CANADA Canada - Barry, 75, & Honey Sherman, 70, found dead, Toronto, 15 Dec 2017 #16

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I posted above about the direction the person seems to be moving, based on google maps. The hydrant side of the driveway is the side closest to Old Colony rd, by my reckoning.

Thank you for that :) I'm catching up hastily as usual and thought I must've missed it somewhere!
 
This is the suspected walking route he would have taken from the location of the video (62 Bannatyne) to Old Colony Road.
oldcolony-jpg.326495

oldcolony-jpg.326495
 
Was the man who knocked at the Sherman’s door several times(think it was the day after the murders) was he ever identified, was he seen in person or on CCTV?
IIRC, that was probably footage published by Kevin Donovan of the Toronto Star. Police have never commented on it, probably because it's irrelevant to investigating the crime. What kind of murderer goes back to a crime scene and waits out front for the victims to answer the door?

ETA, I expect they know who it is and interviewed them. It would be up to that person themselves to contact KD about it, if they wanted to. Headline: 'I waited outside while my client lay dead.'
 
Certainly new information is better than none, but I have to admit to being a little bit disappointed that this is where the investigation stands, four years later. I guess I have become jaded about the usefulness of having a suspect on video, given some of the cases that I have followed, including Libby and Abby in Delphi, Missy Bevers, and Scott Ratigan.

Definitely seems masculine to me, and shorter than average can be a good clue, but not that much more to go on.

I will try to be positive and optimistic and hope that this case will be the anomaly, and someone will turn in the tip that identifies the individual and cracks the case.
 
I just heard!!!

I tried my best to write a transcription of the news conference: Canada - Barry & Honey Sherman, Toronto, 15 Dec 2017 MEDIA, MAPS & TIMELINE *NO DISCUSSION*

I haven’t read any posts yet. But My guess is the ‘defined area’ may be behind that wall that blocked the view of the side door that Honey likely entered.

If anyone needs to see it, I’ll post it with a link.

The person in the video doesn’t seem to be swinging their left arm in the way they’re swinging their right arm—why?

Now I’m off to read what you guys have written…

ETA: will read backwards as there are explosive posts going off in real time..
 
The inside story of how Toronto police zeroed in the Sherman murder ‘suspect’ with the odd gait
''Like the main character in the thriller “The Fugitive,” investigators are looking for a suspect with a distinctive feature. In the television series and movie, it was a one-armed man. As Toronto police homicide Det. Sgt. Brandon Price announced Wednesday, he is looking for a person with a distinctive walk, who “kicks” up the right foot with each step.''

''Here is an account of how the police got to this stage — one reporter called the news conference a “Hail Mary” play — four years after the Shermans died.

The Shermans’ bodies were discovered in their basement swimming pool room roughly 36 hours after they were killed. Over the next six weeks, officers canvassed the neighbourhoods around the Sherman home asking if anyone had a security camera that focused on the streets. Police cast the net wide, two-three kilometres on each side of Old Colony Road, a street that travels east of Bayview Avenue south of Highway 401. The time period police focused on was the Wednesday the Shermans died. Police have refused to say how they can be certain the Shermans died between 9 p.m. and midnight.''
 
What bothers me is that if this was a professional hit then usually hey shoot the person. In and out, super fast, no messing around. To strangle someone it takes quite a bit of time and usually it fits the motive of something very personal, like severe hatred, love relationship gone wrong, etc....

Also, for a hit man he is pretty small ( 5 foot 6 - 5 ft 9in)...but maybe I watch to many crime shows....

He (assuming this person is a he) does have a different kind of walk, maybe he hurt his knee or hip in a struggle or when he was strangling them?

