SIU clears Toronto officer after hospital bean bag rounds

Ontario’s police watchdog has found no grounds to charge a Toronto police officer who fired bean bag rounds from a less-lethal shotgun at a man inside Scarborough Centenary Hospital on June 14, leaving the man with a fractured sternum.

Special Investigations Unit Director Joseph Martino concluded in a report dated Oct. 9, 2026, that “there are no reasonable grounds to believe that the SO (Subject Official) committed a criminal offence.” The SIU announced the decision on Oct. 10 and said the file is closed. The case is numbered 26-TCI-281.

The Director’s Report said a 911 call reported a man at the hospital, on Ellesmere Road, who was armed and threatening people. The report said the man, who was 26, had entered the building carrying a fork and brandished it at four security guards who had surrounded him in the lobby.

Two Toronto Police Service officers from 43 Division arrived at about 10:36 a.m. The report said the officer under investigation fired two bean bag rounds within about six seconds of entering the lobby. A security guard grabbed the man from behind as the shots were fired.

The man kept hold of the fork and did not comply with commands to drop it, the report said. A second officer deployed a conducted energy weapon at about 10:39 a.m., and officers then handcuffed him. He was diagnosed with a fractured sternum.

Martino wrote that he was satisfied the officer “was lawfully positioned” throughout the encounter. He said the officer’s “choice of weapon was appropriate for the circumstances” and that his “quick decision to attempt to incapacitate the Complainant was equally appropriate.” Martino concluded that “the force used by him was reasonably necessary in the circumstances,” citing section 25(1) of the Criminal Code, which protects officers who use only as much force as necessary while acting lawfully.

The SIU investigated because the man was seriously injured. Investigators interviewed five civilian witnesses and the officer under investigation, and reviewed body-worn camera footage from several officers and hospital security video. The report said the video was not released because it contains sensitive personal information. It also said some information was withheld under the SIU Act, 2019 and Ontario privacy law.

The report does not name the officers, referring to them by role. The SIU’s release did not include a statement from the Toronto Police Service, and the report did not summarize the allegations the man made when he was interviewed on July 15.

The SIU first announced the investigation in June, when CP24 reported that the man had been seriously injured. The SIU’s Oct. 10 news release carries the director’s decision.

The SIU is Ontario’s civilian agency that investigates deaths, serious injuries and allegations of sexual assault involving police. It has laid charges in some cases, including the one Canada News Media reported when a Toronto police officer was charged in a Niagara Falls death. Its work has also drawn calls for more openness, as in a province-wide police investigation covered earlier this year, and in the fatal shooting at Pearson airport in 2025.

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