Re Usman Suhrwardy, 2026 CanLII 15

Ontario Review Board

Re: Usman Suhrwardy

ORB File No: 8639

Hearing held on: Monday, December 1, 2025

Place of Hearing: St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton, West 5^th Campus

Pursuant to: Section 672.81(1) of the Criminal Code

Before:

Alternate Chairperson: Ms. L. Banks

Members: Dr. M. Attia

Dr. P. N. Wright

Mr. E. Siebenmorgen

Mr. A. Mete

Parties Appearing:

Accused: Usman Suhrwardy

Counsel: Mr. J. Chrolavicius

The Person in charge of Hospital: Counsel: Mr. S. O’Brien

Attorney General of Ontario: Counsel: Ms. C. Gzik

REASONS FOR DISPOSITION

(Dated January 2, 2026)

Introduction

1. Mr. Suhrwardy was charged under the Criminal Code of Canada with 2 sets of charges arising in Toronto and Hamilton. The first set relate to harassing and threatening emails he sent to 3 professors at Toronto Metropolitan University on November 26 and 27, 2022. Mr. Suhrwardy was subsequently charged in Hamilton on September 21, 2023 with threatening to damage the property of Mr. Faisal Minhas, and uttering a threat to cause bodily harm to Mr. Minhas He was found not criminally responsible (“NCR”) for the latter offences, along with three counts of uttering threats and three counts of criminal harassment, on September 23, 2024. Mr. Suhrwardy was most recently subject to a Disposition of the Ontario Review Board (“ORB” or “the Board”) dated December 12, 2024 pursuant to which he was ordered detained at the Forensic Psychiatry Program of St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton, West 5th Campus (“SJHH” or “the Hospital”), subject to various conditions and privileges, up to and including community living in supervised accommodation approved by the person in charge. This was Mr. Suhrwardy’s first Disposition since coming under the Board’s jurisdiction.

2. On Monday, December 1, 2025, a panel of the Board convened in person at the Hospital to inquire into the circumstances and to determine: (a) whether Mr. Suhrwardy represents a significant threat to the safety of the public within the meaning of s. 672.5401 of the Criminal Code; and (b) if so, what is the necessary and appropriate Disposition, having regard to the factors in s. 672.54 of the Code. Mr. Suhrwardy was present for his hearing and represented by his counsel, Mr. Chrolavicius. Mr. Suhrwardy’s sister, who is also his substitute decision maker (SDM) was also present.

3. The evidence at the hearing consisted of the Hospital Report dated November 17, 2025 (the “Hospital Report”) and the oral evidence of Dr. Y. Alatishe, who has been Mr. Suhrwardy’s attending psychiatrist since he arrived on his unit on December 13, 2024 following the issuance of the Board’s initial Disposition.

Positions of the Parties

4. At the start of the hearing, counsel for the Hospital presented a jointly agreed-upon recommendation that Mr. Suhrwardy be subject to a Detention Order with the same terms and conditions as found in his previous Disposition, except that all of his community privileges, including living in the community, be expanded geographically to encompass all of Southern Ontario. Counsel for Mr. Suhrwardy expressly conceded the “significant threat” issue.

5. The parties maintained the joint position at the conclusion of the evidence.

Findings

6. For the following Reasons, the panel found that Mr. Suhrwardy represents a significant threat to the safety of the public. The panel accepted the parties’ joint recommendation and found that the necessary and appropriate Disposition is a Detention Order containing the terms and conditions found in the December 12, 2024 Disposition, with community privileges expanded to include all of Southern Ontario at the Hospital’s discretion.

Index Offences (Summaries Extracted from Last Year’s Reasons)

7. In relation to the Toronto offences, Mr. Suhrwardy was a student at Ryerson University, now Toronto Metropolitan University, until 2007 at which time he was suspended due to low marks. He was a student of the three victims. On November 26 and 27, 2022, Mr. Suhrwardy sent numerous emails to these professors threatening to shoot them and other students if they did not apologize to him for dismissing him from the program.

8. In relation to the Hamilton offences, on September 21, 2023, Mr. Suhrwardy punched the owner of a pizza store located in downtown Hamilton and then threw a store table onto the street. Mr. Suhrwardy had routinely loitered in front of this store, often yelling and bothering customers. On this particular day, the victim told Mr. Suhrwardy that he was annoying the customers and would have to leave the area. Mr. Suhrwardy responded by slapping the victim in the face and then stated that he was going to hurt him and “fuck up” his store. Mr. Suhrwardy then threw the table onto the road.

Personal Background Information and Psychiatric History

9. Mr. Suhrwardy was 43 years of age at the time of the hearing. He is diagnosed with schizophrenia and cannabis use disorder, severe, in early remission is a controlled environment. He is incapable of consenting to psychiatric treatment and his sister, as noted above, is his SDM. He is considered capable of making financial decisions.

