* * *
—
The private investigation began the day after the bodies were discovered. Greenspan assembled his team and arranged the private autopsies. His detectives canvassed the neighbourhood and began interviewing friends of the Shermans, but six weeks had elapsed since the murders before they were allowed inside the house to conduct their own probe. Control of the Sherman house was turned over to the family at the same time that police held a press conference to announce that the case was being treated as a double murder. The private team wore white forensic suits, gloves, and cloth boots over their shoes. Moving through the house, they were surprised to find it in disarray. In the bedrooms, police had removed clothing from closets and then piled the clothing on the beds or other furniture. The same in the kitchen, where items were taken out of cupboards and left sitting on tables and counters. The walls showed numerous markings where finger and palm prints were dusted and lifted.
According to Greenspan, his group of retired detectives and forensic specialists discovered that the police had not performed what they believed were basic crime scene functions. They had not used a special fine-particle vacuum on the pool deck where the bodies were discovered. “The intruders might have left behind a small sample of hair or fabric,” Greenspan later told reporters at a press conference. He said his specialists determined that although the police team had lifted some fingerprints from the scene, they had “missed” twenty-five finger and palm prints. His team lifted those prints. Greenspan and his team hung on to everything they collected for many months—including two small vacuum cleaner bags used when they vacuumed the floor in the pool room—while he and Scott Hutchison, a lawyer hired by the police department, tried to sort through a way to maintain a legal chain of custody and hand over this new “evidence.” It was eventually turned over to police in stages throughout 2018 and the early part of 2019. Whether it amounted to anything, police will not comment. Going forward, Greenspan has said he wanted a “private/public partnership” between his investigation and the police probe. The Toronto Police have been dismissive of this suggestion, and columnists, including the Toronto Star’s Rosie DiManno, derided the Sherman family and Greenspan for trying to institute a “two-tier” police system in which the rich used their wealth to get justice more quickly than those who lacked financial resources.
At the tail end of his press conference—ten months after the Shermans were murdered—Greenspan announced a $10-million reward from the family for information leading to the capture and prosecution of the killer or killers. It was unprecedented in Canadian crime history. Police occasionally issue rewards, but it is rare that a family would post its own reward. The idea of announcing a reward came from Alex Sherman. She suggested a $1-million reward and had been pushing for this almost since the case began. Shortly before the press conference, Jonathon suggested that if they were going to do a reward offering, it should be $10 million. He was initially going to speak at the press conference, but it was decided it would be better for Greenspan to handle the announcement. The amount far exceeded the normal $10,000 to $50,000 offered in a murder case. But what made it more astounding is that anyone with information was told to call the representatives of the Sherman family. All tips were then to be vetted by the private investigation team and “any meaningful information” would be passed on to police. A panel made up of a former police chief, a criminal lawyer, and a forensic psychiatrist was created to oversee matters related to the tip line. Greenspan invited Chief Mark Saunders to appoint an officer to join the panel, but Saunders did not take up Greenspan’s offer. In fact, at time of writing, the members of the panel had never met. Greenspan says they decided to convene the panel only if they had a particularly serious matter to discuss, including whether or not the reward should be paid out. As to calls and emails received by the tip line, Greenspan says he worked out a protocol with a Toronto Police lawyer to simply hand the information over to police on a monthly basis. Nothing substantive has appeared on the horizon. Often, the people who contacted the tip line were psychics or people unrelated to the case who had a notion they wanted to pass along. Police have said in court that they have received 279 tips from Greenspan’s team but will not say if any of them were helpful. When I spoke to Greenspan about the tips, he said some people were uncomfortable with calling a tip line and reached out to him directly instead. At time of writing, Tom Klatt and the other private investigators, and Greenspan, were still working the case. One lead that real estate agent Judi Gottlieb had been excited about—the “odd ducks” that came through 50 Old Colony Road a few days before the murder—turned out to be a dead end, according to Greenspan.
Well over a year after the initial flurry of work by his private team, Greenspan said he was disappointed that the Toronto Police would not agree to share information with him. “What if we want to re-interview Frank D’Angelo or Kerry Winter?” he mused. “I would like to know from the police if that would interfere with anything they are doing. We are concerned that we might step on police toes and screw things up.”
When Greenspan mentioned the names of Winter and D’Angelo, I saw an opportunity to raise questions regarding his own clients, the children of Barry and Honey Sherman. Technically, his client is the estate of Barry and Honey Sherman, but that is controlled by four trustees on behalf of the children. After all, I pointed out, as sole heirs they appear to be the only people who stood to gain a vast fortune upon the death of their parents. I made it clear to Greenspan that I was simply asking questions. By this time in my investigation, I had heard that among family and friends, fingers had been pointing in all directions during the preceding months: at Kerry Winter, at Frank D’Angelo, even at Jack Kay. Sources, including those within the Sherman family, had informed me that in fall 2018 Jonathon Sherman had told people, including his sister Alex, that he thought Jack Kay may have had something to do with the murders. When I asked Kay and D’Angelo whether they were involved, both said that they loved and respected Barry Sherman and that it was ridiculous to suggest they were implicated. Winter, who had made the outlandish comments to the media about his fantasy of killing his cousin, said he simply did not do it.