Regardless, I think this was a very well thought out plan and whomever this person is he doesn't seem to be in a rush and not bothered at all because he's just walking and not looking around being paranoid at all......which yet again makes me think a hit man, but confuses me because it was strangulation...from what I understand and that doesn't fit the MO of a hit man! JMO

I think the original plan was to make it look like a murder suicide carried out by Barry, and it almost worked. There would not have been any further police investigation, but it was not a perfect hit. The autopsies revealed that the Sherman's wrists had been bound, likely with zip ties, but there were no ties at the scene. There were other obvious errors. Barry dropped some papers in the hall entering the pool area, where he was likely attacked, and bound. They were left on the floor, and found by a real estate agent who picked them up, not knowing it was a crime scene. Honey's cell phone was found by the maid on the floor of the powder room near the front door, likely where she was attacked. Honey's bed upstairs was made, but looked like someone may have been sitting on it. Maybe the killer was choosing belts from their closet. I suspect the killer was a professional hitman, but maybe not really expert in staging a scene well enough to fool a forensic pathologist, or good detectives.

Does anyone know how tall Barry and Honey were ? Maybe it would not have been a problem for someone who is only 5 ft. nine, or 5 ft. six to quickly grab two arthritic seniors and subdue them, especially if he had a weapon of some sort. He looks very muscular even under the bulky clothing, with a long athletic type of stride, even if there is a slightly odd gait on the right
side. Could an old gunshot wound cause a change in gait like that ?

Maybe footprints were found in the house, but he may have removed his boots and coat in the garage area, then put them on again before leaving. If he had a ski mask on his face, he may have left that on, just in case something went wrong, so that anyone who saw him, would not be able to identify him. I agree with others who said there is something very tough, confident, and rather mafia like about him that seems to suggest professional hit man. Others suggested he is wearing combat boots and combat gloves, so he could be ex-military, or even on active duty, in this country, or perhaps another one.
My guess is that he was on a plane leaving Canada far behind that night, or the next day. The big question is who hired him, and who benefits ?
IMO
 
On Tuesday, December 14th, 2021, at 1100AM, Detective Sergeant Brandon Price of Toronto Police Homicide updated the media on the investigation into the murders of Barry and Honey Sherman.

TPHQ: Good morning everybody. Welcome to please headquarters thank you for joining us today. Detective Sergeant Brandon Price from our homicide section will provide a brief update on the Sherman double homicide investigation. He'll then take questions from our media partners online and then here in the media gallery, Brandon

DSBP: Thank you for joining us today. My name is Brandon Price. I am a detective sergeant with the Toronto Police Service, homicide squad. Four years ago, the Toronto Police Service responded to an emergency call for service at the home on Old Colony Road. When officers arrived, they located Barry and Honey Sherman deceased within their residence.

It was later determined that both had died of ligature neck compression. Since that time, members of the homicide squad with the cooperation and support of numerous other Toronto Police Service units have worked diligently to identify the person or persons responsible. So far the investigation has involved:

-41 judicial authorizations

-approximately 250 witness interviews

-1,255 tips have been provided to the police from the public

-992 investigative actions have been undertaken.

We have remained steadfast in our commitment to bring closure to the Sherman family, their friends, loved ones and the community.

At the outside of this investigation, we seized a very large amount of security video footage. Some of these videos are from locations in the area of Old Colony Road. Numerous individuals were found on the video in the neighborhood and our team took extraordinary efforts to identify and investigate those individuals to be able to include them or exclude them from our investigation. These efforts included, but were not limited to, requesting video analysis from law enforcement partners such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Ontario Provincial Police.

Our own forensic video analysis unit conducted photogrammetry measurements; this involves attempts to determine physical identifiers, such as the approximate height of persons captured on the videos. We've also obtained judicial authorizations to collect data from nearby cell phone towers and cross referenced that with the physical locations of individuals on the videos.

We've also conducted numerous canvases of the neighborhood to identify individuals on the videos. We have been able to eliminate the vast majority of people captured on the video. We are left with one individual who we have been unable to identify. I'll ask that you take a look at the screen and observe this individual.

Through our investigation we have been unable to determine what this individual's purpose was in the neighborhood. The timing of this individual's appearance is in line with when we believe the murders took place. Based on this evidence, we're classifying this individual as a suspect. Though there is a lack of detail in features of this individual we believe that further information from the public could assist us in making an identification.

I would ask that you pay particular attention to the gate, or the stride or walk style, that this person has on the video. We are not able to provide you with any certainty of the person's age, weight or skin color. However, through photogrammetry performed, we have been able to determine that the suspect in this video is standing between five foot six and three quarters, and five foot nine and a half inches.

