One Car Was Rented and the Other Was Stolen: Toronto Police Name Mohamud Kheyre, 30, as the Second Man Shot Dead and Burned, Six Days After the Fires, and Still Will Not Say the Two Killings Are One File (September 27, 2026)
The man nobody could name for six days is Mohamud Kheyre, and he was 30. The Toronto Police Service published his identity and his image on Sunday afternoon, September 27, 2026, under the same case number that carries the killing of Marcus Charles at the other end of the city. With the name came a detail that had not been in the record at all, and it is the most suggestive thing either force release has produced: the car Charles was found in was a rental, and the car Kheyre was found in was stolen. Neither vehicle belonged to the man burned inside it. Police still say they do not know whether the two killings are connected, and no suspect has been identified in either.
The second name, and how long it took
Kheyre was found in the vehicle that burned in Etobicoke, in a parking lot in the area of Royal York Road and Edenbridge Drive, shortly before one in the morning on Tuesday, September 22. He had been shot before the fire was set. He was 30 years old. His image has been released.
Six days separate the fire from the publication of his name, against four days for Marcus Charles — and Charles was identified by fingerprints rather than by anyone who came forward. The force has not said how Kheyre was identified. Nothing has been published about where he lived, which is a gap worth marking because the earlier release did give Charles a neighbourhood, and the detail that Charles lived in the same end of the city where his car was burned was the one piece of geography anybody had to work with.
A rental and a stolen car
This is new, and it changes the texture of both files. Marcus Charles was found in a rental vehicle, left in a field on Reesor Road in the agricultural northeast corner of Scarborough. Mohamud Kheyre was found in a stolen vehicle, left in a parking lot off Edenbridge Drive in Etobicoke.
Taken on its own, neither fact establishes anything. Taken together, they describe two bodies delivered to two disposal sites in two vehicles that could not be traced to either victim — one rented, one taken. That is the structure of an arranged killing rather than an encounter, and it is the closest the published record has come to explaining why investigators use the word targeted. It is also, precisely, an observation about method and not a finding by police, who have said nothing about how either vehicle came to be where it was found, who rented the first one, or where and when the second was stolen.
The connection question, six days on
The force’s position has not moved. It remains unclear, police say, whether the two incidents are connected. They repeat that both victims were targeted and that there is no ongoing threat to the public. That is the same formulation Detective Sergeant Henri Marsman gave on Friday, when he said the commonalities were obvious on their face but that he needed solid evidence before making the determination, and it is the same formulation the force has now carried through a second victim identification without amending.
What is different is that the two men are now both named, in one release, under one case number, with one set of public-appeal contact details — which is an administrative acknowledgement of a single file even as the force declines to make an evidentiary one.
Twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth
The two deaths are recorded as Toronto’s twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth homicides of 2026. Neither had carried a homicide number in anything published before now. No arrest has been made in either file and no suspect has been identified in either.
What the identification adds — and what it still withholds
- New: the second victim is Mohamud Kheyre, 30. His image has been released. He was found in a stolen vehicle, in a parking lot in the Royal York Road and Edenbridge Drive area.
- New: the vehicle Marcus Charles was found in was a rental, left in a field on Reesor Road.
- New: the two deaths are Toronto’s twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth homicides of 2026.
- Unchanged: police say it is unclear whether the two killings are connected; both victims are described as targeted; police say there is no ongoing threat to the public; no suspect has been identified and no arrest has been made in either file.
- Still unpublished: how Kheyre was identified; where he lived; any occupation, association or prior history for either man; when and where the stolen vehicle was taken, and who rented the other; whether one firearm or two were used, and any description of the weapon; any accelerant finding from either fire; any suspect or suspect-vehicle description; whether the two men knew each other.
- Named organizations: none. No criminal organization, street gang or outlaw motorcycle club has been named by police in connection with either killing, and neither file has been tied by police to the towing-industry conflict or to any extortion investigation. Targeted is a police assessment of risk, not a statement of affiliation.
Timeline
- September 21, 2026 — shortly before 11:30 p.m. Eastern · Reesor Road, ScarboroughA vehicle burns in a field near Steeles Avenue East and Reesor Road. Marcus Charles, 32, is inside. The vehicle was a rental.
- September 22, 2026 — shortly before 1 a.m. Eastern · Edenbridge Drive, EtobicokeA second vehicle burns in a parking lot near Royal York Road. Mohamud Kheyre, 30, is inside. The vehicle was stolen.
- September 25, 2026 — 10:06 a.m. EasternAutopsies establish that both men sustained fatal gunshot wounds before the fires. Both deaths become homicides.
- September 25, 2026 — 12:42 p.m. EasternThe Toronto Police Service identifies Marcus Charles, 32, of Scarborough, from fingerprints, and releases his image. Det.-Sgt. Henri Marsman says both victims were targeted and declines to say the files are connected.
- September 27, 2026 — 2:53 p.m. EasternThe Toronto Police Service publishes a second update under case 2026-1994013 identifying Mohamud Kheyre, 30, and releasing his image — six days after the fire he was found in.
- September 27, 2026 — 3:37 p.m. EasternCP24 and CTV News Toronto carry the identification and add the rental and stolen status of the two vehicles, and the twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth homicide numbers. Police still say it is unclear whether the two are connected.
Carriage of both files under case 2026-1994013; Det.-Sgt. Henri Marsman. Both victims now identified; no suspect identified in either file.
Responded to both vehicle fires.
Investigating the cause of both fires. No finding has been published.
Sources
- “Homicide Investigation, Royal York Road and Edenbridge Drive area and Steeles Avenue East and Reesor Road area, UPDATE: Second Victim Identified, Image Released,” Toronto Police Service news release, September 27, 2026, 2:53 p.m. Eastern, case 2026-1994013 — tps.ca
- “Toronto police identify second victim found inside burning vehicle,” CP24 and CTV News Toronto, September 27, 2026, 3:37 p.m. Eastern — Kheyre’s name and age, the rental and stolen vehicles, the twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth homicide numbers, the police statement on connection and targeting — cp24.com
- Gangland Files, “A Fingerprint Gave Them the First Name in Four Days” (September 25, 2026) — the parent briefing
- Gangland Files, “They Were Shot Before the Cars Were Lit” (September 25, 2026) — ganglandfiles.com
The times given for the two fires follow the September 27 reporting, which places the first shortly before 11:30 p.m. on September 21 and the second shortly before 1 a.m. on September 22; earlier accounts gave approximately 11:25 p.m. and 12:50 a.m. The observation that two untraceable vehicles suggest arranged killings is this site’s, not a police finding. No criminal organization, street gang or outlaw motorcycle club has been named by police in connection with either killing. No arrest has been made and no charge has been laid. Nothing in either file has been tested in court.
