2014, McArthur was granted a record suspension on the conviction, which was subsequently expunged from his record, and would not have appeared in criminal background checks during subsequent investigations. Most records and exhibits were destroyed in 2010, in compliance with Toronto Police Service (TPS) retention policy. The only surviving documents were the transcripts of the guilty plea and sentencing hearing, the psychiatric report and pre-sentencing report ordered during the trial, and pictures of the victim's injuries and the weapon.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Further on
In 2002, while the assault case was still before the courts, McArthur registered with Recon, a gay fetish dating website for men into BDSM, where his profile noted his interest in submissive men. He was active on numerous gay dating websites including Silverdaddies, Manjam, Grindr, Bear411, BearForest, Scruff, DaddyHunt, Squirt and Growlr. McArthur joined Facebook in 2011 and catalogued his nightlife with pictures of parties, vacations, birthday dinners and concerts. Younger men of South Asian or Middle Eastern descent were in several pictures.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Further on
By this time McArthur had become a part of the gay community and was a regular at its bars. Since 2007 or 2008, he was living in a 19th-floor apartment at Leaside Towers in Thorncliffe Park, a neighbourhood populated mainly by immigrants about 5 kilometres (3 mi) northeast of Church and Wellesley.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Further on
McArthur's 2003 banishment from Church and Wellesley remained well-known and he had developed a reputation for BDSM and rough sex. In 2011, he told an acquaintance named Robert James about an incident in which he had been asked to leave a coffeehouse, which caused McArthur to knock all of the glasses off the counter in a rage. James decided to heed advice to stay away from McArthur, explaining that he had heard disturbing stories about him. According to James, McArthur turned red and screamed about "f---ing f--- ots [ sic] telling stories about me!"


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Further on
and, "You're just like the rest of them, you think I'm crazy." A. J. Khan, a Toronto restaurant owner, remembered McArthur as a friendly regular. Towards the end of 2013, Khan inquired when McArthur came in alone instead of with his usual companion. McArthur said his boyfriend was on vacation, and when Khan noted he had seen the man the previous day, McArthur angrily left and never returned.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Further on
McArthur had become a self-employed landscaper, operating under the name Artistic Designs. A colleague who installed water features on three of McArthur's projects described him as more of a gardener, operating out of a little van with old tools. He said that McArthur was always accompanied by an older white man, who appeared to be romantically involved with him, and a day labourer, usually of Southeast Asian or Middle Eastern descent. Most of McArthur's clients were wealthy elderly women who found him charming, and he had built a client base through personal recommendations. During the off-season, McArthur portrayed Santa Claus at Agincourt Mall and made floral gifts for charities.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Perpetrator, Further on
McArthur's separation from his wife was initially heated, though they later reconciled. His son Todd was reported to have difficulty accepting his father as gay. In 2014, Todd was sentenced to fourteen months in jail for making multiple obscene phone calls. He was released on bail, ordered to stay with his father at his Toronto apartment and assist with McArthur's landscaping business. A former friend of Todd's visited one night and discovered the wall of McArthur's bathroom was decorated with photos of naked men with erections. He said that most of the men appeared to be "East Indian" and that Todd said that they were men whom his father knew. McArthur did not hide the fact, laughing over it at breakfast.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Houston
In November 2012, the TPS launched a task force, dubbed "Project Houston", into the September 6, 2010, disappearance of Skandaraj "Skanda" Navaratnam, believing that he had been murdered but had no leads. According to a 2018 W5 investigation, a man posted on cannibal website Zambian Meat in 2012 that he had killed and eaten a man in Toronto, which had led to the formation of Project Houston. Police briefly investigated a possible link between Navaratnam's murder and convicted killer Luka Magnotta, although this lead was eventually abandoned for lack of evidence.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Houston
By June 2013, Project Houston had identified two other missing-persons cases linked by geography and lifestyle: Abdulbasir "Basir" Faizi and Majeed "Hamid" Kayhan. Like Navaratnam, both men were middle-aged immigrants of South Asian origin who disappeared from Church and Wellesley between 2010 and 2012. An anonymous tip linking McArthur to Navaratnam and Kayhan led police to interview him on November 11, 2013. Police had been told that he had a romantic relationship with Navaratnam and had visited Kayhan.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Houston
McArthur told police that he knew both men and regularly interacted with Navaratnam at a gay bar, but denied being in a relationship with him. McArthur also admitted to employing Kayhan, with whom he had broken off a sexual relationship. Project Houston concluded with no evidence to link the disappearances, that a crime had been committed or to identify a suspect. According to a 2016 case summary, there was still nothing to explain what had happened to these men.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Missing Rainbow Community
On June 26, 2017, one day after attending Pride Toronto, Andrew Kinsman disappeared from Cabbagetown  and was last seen in the area of his residence on Winchester Street. On the evening of June 28, learning that no one had seen Kinsman in a couple of days, Ted Healey and other friends gained access to his apartment. They found no sign of disturbance, though his 17-year-old cat was out of food and water. They reported Kinsman's disappearance to police the following day.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Missing Rainbow Community
