The house where Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was videotaped allegedly smoking crack has been identified by the Toronto Star.
In mid-May video depicting Ford smoking crack and calling a political rival a homophobic slur was shown to two reporters from the Toronto Star and Gawker.com in an attempt to sell the video for up to seven figures. John Cook, the reporter from Gawker, eventually set up a crowdsourcing fund to purchase the video for $200,000, calling it a "Crackstarter."
There was also a photo of the mayor with two men standing outside the house on Windsor Road. The house in the photo has been identified as belonging to Lina Basso, an elderly retiree, who has her children living with her. One of those children, Elena Johnson, 51, was convicted of trafficking cocaine, according to the Toronto Star. The other residents are Mario Basso and Fabio Basso. Sources have told Gawker that Fabio and Ford "knew each other from high school."
Neighbors of the house told the Toronto Star that Johnson was known to have a drug problem and that the house has become notorious for drugs, police often pay visits to the house.
Sources reported to the Toronto Star that Rob Ford blurted out to staffers that the video could be found at an apartment on the 17th floor of a high rise. On May 21 a man was shot on the same floor of the same building mentioned by Ford. That same night police showed up at the house on Windsor, according to the Toronto Star.
A source told Gawker that the video was made six to eight months ago during one of Ford's "binges." The source also said that Ford has been visiting the house on Windsor for years in order to "go down in the basement and party."
The source told Gawker that Fabio Basso had been visited by two large men attempting to find the video. The men told Basso that he needed to track down the drug dealer who had the video. Basso was unable to track down the video because the man in possession of it had left Toronto.
The men would break into Basso's house and attack Basso and his girlfriend with a pipe, breaking Basso's nose, on the night of May 21 according to Gawker's source.
Gawker reported on Tuesday that the video of Ford smoking crack may be "gone." Cook had lost contact with the intermediary he had dealt with in order to view the video for some time and then was told that the video was gone and he wanted to be left alone. Cook had some theories as to what may have happened to the video.
"'It's gone' could mean many things. It might mean that the video has been destroyed. It might mean that it has been handed over to Ford or his allies. It might mean that he intends to sell or give it to a Canadian media outlet. It might mean that the Toronto Police Department has seized it and plans to use it as evidence in a criminal investigation. It might mean that it has been transferred to the custody of Somali community leaders for safekeeping. It might be a lie. The intermediary doesn't know. Neither do I."
