Toronto chef describes being attacked on the TTC in alleged hate crime
Toronto chef, Sonam Pontsang, has become an online sensation — but not for his cooking.
About a week ago, the 34-year-old posted a video on TikTok, showing a portion of an alleged altercation he says he was involved in at Castle Frank subway station. Since then, his post has garnered more than 100,000 views.
“Somebody shoved [me] from the middle of the stairs, and I had to run as fast as I can, [down the] bottom ten stairs. I looked behind and he’s standing in front of me, and he’s just yelling a bunch of racial slur[s] and telling me, aggressively, to get out of the country,” Pontsang told CTV News Toronto on Tuesday.
On Feb. 28, at around 9 p.m., Pontsang said he was on his way home from his restaurant, Momo Ghar, when the attack happened.
“He’s right in front of my face. Anywhere I move — he’s just stepping in front of me,” he said.
Pontsang said he was trying to avoid a fight, given all he’d heard in recent months about violent incidents on the TTC. He says he was also worried the man, who kept fiddling with his backpack, could be armed. But Pontsang claims the man wouldn’t leave him alone.
“He saw my tattoos and he grabbed my hand and he tried to, like, he took a lighter out of his backpack and tried to torch it, aggressively,” he said.
At that point, Pontsang says — he’d “had enough.” He shook the man off and kicked him, before his alleged assailant took off down the platform.
“I stood my ground and I yelled back at him and said, ‘You have to step out of the subway system right now.’ Like, I didn’t want him to prey on another victim,” he said.
That’s the portion of the interaction captured on the TikTok video. In the clip, you can hear Pontsang yell, “You’re getting out of the subway, see what I mean?”
The man responds, “Get away from me, boy, I’m not a girl.”
Pontsang says he followed the man, but his alleged attacker ended up getting on a passing subway train right before the doors closed.
Within a couple of days, however, Pontsang decided he wasn’t going to let the matter go, and he took his story to TikTok.
“Because I want people to know who the culprit is — who’s the guy.”
Several people commented on the video, claiming they have had similar experiences with the same man.
“I saw this guy! With a lighter in University [Avenue]. He approached my friend and playing with his lighter near him,” one person wrote.
Another poster said, “I saw him at Finch station at 6 a.m., he was threatening randoms as they were going to work, I was well away but he was super loud.”
“One of the challenges we face about repeat offenders on the TTC is that we don’t have the ability to actually ban people. The courts have to do that,” TTC spokesperson Stuart Green told CTV News Toronto.
“Now we do have a court advocacy program, so we will go into courts and will advocate for, you know, stiffer sentences for people who assault transit workers, or who commit crime on public transit.”
But Green says people have to report crimes like this to both the TTC — and police — because they can’t fix what they don’t know.
Pontsang admits he did not report the incident. He adds, however, that he hopes his alleged assailant learned something from their run-in.
“Hopefully, he won’t do it again. Maybe he’ll think twice before approaching any vulnerable people.”
Green says the TTC circulates pictures to staff — privately — of people who are banned from the TTC, and their images can also be found in collector booths.
“If any staff see someone who’s not supposed to be in the system, they will call,” Green said.
As for customers, Green stresses that they shouldn’t wait to report an incident because security video is erased after 72 hours.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
NEW Is there a cost to convenience? Canada approves new cancer immunotherapy treatment
A new cancer treatment recently approved in Canada promises to cut treatment time down to just minutes, but experts have differing opinions on whether it's what's best for patients.
Air Canada walks back new seat selection policy change after backlash
Air Canada has paused a new seat selection fee for travellers booked on the lowest fares just days after implementing it.
Canada's new dental program offering hope of free care to millions but many dentists aren't signed up
A new Canadian dental care program is offering the hope of free care to millions, but while 1.7 million people have signed up for the plan, only about 5,000 dentists have done the same.
Province boots mayor and council in small northern Ont. town out of office
An ongoing municipal strike, court battles and revolt by half of council has prompted the province to oust the mayor and council in Black River-Matheson.
King Charles III returns to public duties with a trip to a cancer charity
King Charles III returned to public duties on Tuesday, visiting a cancer treatment charity and beginning his carefully managed comeback after the monarch's own cancer diagnosis sidelined him for three months.
NDP says Ottawa's new grocery task force isn't living up to government promises
The federal government says the task force it created to monitor and investigate grocery retailers' practices has not conducted any probes and doesn't have a mandate to take enforcement action.
A group of Toronto tenants have been on a rent strike for a year and say there's no resolution in sight
Dozens of tenants in Toronto's Thorncliffe Park area have now been withholding their rent for one year, and it’s unclear when the dispute will end.
U.K. police arrest man wielding a sword in east London, 5 people are taken to the hospital
A man wielding a sword attacked members of the public and two police officers on Tuesday in the east London community of Hainault before being arrested, police said.
Archeologists search for remnants of Halifax's 250-year-old wall that surrounded the city
Archeologist Jonathan Fowler is using ground-penetrating radar to search for historic evidence of the massive wall that surrounded Halifax more than 250 years ago.