Kinsman, who was openly gay and had deep roots in the community, was regarded as a stable and responsible man whose friends felt would not suddenly leave, and certainly not without his cat or his prescription medicine. It was also noted to be unlike Kinsman to go anywhere without notifying friends or family. Kinsman was active on social media but investigators found his cell phone was turned off the day he disappeared.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Missing Rainbow Community
At the end of July 2017, the TPS created a new task force, Project Prism, to investigate the disappearances of Kinsman and another man, Selim Esen, and to look for any links with the unsolved disappearances investigated under Project Houston. Greg Downer, a friend and colleague of Kinsman's who set up Facebook groups dedicated to finding him and other missing men, organized an August 1 community safety meeting in which police gave an overview of the task force and thanked the community for "the abundance of information" that they had received.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Missing Rainbow Community
Queer refugees, transgender and two-spirit people spoke of their vulnerabilities, experiencing disproportionate violence within the LGBTQ community. Downer's group, the Missing Rainbow Community, provided strategies for staying safe when meeting people from dating apps. Realizing the difficulty police faced with judicial authorizations for data from servers located outside Canada, which caused delays in the crucial early days of the missing persons investigations, Downer appealed to dating apps to provide an option for users to consent to have their data released to police if they went missing. Safety hotlines were also set up for those reluctant to speak to police.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Missing Rainbow Community
Fears of a serial killer stalking Church and Wellesley grew on November 29 when the body of Tess Richey was found by her mother in an alleyway four days after she was reported missing. The following day police announced that the body of Alloura Wells, a homeless transgender woman, had been identified, her body having been discovered in a Rosedale ravine in August. Because of fears in the community, TPS Chief Mark Saunders held an unprecedented December 8 news conference on the three separate investigations into the deaths of Richey and Wells and the disappearances of Kinsman and Esen. Although the cases occurred in close proximity, police did not believe they were related and Saunders said they had no evidence of a serial killer.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
Project Prism was overseen by Detective Sergeant Michael Richmond and led by Detective Sergeant Hank Idsinga, who had served on the homicide squad for over thirteen years and had been assigned to Project Houston for six months. The task force also included an officer from the sex crimes unit and six officers from Police 51 Division, three of whom had been members of Project Houston. The investigation was difficult because of the lifestyle of the subjects, who used dating apps and frequently met people who they had never met before.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
Kinsman's disappearance was central to the creation of Project Prism because of a lead obtained at the end of July. Idsinga later said that "a crucial piece of evidence" was recovered because Kinsman's disappearance had been reported within 72 hours, after which evidence could have been lost. According to an agreed statement of facts read in court, police found "Bruce" on Kinsman's calendar for June 26 – the same day Kinsman was last seen. That day, surveillance video outside Kinsman's residence showed a person matching his appearance approach a red vehicle.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
The video did not show a license plate or a clear picture of the driver, but chrome siding identified it as a 2004 Dodge Caravan. There were more than 6,000 similar models in Toronto, but only five were registered to someone named Bruce; of those the only 2004 model belonged to McArthur. By late August or September 2017 they matched the van from surveillance video of McArthur's apartment, but it was no longer at his residence.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
Redacted warrants and police documents, partially released by a judge in mid-2018, revealed that in August and September, police investigators had obtained production orders compelling the release of data from Google, Rogers Wireless, Bell Canada, Telus, Royal Bank of Canada and Manulife Bank of Canada. Around September, tracking warrants had been obtained for vehicles and phones. In October, further orders were granted for information from Yahoo!, Air Canada, additional banks and Pink Triangle Press, an LGBT publisher.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
McArthur was named in a September 8 request to place a judicial seal on the warrants, and a later request to seal warrants issued from September to November noted "the investigation into Bruce McArthur." An October request noted "circumstantial evidence" that suggested McArthur's involvement in the disappearance of five men, including Kinsman.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
On October 3, plainclothes police officers arrived at Dom's Auto Parts in Courtice, Ontario, 70 kilometres (43 mi) northeast of Toronto. They were canvassing businesses for McArthur's 2004 Dodge Caravan, which owner Dominic Vetere confirmed he had purchased on September 16. The police found it intact and had it towed away, also copying surveillance video of McArthur visiting the shop. Vetere said that officers later told him that they had found trace amounts of blood in the vehicle. This blood was identified as Kinsman's.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
Court documents show that in November cadaver dogs were brought to a Mallory Crescent residence in the Leaside neighbourhood of Toronto. McArthur had an arrangement to tend to the owners' yard in exchange for storage space in their garage for his landscaping equipment. The dogs did not indicate any human remains. A camera was installed to monitor the garage. Police also obtained a log of McArthur's key fob for his apartment. With this and a tracking warrant for his cellphone, they built a timeline of the day Kinsman went missing.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
