At 4:10 a.m. on November 13, 2021, Brampton police received a report that a man had been found dead of gunshot wounds in a residential neighbourhood behind the WalMart Supercentre near Brickyard Way and Quarry Edge Drive. Two days later police announced the arrest of of a 23-year-old man who was charged with second degree murder. In a search of the suspect's home police recovered two firearms, one of them a loaded .22 calibre rifle which was believed to be the murder weapon. Police did not release the victim's name, citing the ongoing nature of the investigation and the fact that the victim had no family locally. He had a wife and four children in Pakistan. It was not until two weeks later, on November 29, that Global News revealed that the victim, was 45-year-old victim Raiz Ahmed, that he was an Uber driver and that the killer was his passenger. Mr. Ahmed had been driving for Uber since 2019. RideFairTO, a coalition of organizations trying to ensure that ride-hailing industry in Toronto operates safely for drivers and riders, expressed surprise that the Uber connection was not revealed earlier. "The fact that this has not been reported on is almost unfathomable to me. The community has a right to know. It's a very tragic story. Unfortunately, it's not something that has not happened before," said spokesman Thorben Wieditz. "Ride sharing drivers are in a very precarious situation. They often hesitate to refuse trips out of fear of retaliation, out of fear of bad reviews, out of fear that their service rating suffers, or even deactivation [by Uber]," said Mr. Wieditz. As in so many other cases, the safety dance seemed ready to be trotted out for yet another performance: official committee meetings in which driver safety is only one agenda item, discussions in which opinion trumps data, reports and recommendations released with a fanfare and then shelved, and the endorsement of safety measures already in place, as though GPS, cameras, panic buttons and conflict management training were sufficient in themselves to stop a bullet or knife. RideFairTO was to appear before a City of Toronto committee November 30 to discuss ride sharing issues including safety and training. [Next column]

Raiz Ahmed was murdered in a residential neighbourhood near an elementary school (Source: Google Maps) Uber's senior communications associate Navideh Forghani, in an emailed statement to the Toronto Star, noted that Uber drivers have various options available for their safety "including an emergency button to dial 911, GPS tracking and the ability to share trip routes in real time with family members." In his statement Mr. Forghani said "This senseless act of violence that took the life of Mr. Raiz Ahmed is heartbreaking." He said Uber was "reaching out to Ahmed's family to offer support" and had "immediately deactivated" the account of Ahmed's passenger following the shooting. Mr. Ahmed was murdered 19 days after the murder of Toronto driver Christopher Jung. "I'm in shock. I'm in disbelief that it happened at all, and that it happened so soon after my father was murdered," said Mr. Jung's daughter Vanessa. "I'm very sad for the family and for the kids to lose their dad at such a young age, it's heartbreaking."