The alleged crime network around suspended Hamilton cop Ruthowsky
Jeff Green | CBC News | Posted: June 12, 2015 4:29 PM | Last Updated: June 13, 2015
Toronto Police laid 379 charges in Project Pharaoh raids last week
When Toronto Police dropped the net over 45 people last week during the Project Pharaoh raids, they left 379 charges to be handled by the courts with a web of interesting connections.
But how does suspended Hamilton Police officer Craig Ruthowsky fit in?
A forced-network graph created by CBC Hamilton shows an interesting set of connections when looking at the network of co-accused with shared charges.
It's important to remember that these are only allegations at this point, and none of them are proven in court.
The connections were mapped by looking at shared charges, such as conspiracy to commit an indictable offense such as trafficking cocaine. Officer Ruthowsky is charged with that, as well as Hamiltonians Adam Ciborowski, Aleksandar Mihajlovic and Muhammad Moeen, all connected by the time of the allegation.
According to court documents, their alleged offense took place on May 21 to May 22.
Toronto police media officer Const. Caroline de Kloet wouldn't comment on the nature of the alleged connections in any of the cases, but said when police group the charges together in that manner in other projects, "it means people are linked."
The above network graph shows some of the accused in yellow, with their common charges in blue. Click and drag to see more of the map. You can change the orientation of the map by clicking and dragging the circles. You can also click on the dots for more information.
The network map started with Ruthowsky and worked outwards. The main focus of the graph are the accused from the Hamilton and Burlington area.
Ruthowsky is connected to David Barksi of Burlington, and Mihajlovic from Hamilton through a participation in a criminal organization crime. Those two are connected to Farzana Qureshi through a weapons trafficking charge. Qureshi forms the branch from the Hamilton cluster of charges that connects to the Toronto cluster, which is not part of the above graph.