Skip to Content Subscribe Our Offers My Account Manage My Subscriptions FAQ Newsletters Canada Canadian True Crime Canadian Politics Health World Israel & Middle East Financial Post NP Comment Longreads Puzzmo Diversions Comics NP News Quiz New York Times Crossword Horoscopes Life Eating & Drinking Style Sponsored Play for Ontario Travel Travel Canada Travel USA Travel International Cruises Travel Essentials Culture Books Celebrity Movies Music Theatre Television Business Essentials Advice Lives Told Tails Told Shopping Buy Canadian Home Living Outdoor Living Kitchen & Dining Tech Style & Beauty Personal Care Entertainment & Hobbies Gift Guide Travel Guide Amazon Prime Day Deals Savings National Post Store More Sports Hockey Baseball Basketball Football Soccer Golf Tennis Driving Vehicle Research Reviews News Gear Guide Obituaries Place an Obituary Place an In Memoriam Classifieds Place an Ad Celebrations Working Business Ads Archives Healthing Epaper Manage Print Subscription Profile Settings My Subscriptions Saved Articles My Offers Newsletters Customer Service FAQ Newsletters Canada World Financial Post NP Comment Longreads Puzzmo Diversions Life Shopping Epaper Manage Print Subscription HomeNewsCanadaSchizophrenic woman who killed stranger in Toronto financial district goes freeRohinie Bisesar is 'no longer is a significant threat to the safety of the public, and the law requires that an absolute discharge must be imposed,' said the Ontario Review BoardLast updated 5 minutes ago You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account.Rohinie Bisesar in an undated photo. Photo by Courtesy of Karl Gutowski/FileThe schizophrenic woman who committed a notorious killing of an innocent stranger in a downtown Toronto Shoppers Drug Mart more than 10 years ago has been granted an absolute discharge, freeing her entirely from the restrictions of the justice system.Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.Exclusive articles by Conrad Black, Barbara Kay and others. Plus, special edition NP Platformed and First Reading newsletters and virtual events.Unlimited online access to National Post.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.Support local journalism.Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.Exclusive articles by Conrad Black, Barbara Kay and others. Plus, special edition NP Platformed and First Reading newsletters and virtual events.Unlimited online access to National Post.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.Support local journalism.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one account.Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments.Enjoy additional articles per month.Get email updates from your favourite authors.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one accountShare your thoughts and join the conversation in the commentsEnjoy additional articles per monthGet email updates from your favourite authorsSign In or Create an AccountorIn 2015, Rohinie Bisesar, then 40 and now 51, stabbed Rosemarie Junor in the cosmetics section of the drug store in Toronto’s financial district underground PATH, following the malicious command hallucinations of a voice in her head she called the “entity.”Junor, 28, who also went by “Kim,” was newly married and worked in a downtown private medical clinic. She died five days later in hospital of a single stab wound by a small kitchen knife that pierced her heart.Get a dash of perspective along with the trending news of the day in a very readable format.By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder.The next issue of NP Posted will soon be in your inbox.We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again“While the tragedy cannot be undone and will always be on our minds, Ms. Bisesar no longer is a significant threat to the safety of the public, and the law requires that an absolute discharge must be imposed. Ms. Bisesar’s commitment to her present health has substantially contributed to this result,” reads the Ontario Review Board’s new decision.It was a horrific story that transfixed the city with its incomprehensible violence from an unlikely offender. Bisesar was a tiny woman, 4 foot 11 and 85 pounds, whose life appeared to have recently and abruptly unraveled from professional success to the point of spontaneous insane homicide.She had an MBA from a top Ontario school and had worked in a major financial firm, but she had been hospitalized a year before the killing after threatening her parents with arson and expressing bizarre paranoia. Unemployed, she continued to frequent the financial district and became a familiar regular at downtown coffee shops, neatly dressed and working on a laptop.Then, on a Friday mid-afternoon in December, according to facts recorded at her 2018 trial, the voice in her head said “What is the worse thing you can do?” and told her to get a knife. She travelled a dozen subway stops uptown to a discount store to buy one, a small kitchen knife, then returned downtown.In the PATH, she sat on a bench beside a woman and considered stabbing her, but then “the entity picked me up from the bench and had me start walking really fast.”She saw Junor on the phone in the nail polish section of the Shoppers, and almost immediately, 24 seconds later, she stabbed her in the upper chest and fled. She was identified by security footage and arrested four days later at a residence in the east end.Curiously, just 10 minutes before the reported time of the arrest, the National Post received an email from Bisesar’s personal email address, which appeared to be from her though this could not be independently confirmed. “Do you know any top professionals in artificial intelligence, biotechnology, nanotechnology, satellites?” it said. “Something has been happening to me and this is not my normal self and I would like to know who and why this is happening.”The email then addressed the stabbing.“I am sorry about the incidence,” the email said. “I felt the need to be extreme to see if it would work. I would normally not do such a thing.”Bisesar spent three years in jail before her trial by a judge alone, at which prosecutors and defence agreed she was not criminally responsible by reason of mental disorder.It was a long road to that decision. An early videolink court appearance was derailed by her rant about terrorists and the prime minister.Two years after the killing, she went before a jury who heard a psychiatrist testify she was psychotic. A jury agreed she was unfit to stand trial and unable to properly participate in her defence.A year after that, the same psychiatrist found her mental health “radically improved,” her schizophrenia effectively in remission through medication, and a jury agreed she was fit to be tried.After the NCR verdict, Bisesar was in secure detention in a mental hospital until 2021, when she was discharged from hospital to independent housing in the community, with her psychotic symptoms controlled by medication and in full remission.People found not criminally responsible for serious crimes have annual appearances before a review board, which considers the terms of their continued treatment and secure detention in hospital.Some people found NCR end up spending more time in secure hospital detention than they would have spent in prison under a guilty verdict to a crime. Some personality disorders, for example, are effectively incurable and a review board never decides a person’s risk to the public is below the legal threshold for release. In those cases, their detention is basically indefinite. Stabbing victim Rosemarie Junor. Photo by Handout/FileBut schizophrenia is treatable with medications, and so sometimes the period of confinement is much less than what a murderer would get in prison for the same killing. The most famous example is Vince Li, who killed Tim McLean, 22, on a Manitoba intercity bus in 2008 and cannibalized parts of his body. Like Bisesar, his schizophrenia was medically controlled after his NCR verdict, and he was granted an absolute discharge less than a decade after the killing.Bisesar received a conditional discharge in 2023, requiring her to remain under outpatient forensic psychiatric care of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto. She is unemployed, lives alone on disability assistance, and does volunteer work. She is on a long-acting injectable anti-psychotic and has been compliant with medication and therapy.Last year, she was denied an absolute discharge when the Ontario Review Board found she “continues to pose a significant threat to the safety of the public,” though a minority of the panel found she did not.This recent decision to grant her an absolute discharge — effectively closing the books on her case — reflects the hospital’s view that she no longer poses such a threat. It notes that she “understands that she has a major mental illness that requires treatment in perpetuity.”It notes that at the time of her offence in 2015 Bisesar was “floridly psychotic, untreated and desperately unwell.”National PostOur website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our newsletters here. Join the Conversation This website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. Read more about cookies here. By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.