Now, sitting in Greenspan’s office, I told him that I had no evidence or information implicating the Sherman children, but that as a matter of journalistic procedure, I wanted to ask each one if he or she had anything to do with the deaths. I also wanted to know whether Greenspan thought police had done the legwork to eliminate the heirs as suspects. I reminded him that he was the one who told me that a good homicide investigation begins at the centre and moves outward, eliminating suspects as the probe progresses.
There’s a floor-to-ceiling plate glass window in Greenspan’s second-floor office in Toronto. As he digested my line of questioning during the March 2019 interview, I mused aloud that while he might be angry enough to have me tossed out the window, I would survive the fall. Greenspan responded that anybody making such an allegation against his clients would be in serious trouble.
“To suggest that any of the Sherman children were involved is shameful, reckless, and libelous. It is an attempt by people to cast suspicions, and let me tell you, those people who make those claims would be our suspects.”
Two months later, still awaiting answers from my interview with Greenspan, I wrote a letter directly to Jonathon Sherman. Months before he had tentatively agreed to meet me, but only if I agreed in writing to allow him editorial control over any portions of a book or newspaper story that concerned him, an offer I declined. I now had many more questions for him: about Green Storage; about the email discussions he had with his father in 2015; about the email he sent his sisters suggesting their father was incompetent. I wanted to ask him about Frank D’Angelo, Jack Kay, his aunt Mary, and his whereabouts on both the Wednesday evening his parents were last seen alive and the Friday when their bodies were discovered—the latter a question I’d asked everyone. I also wanted to ask him directly if he had
anything to do with the murders, just as I had asked others. I had no knowledge of any police theories—it was simply a question I felt had to be asked. I sent a list of thirty-one queries to Jonathon. It took a couple of weeks but I received responses in late May from both Jonathon Sherman and Brian Greenspan. Sherman’s response was addressed both to me and the Toronto Star publisher, and he described how my “bullying tactics” had placed him in a dilemma. “He has attempted to force me to choose between not honouring our family’s commitment not to discuss our parents’ murder publicly or suffering the consequence of making ‘no comment’ to what I can only term are his insane accusations that I am implicated in the murder of my parents.” Sherman said that he believes that the people I have spoken to and who provided me with the information on which I based my questions are “people who we believe to be persons of interest in the murder of my parents.”
While Sherman maintained that he could not publicly answer any of the questions I asked, he suggested that what I should have done was send my questions to the Toronto Police and “let them ask me.” Sherman then made an interesting revelation. He said that after receiving my thirty-one questions, he had prepared “comprehensive written responses to each and every question” I had posed. And he said in his letter, which he copied to one of the Toronto Police detectives on the case, that he had sent those answers to the Toronto Police along with an offer. “I will also arrange an interview with Detective Price at his earliest convenience to further elaborate on, and if necessary explain, the details which I have provided to him in response to the queries made on behalf of the Toronto Star.”
SIXTEEN
THE MOST LIKELY SCENARIO
HONEY SHERMAN LEFT APOTEX ON Wednesday, December 13, at 6:30 P.M. as soon as the meeting with the architects concluded. She drove off alone in her gold-coloured Lexus SUV. Her daughter Alex says a credit card statement her husband has seen indicates that Honey stopped at Bayview Village Shopping Centre and went to a children’s store to purchase gifts for Hanukkah. Barry Sherman stayed in his office until 8:30 P.M., when he too left Apotex, also on his own. The police have not shared any information regarding whether the billionaire couple stopped anywhere on their routes home. Lawyer Brian Greenspan says he has heard the theory that Honey stopped at Bayview Village before coming home but that it is unconfirmed by his investigators. There are also reports circulating among the Sherman friends that Honey stopped at Bayview Village and someone got into the car with her. But there is no evidence of this. I asked questions at Bayview Village but did not find anyone who saw Honey that day. Security cameras were not installed at the upscale mall until 2018, long after the murders. Speculation among Sherman friends ranges from a scenario where Honey was carjacked to a story that she was at a local plaza, picked up someone she knew, and drove that person to her home. Traffic cameras may have recorded their movements on the roadway. It is likely that Honey was home by 8 P.M or 8:30 P.M.
Honey’s Lexus was later found parked in its normal spot on the right side of the house, near the entrance to the underground garage. It was Honey’s habit to enter through the side door immediately to the left of this parking spot. Whether she went into the house on her own or with someone else, it is likely that she went in through that door. The partial wall that obscures the side entrance would also obscure from passersby the view of any struggle that may have taken place while leaving the SUV.
