A quiet end to case against Rob Ford friend Lisi opens door to make crack video public

Crown’s withdrawal of an extortion charge marks an understated conclusion of one lingering aspect of the Ford saga.
For a moment, it felt as if the matter of Her Majesty the Queen versus Alexander “Sandro” Lisi — which traced its roots back to 2013 — was about to drag on even further.
It would have also meant that the infamous video showing the late Rob Ford, then Toronto’s mayor, smoking crack cocaine would continue to be out of the public’s reach.
Lisi, friend and driver to Ford, was prepared to enter into a $1,000 recognizance in exchange for a charge of extortion being withdrawn, Crown attorney John Patton said in a downtown Toronto courtroom Thursday morning.
The charge related to Lisi’s attempts to retrieve the video in the spring of 2013.
Crown and defence were both in agreement, but Superior Court Justice Ian MacDonnell expressed surprise, saying he wasn’t aware of what was about to take place that morning in court.
It was listed on the docket as a routine court appearance, in preparation for Lisi’s four-week trial which was set for Sept. 12. MacDonnell openly wondered if he had jurisdiction to deal with the Crown’s request and whether it should be sent down to provincial court.
After more submissions and a brief recess, the judge said he was satisfied with the conditions over withdrawing the extortion charge, closing what he described as a “rather tumultuous chapter” in Toronto’s history.
Aside from promising to keep the peace for one year, Lisi also agreed not to contact alleged extortion victim Liban Siyad; Mohamed Siad, who shot the video; or Fabio Basso and his sister Elena Basso Johnson, who lived in the Etobicoke home where the crack smoking was recorded.
The video, of course, had been seen by reporters from Gawker and the Star in the spring of 2013, when its existence was first revealed. Even more people saw it at Lisi’s preliminary hearing last year in provincial court, but it could not be posted online due to a publication ban.
With a quick stroke of the pen in a hushed courtroom, MacDonnell lifted the ban Thursday, allowing the video to be made public.
It all started on April 20, 2013, when Lisi learned Ford’s cellphone had gone missing, several hours after having been at the Basso residence, according to an agreed statement of facts entered in court.
He learned Siyad had the phone, and made a number of calls, some of which included “coercive language.” The calls were intercepted by the Toronto police, who were intercepting Siyad’s calls as part of their Project Traveller guns and gangs investigation.
“Bro, we need that phone ASAP, eh,” Lisi said in one call to Siyad. “This is the f—ing mayor we’re talking about, eh?”
After Gawker and the Star ran their stories on the existence of the video in May, Lisi “took action to recover the recording,” according to the agreed statement.
“Part of his efforts included trying to contact Mr. Siyad and Mohamed Siad, who he believed had been responsible for advising the media about the video,” said the statement. “Mr. Lisi believed if the video was released it would harm Mr. Ford’s reputation.”
Those calls with Siyad were also intercepted by the police, one of which included Lisi saying “You see the heat on Dixon, bro? . . . It’s gonna get worse, bro . . . tell all your boys it’s going to get worse and worse.”
Lisi was later arrested and charged with extortion. His lawyer, Seth Weinstein, made clear Thursday that by entering into the recognizance, Lisi was not admitting any criminal liability. He said his client simply wants to get on with his life.
“Not only was Mr. Lisi followed by the police and under surveillance but his family were as well — it’s tragic,” his other lawyer, Domenic Basile, said outside court. “He was collateral damage. He was somebody caught in the middle and he was the only one charged. It’s caused irreparable harm to him and his family.”
On Thursday, Patton, the Crown attorney, said there were a number of reasons for withdrawing the charge, mentioning the “current frailties” of the case. Among those frailties was the fact that testimony from some witnesses at the preliminary hearing “did not strengthen the Crown’s case.”
He said that Siyad and Siad had not been cooperative and were “unequivocally uninterested” in the current proceedings, Patton said.
The second reason, he said, was the fact that Ford died earlier this year.
The preliminary hearing last year went on for nine days, and included testimony from several former Ford staffers, but Ford himself was never called.
The crux of the case hinged on Lisi’s call to Siyad. His lawyers tried to argue that the meaning and connotation of “heat” in the conversation with Siyad could have been describing the police presence in the wake of the raids on Dixon Rd. as part of Project Traveller.
When the Crown asked Siyad in court at the hearing what he understood “heat” to mean, a sometimes uncooperative Siyad replied: “Isn’t that like a hot temperature?” Pressed by Lisi’s lawyers, Siyad told the court Lisi had never threatened him. “I don’t feel threatened,” he said on the stand.