10. Mr. Suhrwardy’s personal, developmental and psychiatric history is detailed in the Hospital Report. As the Hospital Report is in evidence at the hearing, the information need not be extensively summarized for the purpose of these Reasons. Those portions that provide necessary context for a discussion of the issues are highlighted below.

11. Mr. Suhrwardy was born in Pakistan. The family immigrated to Canada in 2002, returned to Pakistan for two years, and returned to Canada in 2004. Mr. Suhrwardy’s mother passed away in January of 2023.

12. Mr. Suhrwardy’s parents enrolled him into squash at a young age and his sister reported that he excelled at the sport. She noted that he participated in various tournaments while in Pakistan and at a provincial level in Canada.

13. Mr. Suhrwardy’s father indicated that his son began to exhibit behavioural issues starting in elementary school and was advised by his son’s teacher to seek psychiatric care. His father dismissed these concerns at the time as he did not fully comprehend the complexities of his son’s mental health. Mr. Suhrwardy’s behavioural issues escalated during his teenage years. His father reported that Mr. Suhrwardy began smoking cannabis, had conflicts with his peers and teachers, struggled with his studies, and displayed defiant behaviour towards his elders.

14. Mr. Suhrwardy stated that he had obtained his Secondary School Diploma in Pakistan. He denied having an educational assistant or an individual education plan. His sister reported that her brother faced challenges in school and mentioned that he was subjected to bullying by other students. His father reported that Mr. Suhrwardy discontinued his formal schooling in Pakistan when he was in Grade 11 due to ongoing conflict with teachers and peers. Consequently, his parents arranged for a private tutor to assist him in completing his secondary school studies.

15. Mr. Suhrwardy stated that he had attended Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) shortly after immigrating to Canada in 2002. He spent the first year in a transitional program for immigrant students before he could proceed to the second year as a full-time student in the New Media Image Arts program. However, he reported withdrawing from TMU to focus on becoming a professional squash player. He stated that he was initially one of the top students, but he felt marginalized by the faculty who criticized him for producing club music and not allowing him to conduct his research. He had asserted that the faculty had failed him, harassed him, and critiqued his work, which had resulted in him feeling traumatized by their actions. He indicated having attended Mohawk College to study Information Science but having withdrawn from his studies due to medical issues.

16. Mr. Suhrwardy resided in Hamilton from 2013 to December 2020 when he moved back to the family home in Mississauga. Health records from his family physician indicated that since leaving home, Mr. Suhrwardy had conflict with peers while living with extended family, at community shelters, with landlords while living in independent apartments, in Airbnb’s, and later in an apartment owned by family friends. All these arrangements ended with Mr. Suhrwardy being evicted and/or banned from the premises.

17. After moving back in with his parents, he was then hospitalized on multiple occasions throughout 2021 and upon discharge, lived at the Salvation Army in Toronto for approximately three weeks. Since then, he has relocated to Hamilton where he initially lived with a roommate but was later able to secure independent housing with support from a systems navigator through his family doctor. He was then evicted from the unit as a result of uttering death threats to his then landlord.

18. Mr. Suhrwardy has no record of criminal convictions, but police have been involved on several occasions in bringing him to hospital because of mental health issues. As noted in the previous paragraph, he was hospitalized several times in 2021 after threatening his parents, particularly his father, with harm. He has expressed both suicidal and homicidal thoughts since 2019, according to records from his family doctor. In the fall of 2023, he was again brought to hospital by police after expressing threats to his family. He was reportedly experiencing symptoms that included preoccupation with religion, his music career, and wishing to kill his father who he believed had murdered his mother.

19. Mr. Suhrwardy was hospitalized in the Schizophrenia Unit at the Hospital from late November of 2023 until the time of his initial ORB hearing. His criminal responsibility assessment, conducted by Dr. G. Chaimowitz, was conducted during this period of hospitalization. As reported in last year’s Reasons for Disposition, Dr. Chaimowitz stated that Mr. Suhrwardy was at that time unwell and not able to be placed in the community. He was taking both an oral and an injectable antipsychotic medication but remained psychotic. A trial of clozapine had been discontinued due to myocarditis. Dr. Chaimowitz indicated that Mr. Suhrwardy was very angry, intrusive, and intimidating when he first entered the hospital, but had become kinder and more respectful. He remained actively unwell with grandiose ideas, auditory and visual hallucinations, and was actually quite fearful of going outside of the hospital at that time.

Evidence at the Hearing

20. Dr. Alatishe noted, at the outset of his testimony, that Mr. Suhrwardy had come to the Forensic Psychiatry Program in a somewhat atypical fashion, having spent a year on the Hospital’s Schizophrenia Unit under the civil mental health system. His arrival to the Forensic Program was initially a bit of a shock to him due to the additional rules, but he ultimately acclimated well. He had one relapse to marijuana use in April of 2025 (explaining that he found it on the hospital grounds) but there has been nothing since then.

