Here’s the Rob Ford crack video

In March 2015, newsrooms around the city received access to evidence from a preliminary inquiry into Sandro Lisi’s extortion charge. Lisi, remember, is the Rob Ford associate who was accused of threatening Liban Siyad, a convicted gang member, in an attempt to recover the famous Ford crack video. All the evidence presented during the preliminary inquiry was under a publication ban.

The Crown withdrew Lisi’s extortion charge this morning, which means we can finally tell you that the crack video, in its entirety, was part of that evidence. Every newsroom has had a copy for over a year, making its wide release inevitable. A lot has happened in the interim—most significantly Rob Ford’s death. But curiosity about the footage that instigated his global infamy remains strong.

So here it is: all of it, finally. This is the video that, three years ago, half the city didn’t believe existed. (The other half dutifully ponied up $200,000 in a failed attempt to make it public.) It is, unsurprisingly, very similar to how it was described in the original press reports. According to the Crown’s transcripts, the female voice in the background is Elena Basso, sister of Ford’s friend Fabio. The video is believed to have been shot in the Bassos’ house on Windsor Road in Etobicoke.

With this, the Rob Ford saga may finally be over. For some of us, it has felt that way for a long time.