DNA evidence from McArthur's van which matched Kinsman and Esen allowed investigators to obtain a general warrant for McArthur's apartment on December 4. Police then covertly entered McArthur's residence and cloned his computer's hard drive. On December 5, after consultation with the community, Project Prism issued a warning about dating apps, urging users to exercise caution when meeting someone.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
In a December 8 news conference, Project Prism investigators said they had completed 62 witness interviews, 28 judicial authorizations and assigned 308 actions of which 225 had been completed. Police had also conducted searches, utilizing resources from the mounted and canine units; on one occasion a drone was used. They said that they had no evidence to link the disappearances.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Missing persons investigations, Project Prism
The investigation picked up in January 2018, when Idsinga noted they had many 15-hour days and a 72-hour stretch of intensive investigation in mid-January. On January 17, two pieces of evidence came to light directly connecting McArthur to the disappearances of Esen and of Kinsman. A partial download from McArthur's computer, which was going through forensic analysis of deleted files, yielded post-mortem photos of the victims that day. Round-the-clock surveillance was put on McArthur, with instructions that McArthur should be immediately arrested if observed "alone with anyone".


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Arrest
Police officers surveilling McArthur decided to apprehend him shortly after they saw a young man enter his Thorncliffe Park apartment on January 18, 2018, believing the man's life was at risk. A source told CTV News that the police officers found the young man restrained on a bed when they entered McArthur's apartment. The man was shaken but not injured. Referred to in court as "John", the man had arrived in Canada from the Middle East five years earlier, was married and had not told his family that he was gay.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Arrest
He had met McArthur through dating app Growlr, and said that they had met for sex several times. He had agreed to keep his relationship with McArthur secret, and let himself be handcuffed to McArthur's steel bedframe. McArthur put a black bag over his head and tried to tape his mouth shut before police officers interrupted him.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Arrest
According to CP24, the officers had a search warrant for the apartment, obtained after gaining blood evidence from McArthur's van. Police seized electronic devices from the apartment, including five cellphones, five computers, three digital cameras, and about a dozen USB flash drives. Evidence found in McArthur's apartment shortly after the arrest prompted investigators to charge McArthur with two counts of first-degree murder in the presumed deaths of Andrew Kinsman and Selim Esen. Their bodies had not been found, but police said that they had a "pretty good idea" of how they died. Idsinga was satisfied that there was enough evidence for murder convictions even without the bodies.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Arrest
A source told CTV News that photographs of the alleged victims found at McArthur's residence led to the charges. The Toronto Sun reported that McArthur's computer had grisly photos of his suspected victims kept as trophies.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation
At the time of McArthur's arrest, Idsinga said that police believed he was responsible for the deaths of other men and were most concerned with identifying these victims. Doing so included coordinating with other police services, tracing McArthur's whereabouts and his online activity.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation
By the end of January, Idsinga said they were investigating an alleged serial killer who had concealed evidence by burying it across the city. He described the ongoing case as unprecedented, with hundreds of officers involved and 30 properties to be searched. The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), the Ontario Forensic Pathology Service (OFPS) and the Centre of Forensic Sciences (CFS) were aiding with the searches of McArthur's apartment and the Leaside property. Additional charges were laid and at the end of February, the investigation was expanded to outstanding murder cases, hundreds of missing-persons cases and sudden death occurrences, coordinating with other Canadian and international forces.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
Police executed search warrants on January 18 at five properties associated with McArthur and his landscaping business: four in Toronto and a 9-acre (3.6 ha) property about 200 kilometres (120 mi) northeast in Madoc, Ontario. The Madoc property and a home on Conlins Road were residences of Roger Horan, a landscaper and long-time friend of McArthur. Another property searched was the condominium of McArthur's former boyfriend on Concorde Place. These three properties were released back to their owners by January 23. Of greater concern to investigators were McArthur's high-rise apartment in Thorncliffe Park and the Mallory Crescent residence in Leaside.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
The owners of the Leaside residence were barred from their home January 18 so that forensic investigators could search it. The search of the property was extended to an adjacent ravine, aided by cadaver dogs and members of the heavy urban search and rescue team. Cadaver dogs took a "strong interest" in large planter boxes on January 19. The planters had frozen to the ground, requiring heaters to thaw them. A large planter was wrapped on January 22 and brought to the coroner's office.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