There may be a legitimate explanation as to what this person's actions were in the area. If you recognize yourself in this video, please come forward so you can be excluded from our investigation. However, it is our hope that someone will come forward with a name when they recognize the individual's walk - the way in which they kick up their right foot with every step, knowing that the person was, or is connected to the Sherman family, or was in the area on that day at that time.

To be clear this release is in no way an indication of a conclusion to this investigation. From the beginning, this has been a multifaceted investigation and we will continue to work on various other avenues of investigation that we have undertaken and keep an open mind to new ones. In my recent conversations with the Sherman family, they have asked me to remind the public that their private, 10 million dollar reward is still available. Thank you.

TPHQ: Thanks Brandon, we're going to go online first, I will call out your name. If you have a question, please ask, if not, just please say pass and we will provide another opportunity at the end. Ellen Bessner. Please go ahead.

EB(CJN): Hi, thank you very much, I’m Ellen Bessner with the Canadian Jewish News. Detective Sergeant, are there other people assisting you now with the investigation or are you still solo?

DSBP: No, I've never been a solo on this investigation. From the beginning we had a huge complement of officers to sort of take care of the initial mass of data and information processing at the beginning.

At this point, now I have my primary partner in this is Detective Constable Yim, who is on a daily basis assigned to this and works diligently on this investigation.

TPHQ: Do you have another question Ellen?

EB(CJN): Not for now, thanks.

TPHQ: Enzo, please go ahead……Enzo, sorry, please try again, you’re muted Enzo

Enzo: No more questions thank you.

TPHQ: Thank you, JP Nadeau please go ahead.

JP(CBC): I’m JP with CBC French. Detective Sergeant can you please tell me what time is it on the tape right now, because from here, on my screen it seems like it's daylight but I guess it's night time, no?

DSBP: That's correct. I'm not going to say exactly the time of this clip but I will say it is in the evening or night hours of December 13th 2017, and you're correct, it's sort of quite bright but that's partly to do with the type of camera that was recording.

TPHQ: Do you have another question JP?

JP(CBC): Yes, and the only description you can get, is the height of that suspect person?

DSBP: I think that, you know, when people take a close look at this individual, they'll be able to determine that there's a jacket that's being worn. There's some type of headdress, whether it be a hat or part of a hood, long pants and some boots that can be seen, um, further scrutiny and detail was undertaken, to determine with finer with, you know, to get a better idea of what it exactly it was that those items were and we're unable to sort of determine exactly what type of boot that was or those kinds of those kinds of things.

TPHQ: Thanks, JP…MK, Do you have a question?

MK: I do. Yes, good morning Detective Sergeant, thanks for taking my question. I'm just wondering why I believe this is the first time the term suspect is being used in this investigation and why you said this person could potentially be eliminated. So why they’re a suspect versus a person of interest? I was wondering, if you could you elaborate on that.

DSBP: Sure. That's a good question. So this footage is not the only footage of this individual that we have, we have done an exhaustive video canvas of the whole area. And we have, based on the timing of when we understand, when we believe, the murders took place, we have this individual coming into a very defined area aah, surr…around the Sherman's household and remaining in that area for a period and then leaving from that area. So we have been unable to identify what purpose that person had to be within that defined area. And therefore and the timing is, is in line with our belief as to when this, these murders took place. And so that is why we classify this individual as a suspect.

TPHQ: Any follow-up MK?

MK: Yeah. Just one. Just wanted to know if this video has been shared with the members of the Sherman family and if they were able to give you any information to whether they know or are unable to recognize this person

DSBP: I did share with the Sherman family and as always my conversations with them will remain private but they have been very supportive and very helpful all the way through this investigation, um, and I look forward to their continued support.

TPHQ: Rob Gillies do you have a question?

RG(AP): Yes, that's quite a unique gate that he has the way he walks with that right foot kicking it up. You mentioned there was other video. Why not release the other videos of the suspect?

