TORONTO, Aug. 2 (UPI) -- The man who leaked a video purporting to show Toronto Mayor Rob Ford smoking crack was arrested during anti-drug raids, officials said.
Mohamed Siad, one of two men accused of trying to sell the video of Ford, was arrested June 13 during Project Traveller raids by police, the Toronto Star reported Friday.
Siad, 27, was charged with participating in a criminal organization, conspiracy and trafficking of guns and cocaine. More than 50 people were arrested and charged in the raids.
Police have not said whether they are in possession of the video of Ford, which Siad ultimately did not sell to reporters.
Related
Ford has denied using crack cocaine and says the video, first reported about four weeks before Siad's arrest, does not exist.
The Star reported Siad has been put in isolation after being stabbed in jail.
The newspaper said police who arrested Siad searched his home but there was no word on whether they found the video.
When it first reported on the video -- which it said could not be authenticated -- the Star said it appears to show Ford smoking from a crack pipe and making disparaging comments about political opponents and minorities.
At one point, he calls Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau disparaging name related to homosexuality and at another point, while discussing his role as coach of the Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School football team, he appears to say the players are "just [expletive] minorities."
Ford was subsequently fired from the coaching job.
"These allegations are ridiculous," Ford said at the time. "It's another story with respect to the Toronto Star going after me and that's all I have to say."
He later called reporters who wrote the story "pathological liars."
The Star reported May 29 workers in Ford's office were resisting an order to destroy email and telephone records. The newspaper said the following day police said a second suspect had been charged in the April death of Anthony Smith, 21, who is seen in a photograph provided to the Star and the Gawker website with his arm around Ford.
At least six members of Ford's office staff quit within two weeks after the initial reports of the crack video.
