The Ajax man wanted in connection with a recent shooting on Grace Street was previously identified by police as a member of the “Ugly Crew,” a southern Ontario street gang that was largely dismantled after a high-profile investigation dubbed Project Runway.
Jonathon Greaves, 30, has been arrested multiple times for allegedly trafficking hard drugs, including cocaine and fentanyl, and at the time of last week’s shooting he was facing an assault charge in Oshawa, according to court documents obtained by SooToday. He is due to appear in court on that matter Oct. 20.
Now the subject of an arrest warrant issued by the Sault Ste. Marie Police Service, Greaves is wanted for multiple crimes linked to the Grace Street incident, including aggravated assault, assault with a weapon, and six counts of violating a probation order not to possess a firearm.
“The firearm related to the shooting incident has not been recovered and the wanted person should be considered armed and dangerous,” police warned in a recent news release. “If you see them, or know their whereabouts, DO NOT approach, call 911 immediately.”
Greaves is certainly no stranger to police.
In 2012, he was arrested on a Peterborough street carrying crack cocaine and charged with various offences, including possession, resisting arrest and breach of probation.
In 2017, Greaves was among nine people busted during a drug raid at a Peterborough home. He was arrested yet again a year later and charged, along with an associate, with multiple drug-related offences, including possession for the purpose of trafficking and possession of property over $5,000 obtained by crime.
At the time, Staff Sergeant John Lyons of the Peterborough Police Service described Greaves and his fellow accused as “members of the Ugly Crew gang,” a local group tied to drugs and gun activity in the region.
In 2016, a major investigation dubbed Project Runway targeted the Ugly Crew, which police say sourced their drugs and weapons from GTA street gangs.
Five years later, one of the men arrested as part of Project Runway — Jonathon Morningstar — was apprehended again in Sault Ste. Marie. He had been the subject of a Canada-wide warrant for breach of statutory release and was hiding out in the Sault.
In recent years, Toronto-area street gangs have increasingly expanded their criminal operations into rural and northern Ontario, cashing in on the growing opioid epidemic. The trend was the subject of a recent “Big Read” published by SooToday: How Toronto-based street gangs are terrorizing small-town Ontario.