DSBP: The reason is that this is amongst the, the best images of this individual that we have. So, we've sort of chosen the best one that has the greatest likelihood of somebody being able to identify this individual from. So that's why we've chosen to release this one.

TPHQ: Any follow-up Rob?

RG(AP): No, I’m good, thank you.

TPHQ: Thank you. Okay. Tyler Dawson. Please go ahead.

TD: You mentioned this individual is seen going into a defined area, what do you mean by that? Is that they are going on to the Sherman's property, were they all on public property walking down the street, like, what do you mean by “defined area”? So, I mean what makes that of interest?

DSBP: Yeah. So, so, in our exhaustive video canvas, we were able to get images from nearby, on either side, kind of, and around the Sherman household, and this individual walks into that area, does not continue to walk through, but remains in that area that's not covered by video footage and remains in there and then comes back out sometime later. And that's how we have been able to sort of narrow this individual's location down.

TPHQ: Any follow-up, Tyler?

TD: um, yeah, I mean is there anything else to lead you to believe this person’s a suspect other than they sort of go out of camera view for a period of time?

DSBP: Well it's a fairly defined area. So, and like I said before, we were able to eliminate pretty well every other person on the video footage that we've obtained. And so we're left with a very glaring, sort of unknown with this individual, that requires an explanation. If there's a legitimate one.

TPHQ: Thanks everyone, we're just going to move into the room now, Catherine, go ahead, please.

C: Hi, Cathy from… unintelligible…Why did it take you four years to release this video?

DSBP: So as you can see partly to do with the sort of poor quality of the image, um, the investigative considerations were that, the cost to the investigation by releasing this early on, would have outweighed the benefit of releasing it early on. So we undertook these investigative steps, exhaustive investigative steps, um, to identify this individual. And now having gotten to the point where we have not been able to do so with this videos, this is now the prudent time to release this to the public and seek the public's assistance.

Reporter: (Voices talking over each other) …He’s in that defined area for a period of time, around the time of the murders, correct? Are we talking five minutes or ten minutes or an hour or a few hours? How long? Can you give us an idea of how long he was loitering and I guess kinda hanging out in that area?

DSBP: Um, so I'm not going to get into the exact timing of it. I would say, I mean I can just generally answer that it is a very suspicious amount of time. It's in line with our belief as to when these murders took place and so that's, that's the, about as tight as I can get you.

Reporter: And is there any video showing him leaving in a vehicle or arriving in a vehicle? Do you have any idea of how he came to Old Colony Rd and when?

DSBP: So I'm not going to get into that. I'm sorry. Thank you.

Reporter: You mentioned there is a cost that outweighed the benefit at the time, what do you mean when you say cost? Can you expand on that for me?

DSBP: So I mean I'm gonna get into what those are, but they're investigative considerations and that's about as deep as I can get into it with regard to this.

Reporter: Is it budget?

DSBP: No, no it's not, nothing financial, it is a cost to the integrity of the investigation or the potential benefit to the investigation if we identify this individual on our own, as opposed to releasing it widely to the public.

Reporter: unintelligible

DSBP: You can see this as well as I can. It's very difficult to say with any level of certainty whether this is a male or a female. So I wouldn't declare one or the other at this point.

Reporter: With this video do police believe that one person committed these murders or still potential that it was committed by…unintelligible

DSBP: There's certainly a potential, we're keeping an open mind to, to that possibility. There's a lot of scenarios but one thing I can say is that this individual's actions are highly suspicious.

Reporter: unintelligible

DSBP: Well, I mean this is a commonly, we get questioned for updates, updates, updates and the, the common misconception in the public and often in the press, is that nothing's going on when the police are not updating. And, and really, at the end of the day, the most important thing for us is the integrity of the investigation. And unless it is beneficial to the investigation to release information, it's not going to be something that we're going to do.

We are constantly balancing, you know, the public interest to know what's going on and to scrutinize the police work and that is why we have released information. Um, and…but we're do it on a tactical, um, very calculated and careful timeline.