On January 29, police announced that they had found the dismembered skeletal remains of at least three people in two of twelve large planter boxes seized from the Leaside residence. Although the remains had not been identified, police had gathered enough evidence to charge McArthur with three additional counts of first-degree murder in the presumed deaths of Majeed Kayhan, a Project Houston subject, Soroush Mahmudi, who disappeared in 2015, and Dean Lisowick, a homeless man who was never reported missing.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
Former homicide detective Mark Mendelson said the investigation would become "the largest Toronto has undertaken". Criminologist and Western University professor Michael Arntfield said that the alleged method of disposal suggested a sophisticated killer who had developed his craft and, as most serial killers begin in their 20s, the crimes could go back several decades and represent the longest run of a serial killer on record. McArthur's past as a travelling salesman suggested to John Bradford, a forensic psychiatrist and expert on serial murders, that police might have a province-wide investigation ahead of them. Toronto crime journalist James Dubro said the allegations suggest McArthur was the deadliest known serial killer in Toronto and the "most prolific" gay serial killer in Canada.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
On February 8, police announced that they had found the remains of three more people in planters from the Leaside home, and that one of the six sets of remains belonged to Andrew Kinsman, identified through fingerprints. Investigators said that it could be months before all the remains were identified.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
Additional planters were seized from across the city including one from the Danforth neighbourhood and two properties in North Rosedale were searched. Cadaver dogs were having trouble detecting scents due to the cold weather and frozen ground.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
Beginning on January 19, heaters in a large tent were used to gradually thaw the frozen ground in the backyard of the Leaside home at a location indicated by both cadaver dogs and ground-penetrating radar. A forensic pathologist was expected to take at least 10 days to excavate for remains by hand. Forensic anthropologist Dr. Kathy Gruspier, who arrived to oversee the excavation, did not find any sign of soil disturbance by previous digging. Excavation of two sewage lines at the home was conducted on February 13, and a section of one line was removed for testing.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
The police investigation had a continuous presence at the Leaside home, often described as "ground zero", and police established a command post on the property. On February 10–11 the search of the house was completed and it was released to its owners after more than three weeks. The owners requested that police keep crime-scene tape up around the yard to deter reporters by whom they were feeling increasingly harassed.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
Forensic investigators spent hundreds of hours searching every inch of McArthur's apartment, where Idsinga suspected some of the murders occurred. It took them several weeks before searching McArthur's bedroom, where they expected to find the bulk of their evidence. The search concluded on May 11, having occupied ten forensic officers for nearly four months. They took more than 18,000 photographs and collected over 1,800 items. Idsinga noted the thoroughness required as the first murder was believed to have occurred eight years previously. The searches of the Leaside home and McArthur's apartment made up the largest forensic investigation conducted by the TPS.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
On February 23, McArthur was charged with a sixth count of first-degree murder in the death of Skandaraj Navaratnam, a subject of Project Houston. Navaratnam's remains and those of Mahmudi were identified through dental records, and had been recovered from planters at the Leaside home.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
On March 5, police held a press conference and released a photo of an unidentified deceased man alleged to be another of McArthur's victims. They had exhausted their options in identifying the man and hoped the public could help. Police later received over 500 tips regarding the photo and were checking on 22 potential identities. They also announced that a seventh set of remains had been recovered from the Leaside planters. Dr. Michael Pollanen, Ontario's chief forensic pathologist, said his organization had never before been involved in an investigation with such scope, drawing on the skills of each member for many unique challenges, such as scientific issues related to decomposition and post-mortem dismemberment.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
On April 11, McArthur was charged with a seventh count of first-degree murder in the death of Abdulbasir Faizi. He was, at this point, charged with the deaths of all five men from the Project Houston and Project Prism investigations. The charge came as Faizi's remains were identified from the Leaside planters, along with those of Esen and Lisowick. Investigators had finished searching the Leaside planters, from which the remains of all but Kayhan had been identified; they had one set of unidentified remains. They had also searched eight additional planters from elsewhere in the city, which had contained no human remains.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Apartment and Leaside home
On April 16, McArthur was charged with an eighth count of first-degree murder in the death of Kirushna Kumar Kanagaratnam, whose remains were the seventh set identified from the Leaside planters. Police said his name had not come from the many tips generated by the release of his post-mortem photograph but that he had been identified with help from an undisclosed international agency. Kanagaratnam was a Tamil asylum-seeker who was under a deportation order and had not been reported missing. Police said they would look into why his name was not on a list of missing persons. He had last had contact with his family in August 2015, and police believed that he had been killed between September 3 and December 14, 2015.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
