At about 8:48 pm on Sunday, October 24, 2021, Toronto police were called to the corner of Pharmacy Avenue and Eglinton Street where a Beck taxi had crashed into a fence. The driver, 73-year-old Christopher Jung, was found dying inside the cab. He had been shot multiple times. Shell casings were found nearby. Witnesses saw a man in dark clothes running away from the scene. Police identified the 17-year-old killer from the security camera in Mr. Jung's taxi. Several days after the homicide, police received judicial permission to name the juvenile suspect and release his photo to the public. A Canada-wide warrant was issued, describing the man as armed and dangerous. When permission to publish the suspect's name and photo expired on November 3, police were granted an extension until November 14. However, they were unable to find the fugitive by the expiration date. On January 28, 2022 the Saanich Police Street Crime Unit stopped a car on Vancouver Island and arrested four men. A firearm was also seized. One of the men was the suspect in Mr. Jung's murder. Toronto Police officers travelled to British Columbia and escorted the fugitive back to Toronto where he was charged with second degree murder. "I never thought that I would be personally affected by gun violence," said Mr. Jung's daughter Vannesa. "We hear stories about mass murderers, crime, school shootings — these stories all get a lot of attention. But a story like my dad's just really completely, like, shocked me and puzzled me." When she read about the murder of Mahmood Bhatti in 2006, she saw similarities to her father's murder. "And he was a father. He was a husband," she said. "That's when I realized, you know, I'm not alone. Someone else has really gone through this, and many other people have gone through this. And that really, really hurt." Mr. Jung was a taxi driver for more than 30 years. He had just returned to work in October after having hip replacement surgery. [Next column]

Christopher Jung (Source: Toronto Police Service News Release, October 25, 2021 "He was just in such good spirits, so excited to be back on the road and driving around the city," she said. "The future was bright for my dad, he had hopes and wanted to travel. I do really feel his life was cut short." "It didn't dawn on me until I started going through records and found the death certificate for my mother that my dad and I share something because I'm 39 when I lost my dad. And he lost his partner, the love of his life, my mother Nina, at 39." Ms Jung described her father as loving, caring, resilient and incredibly strong. But she didn't expect her relationship with her father to end so soon. She still had so much to learn about him. "I wanted to sit down with him at some point and record his life and know a lot more details about his childhood," she said. "And now I feel like I'm left with a lot more questions than answers. And I'll kind of spend my life trying to piece together my dad's life with gaps that I don't know if I will be able to fill."