21. Dr. Alatishe testified that Mr. Suhrwardy’s presentation has improved over the reporting year: he had been quite aggressive and psychotic before, but Dr. Alatishe has not recently been seeing the same level of aggression. His symptoms remain active but have become more intermittent. He still exhibits grandiosity and suspicion. He expresses a belief that he has been accursed for the past five years with black magic, as retribution for seeing an astrologer. He does not believe that these thoughts have any connection to his mental illness. His hallucinations are more somatic than command in nature. His delusional thinking around his father having murdered his mother seems to have resolved. Overall, Dr. Alatishe considered Mr. Suhrwardy’s symptoms to be stabilized, in that they remain active but are manageable.

22. Asked for his opinion as to Mr. Suhrwardy’s likely compliance with his medication and risk to the community in the absence of the external controls in place at the time of the hearing, Dr. Alatishe referred first to Mr. Suhrwardy’s history when in the community under the civil mental health system: there were family concerns for their safety, and Mr. Suhrwardy was volatile and even physically aggressive. Noting that Mr. Suhrwardy often speaks of wanting to modify (decrease) the dosage of his medication, Dr. Alatishe opined that on his own, Mr. Suhrwardy would initially decrease his dosage, experience some decompensation, then his insight would worsen, resulting in further reductions in his medication and in turn further decompensation. In that context, the doctor stated that Mr. Suhrwardy would be likely to engage in criminal behaviours.

23. Over the next 12 months, Dr. Alatishe would like to see continued stabilization in Mr. Suhrwardy’s mental state and a further attenuation of in his symptoms. He would like to see Mr. Suhrwardy taking advantage of CBT-p (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for psychosis) as well as to seek help with his anxiety. He would also like to see Mr. Suhrwardy receiving psychoeducation around his cannabis use, as he entertains beliefs as to its positive benefits and he wishes to return to cannabis use. The doctor was hopeful that over the course of the year ahead, Mr. Suhrwardy would maintain abstinence from substances of abuse and engage in structured daily activities.

24. Dr. Alatishe testified that Mr. Suhrwardy has expressed interest in attending school, although the doctor felt that the expressed aspirations were “lofty” and somewhat grandiose. He believed that educational pursuits should be undertaken in a more gradual fashion.

25. Dr. Alatishe addressed Mr. Suhrwardy’s current housing situation. He stated that Mr. Suhrwardy remains on waitlists for TRHP (Transitional Housing and Rehabilitation Program) and CHO (Community Homes for Opportunity) housing in the Hamilton area and continues to be considered for housing with Indwell. Dr. Alatishe noted that a vacancy had become available at Indwell. There were three candidates for the spot, including Mr. Suhrwardy, and the housing program accepted a different candidate. Dr. Alatishe noted, as stated in the Hospital Report, that Indwell has moved away from a “waitlist” approach to accepting candidates from the Forensic Program. In response to a question from Mr. Suhrwardy’s counsel, Dr. Alatishe confirmed that Mr. Suhrwardy does not wish to share a room, and that this preference will narrow his options. Dr. Alatishe confirmed that Mr. Suhrwardy is content to remain in the Hospital until an appropriate living situation can be found.

26. Dr. Alatishe updated the panel in relation to Mr. Suhrwardy’s family support. As noted in the Hospital Report, his main social supports are his father and sister, with whom he has frequent telephone and in-person contact. He uses indirectly supervised community privileges for in-person visits with them. They are both in the process of completing applications for Approved Person status, and to facilitate family visits, Mr. Suhrwardy’s Disposition would need to geographically extend his accompanied and indirectly supervised privileges beyond the Hamilton community, as Mr. Suhrwardy’s father lives in Mississauga.

27. Dr. Alatishe also advised that Mr. Suhrwardy’s father may be planning to move to Hamilton in the fall of 2026. If Mr. Suhrwardy should wish to live with his father, the Hospital would need to approve such a living situation.

28. Panel members asked questions concerning a reference to outstanding charges, contained in last year’s Reasons. According to the Reasons, counsel for the Attorney General advised, at the December 2024 initial hearing, that it was alleged that at approximately 2:30 a.m. on July 14, 2022, Mr. Suhrwardy confronted a neighbour of his father in Mississauga with a pair of scissors and threatened to kill the neighbour’s family. As Dr. Alatishe had no information concerning the nature or status of these charges, counsel for the Attorney General, Ms. Gzik, interjected to state, initially, that these charges “are part of this hearing”. Asked later for clarification, counsel stated that according to her information database, these charges had been resolved on September 12, 2024, and that there are currently no outstanding charges. Panel members expressed interest in receiving information, for next year’s hearing, as to whether it could rely upon any information concerning those allegations for the purpose of future assessments of Mr. Suhrwardy’s risk.

