Back on the Mayor Ford/Crack story, first, I made a mistake. In my earlier post I said that ex-Chief of Staff Mark Towhey resigned. That’s not correct. He was fired. When I was writing this morning I’d misremembered and thought there was some uncertainty about whether he resigned or was fired. But he was definitely fired. Actually, he was apparently fired twice and escorted out of the Mayor’s office. Now, part of me wants to say it’s hard keeping track of the murder and crack smoking and hash dealing and resignations and firings. But no excuses. I got that part wrong.
Now, here’s why this is significant.
The Star has more on why Towhey went to the police.
The new story is similar to this morning’s in the Globe and Mail but puts the pieces together in a significantly different way – apparently based on additional reporting. The gist is that when childhood Ford crony (and alleged co-hash dealer with Doug Ford) David Price approached Towhey about the video, Towhey got the clear impression that people from Ford’s inner circle thought they knew where the video was and were going to try to get it. That apparently is what set off alarm bells for Towhey …
Shocked, Towhey told Price that the only thing he would advise is going to the police. Price also said that the video may have been the reason that Anthony Smith, a person pictured in a photo with Ford, was killed.
Towhey’s response, according to sources, was to tell Price that he would be contacting police.
Not hard to imagine how Towhey might have flipped when Price suggested that someone might already have been killed over the video and that members of the Mayor’s staff should try to go on some mission to get it. (Towhey had earlier been assured the video didn’t exist.)
The Star, which calls Towhey “straitlaced”, describes Towhey telling Price “We’re not getting the f—ing thing!”
As we knew from the Globe and Mail story, Towhey told Price in no uncertain terms that he should not try to get the video. Then Towhey went to Toronto police but, according to the Star, without telling his boss, Mayor Ford.
It’s not clear if going to the police was the immediate cause of Towhey’s firing. He got escorted out of the office on the 23rd and the trip to the police was apparently on the 17th. Nor is it clear from the published accounts when Ford learned that Towhey had gone to police. Possibly the original story, that Ford fired Towhey when he told the Mayor he should go to rehab, is still operative. Perhaps even true.
