HUNTER: Cops look to tech, DNA to solve 1991 Canada Day cabbie murder

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Cops found taxi driver Anthony Ekunah slumped across the front seat of his cab.

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There was enough blood in the interior to decorate a slaughterhouse. The hard-working, 36-year-old married father had been stabbed and slashed and was dead at the scene.

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For 32 years, the Ekunah murder — believed to be a robbery gone awry — has gone unsolved. It went into the books at homicide #0481991.

At the time, cops offered a $100,000 reward for information on the Nigerian immigrant’s murder. That went nowhere.

Now, Toronto Police cold case detectives are hopeful that new technology and advances in DNA could finally lead them to the cold-blooded killer.

“In every exchange between two people, no matter where, something is taken and something is left behind,” Det. Andrew Doyle told The Toronto Sun.

“I’m pretty confident our killer left quite a few things behind.”

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On June 30, 1991, Ekunah left the Tretheway Dr. residence he shared with his wife and son for the overnight shift driving hack for Metro Cabs. He drove yellow cab 670.

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Doyle said around 1:14 a.m. on that Canada Day, Metro received a call for a pickup at 783 Willowdale Ave. with the fare going to the area of Finch Ave. W. and Leslie St. That was the last anyone heard from Ekunah.

Around 11:07 a.m., less than five minutes from Ekunah’s final destination, a resident of quiet Rondeau Dr. advised police that a taxi had been parked across the street from her house for hours.

Thirteen minutes later, cops found the lifeless body of Anthony Ekunah. Coroner Peter King inevitably pronounced death at 12:34 p.m. He had been stabbed several times in the chest, and there were slash wounds to his torso and extremities.

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Homicide detectives interviewed and cleared dozens of persons of interest, but there was no clear suspect and the case gathered dust — until now.

“As far as I know, Anthony was a fine, upstanding, hard-working citizen,” Doyle said. “His wife Fina calls in regularly. She has clearly never forgotten — and neither have we.”

The victim left behind his pregnant wife and a 3-year-old son. He had been in Canada just five years.

But a wide array of new technological weapons are in the homicide detectives’ arsenals. Doyle said he is currently working with the TPS forensic lab and the Centre of Forensic Science to try and bring the case to closure.

“Various evidence has been submitted for testing over the years but we’re looking for more of a result this time around,” he said, adding that evidence like fingerprints will benefit from new tech.

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Doyle is currently working on getting an offender DNA profile by re-submitting certain exhibits and evidence to be analyzed by scientists. The new process of genetic genealogy may also provide answers.

“One hundred per cent, we can identify the unknown offender,” he said.

Less than a week after he was murdered, Anthony Ekunah’s body was flown home to Africa for burial.

At the time, Det. Brian Raybould told the Sun the murder was “heartbreaking.”

“It’s the crime everyone fears most,” Raybould said. ”That it can happen to them in a city of more than 2 million people and no one comes forward.”

Raybould said of the $100,000 reward: “‘ll tell you, I’d be happy to hand the cheque to someone if it brings the killer to justice.”

If you have any information on the murder of Anthony Ekunah contact the Toronto Police homicide unit at 416-808-7400, homicide@torontopolice.on.ca or Crime Stoppers at 416−222−TIPS (8477).

bhunter@postmedia.com

@HunterTOSun

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