WARMINGTON: Holiday Inn horror for Sudbury family being probed by Toronto cops
· Toronto Sun
It was three minutes of pure panic and fear as a man fought to keep a man out of his room with his young son inside.
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A man trying to break through the door of a North York hotel room in the middle of the night with a family inside seems to be something right out of a Stephen King novel. All of this happened within a stone’s throw of a police station.
The strange case of hotel horrors faced by a Sudbury family here for a basketball tournament has Toronto Police investigating. It’s one of those stories that are too strange to completely explain.
“We are still in shock,” said Glen Guitard, who called the ordeal terrifying.
Man tried to push way into hotel room
The family came in for the weekend for a nearby basketball tournament. They were staying at the Holiday Inn Express hotel on Norfinch Dr., which is next door to Toronto Police’s 31 Division.
“We were not at the hotel very much,” he said. “There seemed to be a mix of people and no issues.”
But that changed at 2 a.m. on Sunday, when Guitard said a man knocking at his door tried to push his way inside.
“I had opened the door just an inch to see who it was and while he was pushing to open the door, I was pushing to not let him in,” said Guitard.
He said it seemed like this battle went on for a long time.
“The hotel looked at the security camera and they said it was for three minute,” he said.
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2nd incident in 2 days at hotel
But even stranger was that the video, said Guitard, showed the man outside the door for 13 minutes while he and his son were sleeping.
“The only thing I heard him say was he had to get inside to get his phone,” said Guitard. “He did not seem impaired. I was worried he may try to take my son.”
It’s all so bizarre. Guitard said this was not the first knock on this door. On the Friday night before that incident, he said there was a girl of about 14, described as Black and appearing somewhat confused, also standing at the door and trying to look into the room.
At that point, Guitard, his wife Jessica McKerral and their sons Carter, 12, and Gavin, 7, were inside. He said the girl moved along when they told her she had the wrong room. They didn’t think of it again until the next knock.
“Somehow I felt it could be connected,” said Guitard, adding he wonders if there was a potential trafficking situation going on.
Meanwhile, Guitard said the man, who was about 5-foot-8 and appeared to be “Middle Eastern” with a light-brown complexion, finally fled the hotel once Carter called 911. McKerral and Gavin had already left for Sudbury with Gavin suffering from a stomach bug.
“The hotel manager told me he was a repeat offender and they had an incident with him in December 2024,” said Guitard, adding police responded about an hour after the 911 call.
The parent company of the hotel has not returned a request for a comment. Toronto Police spokesperson Shannon Eames, meanwhile, told the Toronto Sun that this case is “actively being investigated” and did not result in any injuries.
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At least physical ones. It has left lasting emotional wounds, said Guitard.
“My son is still very shaken up and in need of therapy,” he said, adding he’s only talking about this to warn other families of the potential danger.
Toronto needs to make this a priority and find out what was going on there? Who is this man and where is he now? If it was connected, then who is the young girl that knocked on their door the night before and where is she? Is she safe?
Was this the same man who was allegedly involved in another incident at the hotel a little more than a year ago?
The Toronto Sun has requested access to video footage of the man who allegedly tried to get into the room and post it to try to identify him. He needs to be questioned and have his background scoped. There have been no charges and none of the allegations reported here have been tested in court.
But these allegations are crazy and in the interest of public safety, so we need to get to the bottom of it.