29. No further evidence was led following Dr. Alatishe’s testimony.

Analysis and Conclusions

Significant Threat

30. This issue was undisputed at the hearing. The panel nevertheless made its own finding that Mr. Suhrwardy represents a significant threat to the safety of the public. He suffers from a major mental disorder, schizophrenia, along with a severe cannabis use disorder that has only been in remission since he has been hospitalized. The psychological report from his criminal responsibility assessment indicates that Mr. Suhrwardy was using cannabis at the time of the Hamilton offences. The index offences involved violence and threats of violence and occurred over a period of months during which Mr. Suhrwardy was experiencing active symptoms of his illness. The evidence satisfies us that when actively unwell, Mr. Suhrwardy is likely to engage in criminal conduct that would result in serious physical or psychological harm. Mr. Suhrwardy has little, if any, insight into the need for his medication and its necessity in mitigating his risk to the community. Based on the evidence of Dr. Alatishe, which the panel accepts, if given the opportunity, Mr. Suhrwardy would stop taking medications and his mental state would deteriorate, resulting in his symptoms becoming more intense and in an increased likelihood of engaging in criminal activity.

31. In forming its opinion that Mr. Suhrwardy represents a significant threat to the safety of the public, the panel had regard to his history of threatening and aggressive behaviour in relation to his family, as well as his behaviour during hospital admissions, some of which required the use of seclusion and physical restraints. In this regard, we note the following extract from the psychological report of Dr. H. Moulden, prepared for the purpose of informing Mr. Suhrwardy’s criminal responsibility assessment:

In terms of problem specific domains, given the reports of anger and aggression Mr. Suhrwardy completed a self-report questionnaire about his experience and expression of anger (ADS). His total score was indicative of anger pathology (84th percentile), which reflected specific elevations on the higher order index of Anger-In (88th percentile), and Reactivity (80th percentile) and Vengeance (75th percentile) to a lesser extent. Specifically, Mr. Suhrwardy’s responses reflected long-standing anger problems, triggered by perceptions of social rejection, resentment and rumination, and characterized by tension reduction, passive, coercive, and indirect expressions of aggression.

32. The following extract from the Clinical Risk Summary in the Hospital Report underscores the panel’s risk finding in this case:

Interdisciplinary observations consistently indicate that while Mr. Suhrwardy is behaviourally stable within the structured hospital environment, he continues to demonstrate persistent symptoms, inconsistent insight, limited engagement in programming that targets dynamic risk factors, and cognitive rigidity that affects planning and flexibility. His appropriate use of privileges and generally cooperative presentation speak to his stability while contained. However, his psychotic symptoms, unresolved delusional beliefs, and limited development of risk-reducing skills indicate that this stability is closely tied to the structure, monitoring, and medication adherence enforced by the current setting.

33. The panel notes with concern that some of Mr. Suhrwardy’s delusions have been directed to his father, with who he has experienced a somewhat difficult relationship in the past. His past preoccupation with a belief that his mother was killed by his father, and that as a result he wanted to murder his father, is greatly concerning. Dr. Alatishe testified that this delusion has resolved, and it is of course encouraging that Mr. Suhrwardy continues to enjoy his father’s support. Nevertheless, this concern underscores the importance of ongoing oversight by the Board and the Hospital’s Forensic Program to ensure Mr. Suhrwardy’s medication compliance and the monitoring of his mental condition.

The Necessary and Appropriate Disposition

34. The panel had no difficulty in accepting the parties’ joint recommendation that the necessary and appropriate Disposition is a continuation of the existing Detention Order, with an expansion of the geographical range of Mr. Suhrwardy’s community privileges from the City of Hamilton into Southern Ontario. Mr. Suhrwardy enjoys the support of his family who, at the time of the hearing, live in Mississauga. As his mental condition continues to be stabilized and indeed, hopefully, improves, an expansion of the range of his privileges should assist in his family’s ongoing efforts to support Mr. Suhrwardy’s reintegration.

35. The panel is confident that the treatment team and the Hospital will continue to exercise appropriate caution and vigilance in mitigating the risk that Mr. Suhrwardy may present to the community, and particularly to his family members. As has already been noted, while his family currently provide his most significant social support, they have also experienced his threats and aggression when he has been unwell in the past.

36. We conclude these Reasons by reminding the parties of the concerns summarized above in para. 28 of these Reasons and request that information concerning that matter be provided in advance of next year’s review.

DATED this 2^nd day of January 2026, at the City of Toronto, in the Toronto Region.

Eric Siebenmorgen

Legal Member

Office of the Registrar

Ontario Review Board