
The unsolved murder of an unusual billionaire - BerislavLopac
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2018-apotex-billionaire-murder/
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mabbo
This whole case has been crazy. I live about 4km from the home. It went from
murder/suicide to murder/murder to maybe the kids did it? to no wait they've
hired all these extra detectives to... Anyone's guess really.

At this point, short of a confession from someone I doubt we'll ever know.

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refurb
As someone who works in the pharmaceutical industry, Apotex is a HUGE player
and Barry was very well known for being an aggressive and shrewd businessman.

His death came as a shock to a lot of people.

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HoochieKoo
I wonder if he had spent more money on security, drivers, personal assistants,
etc., whether that would have protected them more from unsavory people in
their lives and these extra staff might have given the police more leads in
the case. And why wouldn’t they have invested in better security and
monitoring of their home? Crazy.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
The lack of a serious security system is the craziest part of all of this
imho.

Not only were they extremely rich, but they splashed money all over the place
in various charitable events and business dealings.

It seems almost irresponsible to at the very least place a security camera
system that monitors the grounds of the home and offices where they spent the
most of their time.

~~~
1024core
Yeah, I was about to say that, but decided not to, since it sounds like victim
blaming. But it is true, though: you can get a bloody Wyzecam ($25) which has
motion alerts, etc.; put a dozen of them all around the house and you still
come in under $500. Why would you _not_ do this?

Maybe because it's Canada, and people have a reasonable expectation of not
being robbery victims? I don't know.

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51Cards
This one struck a little close to home as less than three weeks earlier I had
met them at a fundraising event. At the time I really didn't know who they
were but the names came back when the news broke a few weeks later. They just
seemed like a nice couple in the admittedly very short few minutes I spoke
with them.

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11eleven
Interesting fact about this case:

At first, the police made statements that there was no signs of forced entry
and they were not seeking suspects. This led numerous media outlets to report
it was a murder-suicide. After the family conducted a parallel private
investigation which discovered contrary evidence, the police finally ruled it
a double homicide.

[https://www.cp24.com/news/sherman-family-s-lawyer-
offers-10m...](https://www.cp24.com/news/sherman-family-s-lawyer-
offers-10m-reward-slams-tps-handling-of-murder-case-1.4150539)

~~~
kingofpandora
That's all in the original article.

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rdtsc
I am kind of surprised billionaires and CEOs don't order each others' killings
more often.

I was doing homework one night and the building next door's top 2 floors were
blown up because some banker had a hit placed on his head. So perhaps I have
pretty low expectations on what powerful people without morals can do.

~~~
zawerf
It is indeed surprising because the profit motive is there and it is not
limited to just rival billionaires.

Any random guy with enough capital can short the company stock and then place
a hit on the CEO.

I would expect stuff like that to happen super often but I don't think I have
even heard of one real case like this.

~~~
kasey_junk
Can you explain that trade precisely? Like with example orders/prices? I’d
also be curious about how one gets reliable hitmen & deniability and the like.

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stevewodil
Explain what trade? If the CEO dies the stock will go down due to the
uncertainty of the future for the company.

~~~
kasey_junk
Right. Give me literally the orders you put in, with a timeline for the hit.
Then explain the price points, liquid capital & risk stats you need to make a
particular profit.

This is _basic_ stuff for actual short sell trades so I presume it is easy to
produce in the “hit a CEO” fund space.

~~~
jjoonathan
I'm no trader, so I couldn't confidently craft a good strategy to exploit an
opportunity even if there was a good one. How about you explain why you don't
expect this to be workable instead?

~~~
kasey_junk
Sure. The first rule is that _no_ trade is a good one without specific
entrance & exit points. Saying “I can predict a share will go up/down”
independent of that specificity & risk profile is a classic example of someone
who isn’t realistic in their trading behavior.

The second rule is that shorting is _much_ _much_ harder to get right than
going long. Small procedural errors or day long mistimes of the market turn
trades unprofitable.

Third, the market for this trade is _exceptionally_ non-desperate people. If
you have the money to make this trade happen you have virtually risk free
access to trades that keep you fat & happy.

Finally, the riskiest part of this trade is the most hand wavy “hit a ceo” is
not a thing I can get a counter party to hedge. It’s quite literally
impossible for the vast majority market participants. Even before we talk
about the very real likelihood of going to jail let’s talk about the risk of
not being successful. See above about short timing.

All told the answer to “why don’t rich guys hit other rich guys to short their
assets” can easily boil down to “cause that’s stupid”

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democracy
They are doing/attempting it all the time (in 2nd/3rd world countries where
the law can bought) this is why there are security firms equipped better than
most of the special forces out there. In 1st world countries the law can be
fought instead and still it happens (just a recent "New trial for Sydney
property developer Ron Medich over murder of former business partner"). But I
am certain most of the time it is (like with the regular folks) just hatred
and personal revenge for theft/insult rather than "just business".

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flyGuyOnTheSly
Interesting timing with this articles release.

The family lawyer just accused the Toronto Police of not doing a thorough job
just a few days ago.

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da02
Why was he unusual? (I didn't read the article.)

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
I read the entire article and I still don't know why they called him an
"unusual billionaire".

~~~
kik0729
Probably because he didn't seem to live a very lavish lifestyle, had some
dealings with some shady people and was labeled as erratic by some while being
a popular and loved figure in Toronto.

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Invictus0
Off topic but this cover is just so poorly designed.

[https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/i7R8Z2i.mox...](https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/i7R8Z2i.mox0/v0/800x-1.jpg)

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lainga
Less so now, but in the early half of the decade Businessweek was known for
its unorthodox, and often lighthearted style of graphic design. This still
survives on in the Businessweek 404 ( _When will Businessweek get its sh!t
together?!_ ), but the corresponding 404 for Bloomberg itself has been
replaced by something more sober.

~~~
colechristensen
I think I tend to trust outlets more if they don't pay so much attention into
keeping up with the design style of the day.

Overfocus on this shallow surface quality has a correlation with a lack of
underlying quality in the actual content. It's not that you can't have both or
that I don't appreciate surface quality. But if something is ugly or simple or
doesn't follow trends and has great content, it tends to remove a certain sort
of person as consumer and perhaps lowers the temptation to cater to shallow
desires because not many are around to get hooked.

That is, many things are better because certain parts of them are objectively
worse and turn away certain people.