And so we will not rush into releasing information. This, like I said, is a very multifaceted investigation, right from the beginning. It continues to be. This was a very complex effort to reach this point, the cellular telephone data portion of this investigation, in attempts to identify this individual, yielded tens of thousands of data lines that needed to be analyzed. These kinds of things take a great deal of time and earlier I spoke of 992, I believe, investigative actions. Analyzed data from cell phone tower download is one line of the 992, to give you some measure of perspective of what can be going on in this investigation.

Reporter: If this is the best quality of this person, suspect…what has linked the other videos to think it's the same person?

DSBP: I mean it’s like, when we're tracking individuals, you can, you can logically connect one individual walking out of one frame and into another frame with some measure of certainty. As you can see there, you can tell the, to some measure with the clothing this individual is wearing it is discernible on the other footage, it's just not as, not as clearly discernible but we have a great deal of confidence that we have properly tracked this individual to and from the location.

Reporter: Can you tell us where this video was captured and even which direction the suspect appears to be going in?

DSBP: No, I'm not going to get into further detail as to the location or the directions of travel. Thank you, though.

Reporter: How many videos do you have of this person and what’s he doing or what are they doing in the other video…?

DSBP: So we have gathered four terabytes of video footage in this investigation and a great deal of it was from the area around Old Colony Road and the surrounding neighborhood. Um, I'm not going to get further into it, but the walking is generally the action, um, leading hi-, this individual, to and from the defined area.

Reporter: Is this your biggest lead in the case right now?

DSBP: I don't know if I would say it’s, it's the biggest lead. It is, it's been with us from the, from the early stages of this investigation. It took some time to collect all of this footage. It took some time to analyze the footage to be able to link the, these images together and identify that this individual's time-timeline was, was consistent with when we believe these offenses took place. Um, but there's other avenues of investigation that we have undertaken, and are ongoing. This is certainly a valuable piece of evidence, though.

KD(TS): I have two questions, Kevin Donovan, Toronto Star. The first one is: Last year, there was discussion, you put out a release saying there were numerous persons of interest and you haven’t identified them. Have you looked at each of those people to see if they match this person and have you excluded them…people of interest?

DSBP: So, I don't like to say that we've excluded people or included people, specifically, so I certainly won't get into that, um, but it's a consideration. Now, the fact is, is that nobody can be 100% excluded because there's always a possibility and we’ll keep an open mind to, that there's more than the one individual who executes the action, that may be culpable. So we're certainly keeping an open mind to that and so

KD(TS): But you had a look at those people that you identified as persons of interest to see if their body style and walking matches?

DSBP: Yes.

KD(TS): You’ve done that, and they do not.

DSBP: Well, we need to get a lot more than that to be able to move that any individual that we are looking at to a level of a suspect. But this individual is a suspect.

KD(TS): Second question. Do you have video that shows that person entering the Sherman property?

DSBP: So, um, I don't think it's a, so like I said, it's a very well defined area around the Sherman property. I won't say whether we have onto specifically the property itself though.

KD(TS): But there is video across the street…of low quality…should show you something. I’m sure you checked that…from that home to see this person going in or does he come in from the street to the north?

DSBP: All footage that could be collected was collected by the Toronto Police. We have analyzed it all and I'm not going to get into what exactly we see this individual doing when it comes to the address itself.

KD(TS): Last question, the defined area, does it include, it obviously includes the Sherman property, does it include a couple of other houses around there or is the defined area-

DSBP: No, it's, it's a well it's a well-defined area. It is tight to the Sherman property.

KD(TS): Tight to the Sherman property.

TPHQ: Any other questions in the room? Any other questions online?

Reporter: I have one. Sorry if, just because it's hard for us, we're online to see this video. Is it going to be on the TPS website so we can download it or how to get it.

TPHQ: Yes, a news release will be published if it has not been published already, it includes a link to the video as well as a screen capture in a still format as well. If there are any other question after that news release has been published, you can please contact Corporate Communications. Thanks for joining our news conference today.

!! I wish I had seen your excellent transcription before starting mine. Thank you! I’m going to link your post and cut and paste it in the media thread.
 