The scope of the investigation was expanded at the end of February 2018, looking at outstanding murder cases, hundreds of missing-persons cases and sudden death occurrences and coordinating with other Canadian and international forces. Police had received tips from around the world, including countries where McArthur had vacationed. Idsinga said that the investigation would take years.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
A police source told the National Post that McArthur had covered his tracks, using aliases online, using pay phones instead of cellphones and avoiding areas with surveillance cameras. The source suggested that McArthur had targeted vulnerable men who did not have a fixed address or had not told their families that they were gay.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
Detective-Sergeant Stacy Gallant of the TPS homicide squad's cold-case unit said that active crime scenes of the investigation took precedence over revisiting cold cases. Each of 600 cold cases was being looked at for consideration of further attention. They drew up a list of 15 homicide cold cases linked to the gay village, and fitting the general profile of the victims identified thus far. Investigators began reviewing these cold cases, dating between 1975 and 1997, for a possible connection to McArthur. By mid-July, forensic testing related to the cold cases was underway, searching for links to McArthur.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
The cold cases include some of a series of brutal murders in the gay village between 1975 and 1978, when McArthur would have been 23–26 years old and working just a few blocks south of the gay village. The victims of these crimes, all gay men, were found in their homes, naked, tied to beds, and stabbed or beaten to death in a manner described as "overkill". In October 2018, homicide detective David Dickinson said that they had not yet found any links between McArthur and the cold cases.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
Investigators had planned to return to the 30 properties associated with McArthur in April or May, when the frozen ground had thawed, allowing cadaver dogs to operate with greater accuracy. Idsinga said he was particularly interested in excavating at three properties,The excavations included a return visit to the Leaside residence, where remains had been found. Additional tip-offs caused the number of properties to be searched grow to 75 then 100, some of them outside the city. A team of seven cadaver dogs, some on loan from other GTA police forces, were searching the properties by the second week of May. These searches had concluded by the first week of June. Follow-up investigations had then considered whether additional searches would be required.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
Between July 4 and 13, twenty police investigators conducted excavations in the forested ravine behind the Leaside property. They began sifting through a large compost pile, then proceeded with the guidance of trained dogs and a forensic anthropologist. They collected human remains almost every day of this search. On July 20, it was announced that the remains belonged to Kayhan, and that the remains of all of McArthur's alleged victims had been identified. Idsinga said that they had no evidence suggesting McArthur was connected to any other deaths, though the investigation into cold cases was continuing.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Homicide investigation, Expanded investigation
Waterloo Regional Police contacted Ontario's serial predator crime investigations coordinator to inquire about McArthur in the November 2002 disappearance of David MacDermott from downtown Kitchener. Jon Riley of Meaford, Ontario, is another possible victim. He had gone to Toronto to find work in landscaping, planning to stay in a shelter at Church and Wellesley, and disappeared in May 2013.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Five victims were noted by investigators for similarities: middle-aged, bearded, patrons of The Black Eagle bar, and self-identified as "bears" (gay men with overtly masculine traits, such as beards). They had also disappeared over holiday weekends: Navaratnam at Labour Day, Faizi after Christmas, Kayhan during Thanksgiving, Esen on Easter, and Kinsman after Toronto Pride. During McArthur's sentencing hearing, prosecutors said that the eight victims had ties to Church and Wellesley and a "social life" in that community, physical similarities which usually included facial hair or a beard, and six were from South Asia or the Middle East. Several of the deceased had characteristics that made them more easily victimized or the crimes easier to conceal, such as moving between temporary residences or keeping aspects of their lives secret.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
All information should be properly sourced below and is accurate as of June 23, 2018. Notes are intended to briefly show commonalities, vulnerabilities and connections to McArthur.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Skandaraj "Skanda" Navaratnam, 40, was last seen in the early morning of September 6, 2010, leaving Zippers, a former gay village bar, with an unknown man. A friend who saw Navaratnam the day before said he was excited about having a dog; he left this pet behind at the bar when he disappeared. He was reported missing September 10 or 11, 2010. Navaratnam was romantically involved with McArthur, whom he met in 1999. Navaratnam also worked for McArthur's landscaping business and friends said that they were still involved in 2008. Navaratnam was a Tamil refugee from Sri Lanka and had no family members in Canada.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Abdulbasir "Basir" Faizi, 42, was last seen December 28, 2010, leaving his workplace in Mississauga, though banking records later placed him at Church and Wellesley. His last night out included a stop at the Black Eagle bar and the Steamworks bathhouse. He was an immigrant from Afghanistan. While living in Iran, a childhood friend had cautioned him on coming out as gay, advising that he should "find God or leave". That conflict remained with Faizi, who was not out to his family.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
