‘Frequent flyers’ behind surge in violence on public transit

This story is a collaboration between CBC Visual Investigations and the Investigative Journalism Foundation (IJF).

As police try to address a dramatic spike in violence on transit systems across the country, they’re finding a relatively small number of people are committing a disproportionate number of violent crimes.

In particular, the Edmonton Police Service (EPS) says 22 per cent of offenders are responsible for nearly half of the crime on transit.

“We've been pushing this boulder up a hill as a sector for the last few years,” said public transportation consultant David Cooper, who has observed similar problems with repeat offenders on transit systems across Canada. 

“A lot of times it's the same people really impacting detrimentally the same cohort of people in a transit space,” he said. “What was very eye-opening to me, going out with police in several cities and going out with front-line staff, is that the police know who they are.”

Exclusive Statistics Canada data obtained by CBC’s visual investigations team and the Investigative Journalism Foundation (IJF) shows that Edmonton’s transit-related violent crime rate more than doubled between 2015 and 2024. The annual number of physical assaults on transit spiked by a whopping 260 per cent in the same time period.

Edmonton police are currently playing catch-up to address the issue, according to acting Sgt. Scott Nolt of the EPS’s crime suppression branch.

“From my personal perspective, I think the transit system was neglected from a policing sense for a period of time, until we got back … into the space two years ago,” he said. “The transit peace officers do a great job, but they're severely limited by authority and policies.”

The man who attacked Ben Mazor on an Edmonton LRT train on Nov. 21, 2023, was a repeat offender with a criminal history going back decades, according to court records. 

Exclusive video obtained through a freedom of information request shows Mazor boarding the train at Stadium Station, where a man was blocking passengers from reaching the seats. In the video, Mazor pushes past and argues with the man, who follows Mazor as he sits down.

“It was after I sat down that he started becoming violent and attacking me,” Mazor told CBC.

He was punched and knocked to the ground in the attack. The video shows Mazor scrambling to his feet and then repeatedly pushing the train’s alarm button for help.

“You don’t know how far south it can go when someone is willing to be that violent,” he said.

The attack left Mazor with a broken nose, a concussion and smashed eyeglasses. The man who punched him was arrested six months later, convicted of assault and sentenced to four months in jail.