I think the original plan was to make it look like a murder suicide carried out by Barry, and it almost worked. There would not have been any further police investigation, but it was not a perfect hit. The autopsies revealed that the Sherman's wrists had been bound, likely with zip ties, but there were no ties at the scene. There were other obvious errors. Barry dropped some papers in the hall entering the pool area, where he was likely attacked, and bound. They were left on the floor, and found by a real estate agent who picked them up, not knowing it was a crime scene. Honey's cell phone was found by the maid on the floor of the powder room near the front door, likely where she was attacked. Honey's bed upstairs was made, but looked like someone may have been sitting on it. Maybe the killer was choosing belts from their closet. I suspect the killer was a professional hitman, but maybe not really expert in staging a scene well enough to fool a forensic pathologist, or good detectives.

Does anyone know how tall Barry and Honey were ? Maybe it would not have been a problem for someone who is only 5 ft. nine, or 5 ft. six to quickly grab two arthritic seniors and subdue them, especially if he had a weapon of some sort. He looks very muscular even under the bulky clothing, with a long athletic type of stride, even if there is a slightly odd gait on the right
side. Could an old gunshot wound cause a change in gait like that ?

Maybe footprints were found in the house, but he may have removed his boots and coat in the garage area, then put them on again before leaving. If he had a ski mask on his face, he may have left that on, just in case something went wrong, so that anyone who saw him, would not be able to identify him. I agree with others who said there is something very tough, confident, and rather mafia like about him that seems to suggest professional hit man. Others suggested he is wearing combat boots and combat gloves, so he could be ex-military, or even on active duty, in this country, or perhaps another one.
My guess is that he was on a plane leaving Canada far behind that night, or the next day. The big question is who hired him, and who benefits ?
IMO
My thoughts are, if someone is counting on being able to escape detection because they are a stranger to the victims, and will be leaving the country, why the elaborate staging? It seems so unnecessary. IMO, the super-elaborate staging of the scene implies the main strategy to avoid detection was to try to convince police it was M-S.

JMO
 
My thoughts are, if someone is counting on being able to escape detection because they are a stranger to the victims, and will be leaving the country, why the elaborate staging? It seems so unnecessary. IMO, the super-elaborate staging of the scene implies the main strategy to avoid detection was to try to convince police it was M-S.

JMO
With respect, I think that the person who hired the hit man hired him to do the job, and make it look like a murder suicide, so that the police would not carry out a homicide investigation, which has no time limits for murder, and might someday lead back to not only the killer, but the person or persons who hired him. IMO
 
From the position of the fire hydrant, IMO in the footage he's walking away from Old Colony Rd.

jmo, could be wrong

This is speculation…but if they were on their way away from the home that may explain the odd gait—maybe they were injured during the murders. From the video it looks like their left arm is being kept close to their side (moo).

Also, it seems as if it had just started to snow. I’m going to see if we know when the snow started to fall.
 
This is just a reminder...I just looked this up. It was posted on CP 24 news dated June 14 2021

Slain billionaire Barry Sherman's will divided estate equally among four children

"Barry’s primary will is dated May 13, 2005 but it was amended in March, 2017, just prior to his death, to change the trustees listed.

He previously named eight trustees including all four of his children but in 2017 changed it so that only his son Jonathon Sherman, his son-in law Bradley Krawczyk, his business partner Jack Kay and family holding company executive Alex Glasenberg were listed as trustees.

The estate papers suggest that Barry had $124 million in assets at the time of his death, including more than $6 million in real estate holdings.

Honey Sherman did not have a will at the time of her death."

** In Ontario trustees get an amount of money also, usually a percentage of the will. Just thought I would put that out there....
 
With respect, I think that the person who hired the hit man hired him to do the job, and make it look like a murder suicide, so that the police would not carry out a homicide investigation, which has no time limits for murder, and might someday lead back to not only the killer, but the person or persons who hired him. IMO
Yes, that is possible.

Wonder what kind of surcharge there is, if you want a hit staged...
 
So by my calculations 2 percent of 124 million is 2.4 million dollars?? Just for being a trustee? Now if they take into account 3 .2 billion (his worth) his trustees would get very rich from their deaths.....I'm just thinking out loud and a little off topic but just throwing this out there
 
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