Earlier in the day, Honey had been at home for her personal training session with her good friend Denise Gold, followed by a three-hour massage given by a woman who provided regular massage therapy to Honey. While Honey was receiving training and massage upstairs that Wednesday, the house was buzzing with activity. One of the couple’s real estate agents, Elise Stern, was present, overseeing workers with the goal of polishing the house for upcoming showings. No viewings were booked by the time Honey left on Wednesday for the architects’ meeting. By the evening, when she arrived home, the workers and the agent were gone. Honey would have used a key to open the side door. Once inside, if she followed her normal routine, she would have left the door unlocked. Barry, if he parked in the driveway and not underground, would then come in the side door when he arrived home. The Sherman couple did not believe in having a security system. There was no alarm on the entrances and windows, and there were no security cameras. The previous weekend, Barry and Honey had had a Sunday dinner prior to attending a Toronto Maple Leafs hockey game with their good friends Leslie Gales and Keith Ray. Over their meal, at the Hot Stove Club at the Air Canada Centre (as it was then named), Gales recalls making what had become a frequent suggestion, telling Barry it would be wise for a man of his wealth to have a security system and perhaps even a driver or bodyguard. “We don’t believe in that stuff,” Barry said in reply. “If they are going to get you, they are going to get you.”
It was not unusual for Honey to be alone in the house for several hours in the evening. Unless she had a social or charity event, she would head home and wait for Barry to arrive after his lengthy workday. Years before, in a conversation with Aubrey Dan, Honey had expressed surprise that Aubrey and his wife and their children, if they were not away, would eat dinner together each night. “That is not the case in our house,” Honey had told him. “Barry works too late for that.”
Whether Honey entered their house on her own or with someone else that Wednesday evening, she was violently attacked inside the house at some point. It was most likely before Barry came home. One clue is that her iPhone was found on the floor in a main floor powder room that she rarely used. That has fuelled speculation that she ran into the room to get away from her attacker and in the ensuing struggle the phone was dropped. Based on her facial injuries, she may have been struck on the face to subdue her, dying by strangulation almost immediately after. At some point, most likely while she was still alive, a thin rope or plastic tie was used to fasten her hands. One story the Sherman friends have been told is that Honey was hit with a laptop. Other friends have said they were told Honey’s facial injuries were caused by her being dragged down a stairway to the basement level. With the police not providing any information, friends looking for answers have latched onto these pieces of information or speculation. To get downstairs, either the main staircase or a smaller spiral staircase would have been used. Honey weighed about 170 pounds, and it is most likely that two people were present, given the difficulty of moving a heavy person who was unconscious or dead. Why she was taken to the pool room is a question that’s also been the subject of much speculation. The lap pool does not appear to have had any particular significance in their lives and was rarely used now that the children were grown and out of the house.
Barry Sherman walked out of Apotex at about 8:30 P.M., after sending a routine work email from his office desktop computer at 8:13 P.M. The email went to several people, including Apotex outside counsel Harry Radomski and company president Desai. He left the building and drove south. With him, he likely had a copy of the home inspection report their realtors had arranged, detailing the state of 50 Old Colony Road. With no security cameras at the home, it is impossible to know if he was alone in his car. The house across the street does have security cameras that pick up, in the background, the Sherman home. The family handed the security footage over to police and the private detectives but never checked it themselves to look for activity on the Wednesday, and neither the police nor the private team will say what they saw on the video. Presumably, it shows when the Shermans arrived home that evening, though it was after dark and the street is not particularly well lit. And while Sherman often parked overnight in the circular driveway near the front door, his car was found in the basement parking garage, giving rise to speculation that he decided, for some reason, to park there that evening. Snow was predicted for the following day, and that may have contributed to his decision. Or perhaps he had a passenger in the car who suggested, or insisted on, parking underground. The ramp to the garage and the driveway of the Sherman hom
e are heated, so no footprints or tire tracks would be recorded in the snow. Once he drove down the ramp, Sherman would have parked his car and left the garage through a door that opens onto a long hallway that leads to the two staircases, one at either end of the hallway. It seems likely that Barry was carrying the home inspection report in his hand. The report was found lying in the hallway near the garage door two days later by real estate agent Elise Stern when she was showing the prospective buyers and their agent through the house. It is reasonable to conclude that Barry was grabbed as he exited the garage and entered the hallway, dropping the report. However he was grabbed, the assailant or assailants did not damage his face or his eyeglasses. At some point, his wrists were bound together as Honey’s were, using either a thin rope or a plastic tie. He was taken to the pool room. To get into the pool room, a button at shoulder height has to be pressed to release a magnetic lock. No security code is needed.
The Billionaire Murders Page 28