Chanting “Whose streets? Our Streets!” Parkdale residents marched through their neighbourhood Saturday in response to a string of attacks targeted against the mentally ill.
Six people have been viciously attacked in the same part of Parkdale since January, and all but one of the victims was suffering from mental illness. George Wass, a 62-year-old with the mental capacity of a child, died March 21 three days after being beaten outside his apartment. His death has been ruled a homicide.
Because of the similarity and location of the attacks, police believe they were carried out by the same person. The suspect does not appear to be mentally ill and covers his face when he attacks, pushing his victims to the ground before repeatedly kicking and punching them. The assaults occur late at night and have been focused outside two apartment buildings where the mentally ill live in community housing.
The unprovoked attacks have shocked a neighbourhood that is no stranger to violence, and some have taken them as evidence of a rift between Parkdale’s mentally ill residents and the increasingly gentrified wider community.
But Victor Willis, executive director of the Parkdale Activity-Recreation Centre, says the recent violence isn’t a sign of friction between the area’s diverse inhabitants. “I think that was some of the suspicion originally,” he said, “but we’re pretty convinced now that it’s not the case because of the number of people who have come out from all walks of life in support of a safe place and in support of folks who have been targeted. That’s been remarkable, in the emails, phone calls we’ve received, that’s been uniform.”
Willis described the roughly 50 people who braved the rain to march on Saturday as a cross section of Parkdale inhabitants, with families, community organizers, and mentally ill residents all taking part.
But while the community is doing its best to take back the streets, many in the neighbourhood won’t feel completely safe until the attacker is apprehended. Brian Cotterell, who lives in community housing on Queen Street, said he’s changed his behaviour since the assaults began.
“Walking the streets, I’m nervous someone’s going to whack me in the back of the head with a rock and start kicking me when I’m down on the ground,” he said. “Now, instead of going out and maybe having a cup of coffee and staying out until seven or eight o’clock, I go out at three or three thirty and I’m back at four thirty. I won’t go out when it’s dark at all.”