A colleague said that he had been working overtime to ensure that his two daughters got everything that they wanted for Christmas. He was reported missing on December 29 to Peel Regional Police, west of Toronto. His 2002 Nissan Sentra was found abandoned on Moore Avenue, steps away from the Beltline Trail, a small ravine which is a popular cruising spot for gay men. Moore Avenue connects to Mallory Crescent and the Leaside home where McArthur stored his landscaping equipment. On April 11, 2018, police charged McArthur with the murder of Faizi, which occurred on or about December 29, 2010.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Majeed "Hamid" Kayhan, 58, was last seen October 18, 2012, in the gay village near Yonge Street and Alexander Street. He was reported missing by his adult son on October 25. Kayhan was an immigrant from Afghanistan, who fled to Canada with his wife and children in the late 1980s. Kayhan and his wife divorced in 2002 but, as the son of a Muslim cleric, he had not come out to his entire family. He suffered PTSD from the Soviet–Afghan War and was a heavy drinker.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
According to a bartender, Kayhan had been active in the gay village since the mid-1990s and would stay at an apartment kept by his partner, who had also not come out to his family. Following the death of his partner, Kayhan romantically pursued McArthur whom he knew from the Black Eagle. Kayhan's remains were found in a ravine behind the Leaside property, the eighth set to be identified.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Soroush Mahmudi, 50, was last seen alive on August 14, 2015, by his home near Markham Road and Blakemanor Boulevard in the South Cedarbrae neighbourhood. He was a manufacturing plant worker who lived with his wife. Police believe that McArthur killed Mahmudi on or about August 15, 2015. He was reported missing by his wife in August. Mahmudi had come to Canada as a refugee from Iran and did not have any family in Canada until he met his wife. They moved from Barrie to Toronto to be closer to his wife's family. Police and his family had not connected him to Toronto's gay scene, though before his marriage he had been in a four-year relationship with a transgender woman he met in a bar in Church and Wellesley.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Andrew Kinsman, 49, was last seen June 26, 2017, the day after the Pride parade, near his Winchester Street residence in Cabbagetown, south of the gay village. He was reported missing on June 29. A friend who last saw him said that Kinsman was "happy and upbeat". Kinsman was known as a stable and responsible man, a superintendent of his building and a community volunteer. Kinsman had known McArthur for at least a decade, back to when Kinsman was a bartender at the Black Eagle. Kinsman was seen carrying bags of debris on one of McArthur's landscaping projects in 2011 and had been in a sexual relationship with McArthur for some time.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Selim Esen, 44, was last definitively seen on March 20, 2017, near Yonge Street and Bloor Street, just west of the gay village, though there have been reports that he was seen as late as April 14 near Bloor Street and Ted Rogers Way in the gay village. He was reported missing by a friend on April 20. Police initially described Esen as a man of no fixed address who often pulled a wheeled suitcase. A friend disputed this, saying that Esen was in an "unhealthy relationship" and would at times stay with friends.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Esen was a Turkish citizen who had first come to Canada to be with a partner that he had met in Turkey. According to the friend, he struggled with addiction but was getting control of his problem and had completed a certificate course in peer counselling from St. Stephen's community house just before he disappeared. McArthur was also a client of St. Stephen's and very trusted within the community support organization. He was killed by McArthur on or about April 16, 2017.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Dean Lisowick, 43 or 44, was not reported missing. He was a resident of Toronto's shelter system. He had periodically stayed at The Scott Mission on Spadina Avenue since 2003 and was last recorded there on April 21, 2016. He had faced struggles including issues with substance abuse but was remembered as being very respectful. He was trying to work more, as a cleaner or labourer, having previously worked as a prostitute. He was killed by McArthur on or about April 23, 2016.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Kirushna Kumar Kanagaratnam, 37, last had contact with his family in August 2015. He was not reported missing. He was one of 492 Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka who had arrived in Canada on the MV Sun Sea in August 2010. When his deportation order was given, he went into hiding in the Tamil community in Ontario and worked as a cleaner and mover. McArthur killed him on or about January 6, 2016.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Victims
Following the extensive coroner and pathology examinations, after Crown and defence lawyers had information needed for trial, the victims' remains were released to their families. A memorial for Kinsman was held in September, and Mahmudi and Esen's funerals were held in mid-October. Lisowick's remains were laid to rest in late October.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
In January 2018, a publication ban was ordered on court proceedings, limiting what can be reported in the media.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
McArthur was detained at the Toronto South Detention Centre. Torstar News Service reported on March 19, 2018, that McArthur was being held "in segregation and under constant suicide watch". As of November 5, 2018, McArthur remained held at the Toronto South Detention Centre.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
He made his first court appearance on January 19, 2018, represented by lawyer Marianne Salih. He made another brief courtroom appearance on January 29, 2018, and subsequently attended via video link, represented by W. Calvin Rosemond of the legal defence firm of Edward H. Royle & Partners. Rosemond's biography on the firm's website states that he believes "guilty pleas ought only be entered as a last resort".


