Deep Dives

Firouzeh Zarabi-Majd always wanted to be a cop, and she loved the job. Even when her fellow officers started harassing her, she said nothing at first. That’s the code—you don’t go public, no matter what. But eventually she had to speak up, and it cost her everything

A ranking of our most popular feature stories of the year

Carolyn Krebs (alias Carolyn Goodman, alias Marian Linton) is the owner of 500 Dawes, one of the city’s most complained-about apartment buildings. She ignores work orders, falsifies documents and evicts tenants without cause. How one woman is making a killing off a system that’s too broken to stop her

Prominent Torontonians divulge the hush-hush venues, one-of-a-kind treats and city hacks they leverage to get the most out of the GTA

The rent was dirt cheap, the rules were nonexistent and the parties were legendary. Now, with demolition underway, former tenants share their favourite memories of the city’s most storied artists’ space

Our inaugural list of the up-and-comers shaping our city and the world

He spent half a century developing artificial intelligence. Now, he worries that his life’s work could spell the end of humanity. Inside his mission to warn the world

Our annual ranking of the people whose courage, smarts and clout are changing the world as we know it

Blame Zoom, AI filters, TikTok. Facial alteration has become one of the fastest-growing segments of the $16-billion medical spa market. Toronto providers have never been busier, and their clients have never been younger

After Kenneth Law lost his job as a low-level cook at the Royal York hotel, he found another way to make money: peddling suicide kits on the internet. Now, he’s been linked to the deaths of over 100 people around the world—and their grieving families want justice

A semi-scientific guide to the city’s 158 neighbourhoods

He said his name was Mike Borac and that he could build homes faster and cheaper than anyone else. By the time his clients realized his promises were too good to be true, their money was gone

After nearly three decades building her restaurant empire in Toronto, Janet Zuccarini is launching an 8,000-square-foot, $7-million hotspot in LA this fall—all while mourning her husband, Robbie Robertson. Opening a restaurant in 2023 is brave. Running a dozen of them is bonkers

Robert Konashewych was a young police officer with expensive tastes, two girlfriends and a mountain of debt. Heinz Sommerfeld was recently deceased with a large unclaimed estate. Problem, meet solution

Every successful actor has that special someone—a voice coach, a drama teacher, a best friend—who was there in the beginning. Here, 14 behind-the-scenes superstars

At their luxury high-rise in Vaughan, Doreen and John Di Nino endured years of harassment from their neighbour, Francesco Villi. His worst vitriol was reserved for the condo’s board, of which John was president. But no one suspected that Villi was plotting their murder

AI has made it easy for post-secondary students to fake their way to a degree. They argue that ChatGPT is just another study tool. Schools say it spells the end of university as we know it

TikTok turned Josh Richards from an ordinary small-town teen into a multimillionaire, CEO and venture capitalist. How to make a fortune via bedroom eyes, 10-second lip syncs and a signature ’do

Toronto used to have one of the best transit systems in North America. Now it’s overcrowded, underfunded, unreliable and dangerous—and it costs us $2.38 billion a year

Noam Tomaschoff grew up in a tight-knit family with strong ties to Toronto’s Jewish community. After he took a DNA test on a lark, the story of his life unravelled

Doug Ford’s U-turn decision to earmark swaths of the Greenbelt for development prompted widespread outrage, plus pockets of praise, across the GTA. But what do the people who live and work on the land think about it?

Before she became a global phenomenon, Shania Twain was flipping burgers, hawking jeans and fronting cover bands in Toronto. Today, the queen of country pop is touring the world with a new album, but she’s still nostalgic about the city that made her

From a young age, Courtney Wallis Simpson had big plans, and she was ruthlessly ambitious when it came to achieving them. To finance her lifestyle, she hatched a series of property schemes that would cost her victims—more than 100 of them—millions

In 2022, the Toronto District School Board consolidated two high schools into one crumbling, crowded building. Within weeks, stressed-out students were brawling in the halls, teachers were refusing to come in to work and parents were yanking their kids out of class