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TORONTO SUN
By Michele Mandel
Monday, September 08, 2008
Three years have now passed since Loyan Ahmed Gilao was gunned down with a friend outside the Phoenix Nightclub in the early morning hours of Aug. 8.
Three years of heartache for his family, three years of emptiness and unanswered questions about why someone coldly snuffed the life of the promising 22-year-old York University student.
You likely don't remember his name. Loyan was one of the dozens of victims killed during that infamous Year of the Gun, a bloody 2005 that saw a record 78 murders, with 52 of those victims cut down by a bullet. The most infamous victim was Jane Creba, the 15-year-old Riverdale Collegiate student killed Boxing Day on Yonge St. when she was caught in the crossfire of two warring gangs.
What an uproar there was for the loss of this young innocent from a good family and upper scale home. How quickly a reward was offered, how swiftly arrests were made.
So it is difficult for a frustrated Somali-born father not to wonder whether there is a different standard of justice at play.
"Is it the same for all people?" asks the eloquent Gilao, as he sits in his Etobicoke office as executive director of the Dejinta Beesha settlement agency for Somali immigrants.
"I'm not a criminal specialist but I feel, as a father who was a victim, I did not have my rights to get the same swift investigation as Jane Creba's.
"I don't think it's open racism," he adds thoughtfully. "But what I see is a white young girl shot downtown has people charged and my son does not. They were two young people, they were both victims of violence. The system must work -- no matter what colour they are."
His son, you see, was no less innocent, no less upstanding. Loyan was known as "Banks" in his neighbourhood, the go-to role model who was always digging into his pocket to help other kids.
He had helped start a tutoring service for struggling students in the East Mall and West Mall neighbourhoods. He was a loving big brother to his four sisters.
"His dream was to be a lawyer," his father says with pride. "He was a brilliant man who could have been a leader tomorrow."
Acting as peacemaker
Loyan wasn't even a regular clubgoer. But his friends were in from out of town to celebrate their pal's wedding and he wanted to show them a good time before they headed back the next day.
"He didn't even want to go because he was so tired," Gilao recalls. "But for their sake, he went ..."
Staff Sgt. Bill Vieira says their investigation revealed something occurred before and during the friends' time at the club and Loyan was caught in the middle. "He was someone who was trying to mediate and act as a peacemaker."
Police say a man pulled out a black handgun and fired at Loyan's group without warning. The shooter then fled down an alleyway. Ali died at the scene and Loyan a short time later in hospital. A third friend from Virginia was shot but recovered.
Initially, Vieira says their homicide investigation led to a suspect but they were unable to gather enough evidence to lay a charge. "Every effort was put into investigating this case," he says. "Unfortunately, the evidence didn't lead to a resolution at this point."
Yet while a reward was offered five months after the Creba shooting, Gilao wonders why it took a year of lobbying before Toronto Police finally agreed to post a $50,000 reward for information on his son's murder. Vieira rejects the father's contention that his son's murder was not given the same attention as others or that some kind of unintentional racism was at work.
'Many conversations'
"I don't think this case was treated any differently," he maintains.
The former homicide detective, who now teaches at the police college, last spoke to Gilao on the third anniversary of his son's death and knows well his complaints. "We have had many conversations about the frustration we all have at this point that no one has been arrested."
Every murder case is different and it is no doubt unfair to expect the same outcome on each. Yet it is hardly surprising that a heartbroken father sees only through the prism of his own grief.
"My child was murdered in downtown Toronto and nothing's moving," Gilao says in exasperation. "I'm demanding justice. I need justice."
Read Mandel every Monday, Thursday and Sunday. [email protected] or 416-947-2231.
Source: Toronto Sun, Sept 08, 2008