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
Rosemond noted at a February 14, 2018, hearing that it was McArthur's third court appearance without disclosure. Crown attorney Mike Cantlon said his office received disclosure from police on February 13, 2018, and was in the process of vetting and screening it. In mid-March the same year, Cantlon said one package of disclosure had been made to McArthur's lawyers, with more to be expected in the following weeks, some in excess of 10,000 pages owing to the case's complexity.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
On April 25, 2018, Cantlon said more evidence would be turned over to the defence before the next scheduled court date, May 23, 2018, at which time defence counsel said that they were continuing to receive disclosure. On June 22, 2018, the Crown stated that it had disclosed all evidence to the defence.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
A judicial pre-trial was scheduled for June 20, 2018. The closed-door meeting with the Crown and defence attorneys and judge was to address issues such as resolving the case without a trial (such as by entering a guilty plea), trial length, and procedural and evidentiary issues. Daniel Lerner, a Toronto defence lawyer and former Crown prosecutor, suggested that the Crown would consider severing charges. Lerner noted that a long and complicated trial could put a burden on the jury and create a risk of mistrial. Kevin Bryan, a former detective with York Regional Police's forensics unit, considered the amount of evidence to be catalogued and disclosed and believed a trial was "years away".


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
Several media outlets had applied for the release of the psychiatric and presentencing reports from McArthur's 2003 assault conviction. James Miglin, an attorney for McArthur, argued that this could risk his fair trial rights but Justice Leslie Chaplin felt the reports were generally positive toward McArthur and released them on June 27, 2018. Chaplin also allowed the media to view, but not publish, photographs of the victim's injuries and the weapon used, citing fair trial rights and the victim's privacy.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
In court on October 5, 2018, Cantlon said that "negotiations and discussions are ongoing". Represented by James Miglin, McArthur appeared in court in person on October 22, 2018, and waived his right to a preliminary hearing, not contesting the weight of evidence which warranted a trial. McArthur was ordered to be tried for eight counts of first-degree murder. On November 5, 2018, he first appeared at the Superior Court of Justice before Justice John McMahon, who noted a 2016 Supreme Court of Canada ruling, by which the trial should conclude before August 2020. Following a judicial pretrial on November 30, McArthur appeared in court and was told that his trial would begin on January 6, 2020, and was likely to last three to four months.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
On January 28, 2019, TPS announced an anticipated "significant development" in McArthur's case the following day. People queued outside the courthouse from 6 am, following a major snowstorm, and the hearing was moved to the largest available courtroom. On January 29, 2019, before Justice John McMahon, McArthur pleaded guilty to each of the eight first-degree murder charges that he was facing, ending the possibility of any trial.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
Reading from an agreed statement of fact, Cantlon divulged details of the killings, which took place in Toronto between 2010 and 2017. Each murder was either premeditated or involved other crimes which qualified them as first-degree: six were "sexual in nature" and five included confinement. McArthur kept trophies from his victims including jewellery and a notebook. DNA from four of the victims had been found in McArthur's van. Cantlon then outlined McArthur's "post-offense rituals". McArthur had hundreds of post-mortem digital photographs of his victims, which were recovered forensically after he tried to delete them. He took staged post-mortem photographs, typically with ropes around their necks or with them nude in a fur coat or hat; some photographs had them with their heads and beards shaved and he had kept their hair in Ziploc bags in a shed at Mount Pleasant Cemetery.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
Cantlon said that McArthur "sought out and exploited [...] vulnerabilities" in his victims that made his crimes difficult to detect; that he used sex to lure them, killing many in his bedroom through "ligature strangulation". One photograph showed a rope around a victim's neck twisted with a metal bar wrapped in tape, a mechanism to control the pressure during strangulation. The bar was found in McArthur's 2017 van and contained the DNA of Kinsman and Esen.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
McArthur's sentencing hearing began on February 4, 2019. A 2011 change to the criminal code permits a judge to order that parole ineligibility periods be served consecutively for offences committed after that year, which would include six of McArthur's murders. The crown asked for a 50-year parole ineligibility, citing "the enormity of McArthur's crimes", his lack of remorse (McArthur declined to address the court), the betrayals upon his victims, the effect of his crimes on the community, and how he had been a danger up to his arrest.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Legal proceedings
