“Elevated” levels of gang activity are behind a recent spike in violent crime in Toronto that saw three people shot to death in a little over a 24-hour span, Mayor John Tory says.

From 7 p.m. on Monday night to 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday evening, Michael Opong Berchie, Cam Thanh-Tat and a yet-to-be identified third man were shot and killed on the streets of the city.

No arrests have been made in any of the three homicides.

There have been nine murders in the city since the start of the year, including a shooting on Saturday that left a 21-year-old man dead.

“We’re seeing again elevated levels of what I understand to be principally gang-related activity with retaliations going on – with a lot of this going on social media, which is unusual now but you get this taunting going on, which is not an excuse for it,” Tory told CP24 on Wednesday.

Twenty people have been killed or injured by gunfire in the city so far this year, the exact same number as was documented by this point in 2020, and lower than in 2016, when 31 people were hit by gunfire in the first six weeks of the year.

Tory said interim Toronto police Chief James Ramer has been “quite effective” in securing guns and making arrests so far in his tenure, and pointed to a regular criticism local officials have had of the justice system for several years.

“There continues to be a problem with people who are arrested, often in connection with firearms charges who are let out on bail and offend again,” he said.

Criminal lawyers have criticized this observation, saying it is an oversimplification.

Tory said the sustained levels of gun violence in the city pose a challenge for the movement to defund police services.

“While I understand the need for policing reforms – and we are underway on those in a very significant way, you have to ask yourself the question – if we need more neighbourhood officers walking in the area all of the time and not just showing up when something bad happens, how are you going to pay for that?”