Canadian serial killer Bruce McArthur would dress victims in fur coats and cigars, a court hears
The landscape gardener murdered eight men between 2010 and 2017
By Steve Brown
Canadian serial killer Bruce McArthur reportedly staged photos of some of his victims wearing fur coats and smoking cigars.
The 67-year-old landscape gardener was arrested in January last year and charged with the murders of two men before police discovered human remains of seven men in planters at a property McArthur had worked at.
The remains of an eighth man was found by Canadian police in a forest ravine located behind the same property.
At the time, police could not say whether the newly discovered remains belong to victims already identified or a new one.
The remains were identified to belong to Selim Esen, Skandaraj Navaratnam, Andrew Kinsman, Majeed Kayhan, Dean Lisowick, Soroush Mahmudi, Abdulbasir Faizi and Kirushna Kanagaratnam.
Last week, the landscape gardener pleading guilty to murdering the eight men which spanned between 2010 and 2017.
During the first sentence hearing on Monday (January 4), the prosecutor revealed that McArthur took pictures of his victims after strangling them to death and staged some of them in fur coats, a black leather hat and two of them had a cigar placed in their mouths, The Guardian reported.
McArthur would also shave the facial hair from his victims and kept it, prosecutor Michael Cantlon revealed.
Cantlon told the court: “Many of the victims had ties to Toronto’s LGBT+ village and had a social life within that community.
“Many met or corresponded with Mr McArthur through dating apps. Some were forced to live parts of their life in secret because of their orientation. Some lack stable housing.
“There is evidence that Mr McArthur sought out and exploited these vulnerabilities to continue his crimes undetected.”
When McArthur was arrested last year, police found a ninth man handcuffed to his bed, naked with a bag over his head.
The court heard that the man was saved because police arrived at the killer’s door after connecting McArthur to the death of his last known victim Andrew Kinsman.
The sentencing hearing continues.