McArthur's defence counsel James Miglin said such a sentence would be "unduly harsh" given McArthur's age, and noted McArthur had waived a preliminary hearing and pleaded guilty, which benefited all involved in the proceedings. On February 8, 2019, Justice McMahon sentenced McArthur to life imprisonment with no parole eligibility for 25 years. McMahon described the crimes as "pure evil" and stated that McArthur showed "no evidence of remorse" and would have continued killing had he not been apprehended. Despite this, he felt that the sentence should not be one of vengeance given McArthur's age and his guilty plea. McArthur could apply for parole when he is 91, but McMahon said that it would be "highly unlikely" he would be granted parole. The Toronto Sun noted that McArthur is overweight with Type 2 diabetes and is unlikely to live that long.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies
The high-profile investigation and media coverage have drawn controversies including accusations of indifference towards LGBTQ, racialized and homeless persons.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
In mid-November 2017, Richmond said that there was no evidence to establish or exclude that a serial killer was responsible for the disappearances. Saunders told the community on December 8 "The evidence today tells us there's not a serial killer". Police first said that they were dealing with an alleged serial killer on January 29, 2018, confirming what some in the community had feared for years. Some questioned whether police had been taking their concerns seriously. Nicki Ward, a director of the Church-Wellesley Neighbourhood Association, asked "Why weren't we listened to earlier? Perhaps some lives could have been saved if that was the case."


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
Saunders responded that police were not being "coy" about community safety, but that he had been speaking of the evidence that they had at that time. Saunders, who had been a homicide detective for nine years, was an investigator first and spoke in terms of evidence that could be presented in court. Idsinga said that police knew "something was up" with the disappearances in Project Houston, that they had hunches of a killer operating at Church and Wellesley, but that he could not say it without evidence. TPS spokesperson Meaghan Gray noted that while there were theories connecting the disappearances, there had been no evidence at that time.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
James Dubro, a long-time Toronto crime journalist and past president of the Crime Writers of Canada, wrote in July 2017 that a serial killer – though not ruled out by police – was highly unlikely. Jooyoung Lee, a University of Toronto associate professor who teaches a course on serial homicides, said in November 2017 that the disappearances had the warning signs of a serial killer but that it remained unclear and that serial killers were very rare.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
Sasha Reid, a University of Toronto PhD candidate specializing in statistical analysis of missing persons and sexually motivated killers, was compiling a missing-persons database when she came across the Project Houston disappearances. She noticed a pattern and concluded that a serial killer was operating in Toronto. Reid said she informed police of her findings and provided a basic criminal profile in July 2017, the month Project Prism was created. She was not contacted again by police, probably because her academic data could not be used in court. Reid's profile identified a suspect of colour in his early 30s, which excluded McArthur. Reid noted that the term serial killer was problematic as it is defined and used differently by various organizations, legal jurisdictions, researchers and the media.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
Mike Arntfield, a criminologist and Western University professor, has advocated data-based approaches to augment traditional investigative work, particularly in detecting elusive criminals like serial killers. His research team developed an algorithm to perform cluster analysis on 800,000 American murders catalogued by the Murder Accountability Project, which has led to arrests in Cleveland and Chicago. There is no equivalent database in Canada, which lacks standardized reporting.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
Arntfield had been critical of the TPS for not admitting that there was a serial killer, suggesting that they could have made an arrest sooner if they had. He made a comparison to the Seminole Heights serial killer in Tampa Bay, Florida, where police warned the public of a serial killer in November 2017. This led to 5,000 tips being reported, one of which resulted in an arrest.


2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides, Controversies, Use of the term serial killer
On October 23, 2017, Tampa's interim police chief avoided the term serial killer when three victims had been killed with the same weapon; it was only used after a fourth murder in November when police obtained surveillance video of the same suspect at two crime scenes. In comparison, the TPS said they did not have evidence of a murder or that any of the suspicious disappearances were connected until January 17, the day before McArthur's arrest. The large number of tips generated in Tampa may have been influenced by a US$100,000 reward offered at that time.