The man accused of dumping buckets of “liquefied fecal matter” on several people in a baffling series of attacks in or near two Toronto universities made a brief appearance in a downtown court Wednesday afternoon.
Samuel Opoku, 23, entered the courtroom for his bail hearing at Old City Hall in handcuffs with his hair uncombed, wearing no shoes and unmatched socks — one white, one black.
At the request of defence lawyer Jordan Weisz, Opoku’s hearing was pushed back into the next week. He was scheduled to return to court at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, also at Old City Hall. He will remain in custody until then.
Police arrested Opoku Tuesday evening following three separate incidents over four days in which police say a man attacked a total of five people with buckets containing feces.
He is charged with five counts of assault with a weapon and five counts of mischief interfering with property.
A courtroom at Old City Hall was fully packed ahead of Opoku’s scheduled appearance earlier Wednesday morning.
Several onlookers, many curious university students, gathered huddled around a TV monitor in a hallway outside the courtroom after they could not find seating.
University of Toronto life sciences student Advait Sridhar said he wanted to be there to show support for the victims of the attacks.
“Can you imagine that stuff dumped on you? It’s disgusting,” the second-year student said.
Outside court, Weisz told reporters Opoku is “shocked” by the charges he’s facing. “He understands the allegations are troubling,” Weisz said, noting his client enjoys the presumption of innocence, like any other accused.
Weisz added that, although details of Wednesday’s hearing cannot be reported due to a publication ban, he has “unfortunate concerns” regarding how mental health disorders are treated and funded in general.
“Obviously the public doesn’t have the full story yet,” he said.
The most recent incident happened shortly before midnight Monday near U of T’s downtown campus as a man approached a woman and threw the contents of a bucket on her.
“A young girl had a bucket of waste, feces, dumped on her,” said Toronto police Const. David Hopkinson. “I don’t know what to say, I’m at a loss, this is absolutely disgusting.”
The two similar assaults occurred in libraries at York University’s Keele Street campus on Sunday and at U of T’s downtown campus on Friday.
On Friday evening, police say a man entered U of T’s John P. Robarts Library and allegedly poured a bucket of fecal matter onto a woman and a young person seated at a table before fleeing.
On Sunday, police say a man attacked two more people in the same fashion at York’s Scott Library.
Emily Leonard, a PhD student in the Ancient Greek program and a frequent user of the Robarts Library on Tuesday said she found the serial nature of the attacks especially concerning.
“Unbelievable that a person would be going around doing this.”
Victor Kwong, a spokesperson for the Toronto police, said although the victims of each attack are all Asian, police do not believe the attacks were racially motivated.
With files from Jacob Lorinc
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