An audio recording of Ford was captured by a patron of Sullie Gorman’s Monday night, in the Royal York Road area of Etobicoke, Ontario. Described by the Toronto Sun as “raunchy”, Ford was heard on tape making off-colour comments about Councillor Karen Stintz: “I’d like to f**king jam her, but she doesn’t want … I can’t talk like this … I’m so sorry.”
In a separate report from the Globe & Mail, Ford allegedly was shown in a video using a pipe last Saturday morning.
Soon after the The Globe asked the mayor for comment, and the mayor declined, his lawyer, Dennis Morris, said Ford is planning to “take a break” from the mayoral election.
Ford’s full statement was released Wednesday night, and according to blogTO it read:
Today, after taking some time to think about my own well-being, how to best serve the people of Toronto and what is in the best interests of my family, I have decided to take a leave from campaigning and from my duties as Mayor to seek immediate help.
I have tried to deal with these issues by myself over the past year. I know that I need professional help and I am now 100% committed to getting myself right.
I love the people of Toronto, I love being your mayor and I hope you will continue to stand by me.
Ford’s mayoral campaign to get him re-elected will be on hiatus, but the campaign will still continue, it’s being reported.
As the Globe and Mail describes it, the video shown Wednesday displays the mayor rapidly shifting his weight back and forth on the spot.
He is seen:…talking into his cellphone and his right arm swinging at his side. When the camera pans around the room, a man that looks like Alessandro “Sandro” Lisi, the mayor’s former driver who has been charged with drug dealing and extortion, can be seen in the background. Mr. Ford’s sister, Kathy, who has admitted in media interviews to being a drug addict, is sitting in front of her brother. In the last of three clips, Mr. Ford is holding the pipe and speaking to his sister.
A still from the video has been added to this report, via the Globe & Mail. The Canadian news outlet reports the video was taken Saturday April 26 at 1:15 a.m, and shown to reporters by a self-professed drug dealer.
Stintz told the Toronto Star it was “time that Ford gets the help that he needs for himself and his family.”
Also on the audio recording obtained by the Sun, Ford was heard ranting about being pressed to keep the gay pride rainbow flag raised at City Hall.
“They put this f—–g flag up ahead of our Canadian flag, I said, ‘No, I’m sorry. Bulls—,” he said.
Later Wednesday night, her campaign spokesman Karl Baldauf reportedly called for a full apology, the Star adds.
“The comments released tonight by Mayor Rob Ford are deeply offensive to everyone living in Toronto. That a sitting mayor would make such shocking and bigoted remarks is disgusting.
It has been a year the name Rob Ford resonated across the world. He first was infamous for being allegedly linked to drug dealer, Mohamed Siad, who began approaching media outlets in Canada and the United States with a video allegedly showing the mayor smoking crack. At the time, the mayor denied using the drug, but then he later admitted that he had smoked crack cocaine in a “drunken stupor” and that he was not an addict.
