An associate of the Asian Assassinz gang legally purchased almost a dozen guns, and was unable to produce 10 of them when asked by police in September 2013, according to a police document created one year later. On Saturday, an alleged member of a rival gang to the Asian Assassinz was killed at a North York bowling alley.Thanh Tien Ngo, 32, was shot to death at Playtime Bowl & Entertainment after being chased down by three men, two of whom were armed, police said. Ngo is an alleged member of Chin Pac, a gang embroiled in a years-long feud with the Asian Assassinz, according to a police document obtained by the Star regarding 2014 raids that targeted five gangs.“Over the past few years, tensions have increased between the Asian Assassins/Project Originals and Chin Pac/Sic Thugz alliances,” the police document says, citing control over illicit cocaine and heroin distribution networks as playing into those pressures.“This conflict and continuing battle for control has erupted into running gun battles, stabbings, assaults and homicides,” it says.Toronto Police have not indicated that Saturday’s shooting is gang-related. The suspects are still on the loose, and police did not say what kinds of guns were used in the shootings. The police document indicates the Asian Assassinz associate legally purchased the weapons with his firearms acquisition license in 2012, but does not say where most of them were purchased, although a shotgun was bought at a sporting goods store in York Region.The document says that gang members used locked safes to hold guns, and the legally-purchased guns include several semi-automatic weapons capable of spraying bullets with the touch of a finger.University of Toronto associate professor Jooyoung Lee has written extensively on gun violence and gangs, and said he is not surprised by this case.“This has long been the preferred method for gangs in particular to get firearms, is to rely on somebody who has a ...
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