Two Toronto Star reporters have viewed the video three times. It appears to show Ford in a room, sitting in a chair, wearing a white shirt, top buttons open, inhaling from what appears to be a glass crack pipe. Ford is incoherent, trading jibes with an off-camera speaker who goads the clearly impaired mayor by raising topics including Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau and the Don Bosco high school football team Ford coaches. 
 
 A cellphone video that appears to show Mayor Rob Ford smoking crack cocaine is being shopped around Toronto by a group of Somali men involved in the drug trade. 
 
 A lawyer retained by Ford, Dennis Morris, said that Thursday evening’s publication by the U.S.-based Gawker website of some details related to the video was “false and defamatory.” Morris told the Star that by viewing any video it is impossible to tell what a person is doing. “How can you indicate what the person is actually doing or smoking?” Morris said. 
 
 The Star had no way to verify the authenticity of the video, which appears to clearly show Ford in a well-lit room. The Star was told the video was shot during the past winter at a house south of Dixon Rd. and Kipling Avenue. What follows is an account based on what both reporters viewed on the video screen. Attempts to reach the mayor and members of his staff to get comment on this story were unsuccessful. 
 
 “I’m f---ing right-wing,” Ford appears to mutter at one point. “Everyone expects me to be right-wing. I’m just supposed to be this great.…” and his voice trails off. At another point he is heard calling Trudeau a “fag.” Later in the 90-second video he is asked about the football team and he appears to say (though he is mumbling), “they are just f---ing minorities.” 
 
 Ford’s chief of staff, Mark Towhey, would not listen to questions by the Star on Thursday night and abruptly hung up when the Star called. 
 
 The video was taken on a smartphone by a person who said he has supplied crack cocaine to the mayor. 
 
 Throughout the video Ford’s eyes are half-closed. He lolls back in his chair, sometimes waving his arms around erratically. He raises a lighter in his hand at several points and moves it in a circle motion beneath the glass bowl of the pipe, then inhales deeply. 
 
 The Star reporters (Donovan and Doolittle) were shown the video on the evening of Friday, May 3, in the back of a car parked in an apartment complex at Dixon Rd. near Kipling Ave. in the north end of Etobicoke. The reporters were allowed to watch and listen to the video three times. After, both reporters separately made written notes of what they saw and heard. Both reporters, prior to watching the video, studied numerous city-hall-related videos of Ford and, to the best of the reporter’s abilities, they separately concluded the man in the video was Ford. 
 
 In the video, what appears to be afternoon sunlight is streaming through partially closed window blinds, lighting Ford’s face. The video ends with the ringing of a cellphone (it is not clear if it is the cellphone that is being used to video the scene). The ring tone, which is a song, startles the mayor, whose slitted eyes open a bit, and he is heard to say, “That phone better not be on.” 
 
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 The Star was approached with an offer to purchase the video shortly after the Star’s story on Ford’s removal from the Garrison Ball due to apparent intoxication of some sort. The story, published March 26 of this year, described a concern by unnamed associates and staffers at city hall that Ford had a substance abuse problem. Ford dismissed the Star story, called the Star “pathological liars” and invited the newspaper to sue him. Garrison Ball attendees interviewed by the Star did not say they smelled alcohol. One said, “He seemed either drunk, high or had a medical condition.” 
 
 After the story was published the Star was contacted by two separate people who purported to have information on Ford abusing crack cocaine. 
 
 One person, who described himself as an organizer in the Somali community, told the Star he had copies of a video that, he said, showed Ford smoking crack. This man was acting as a sort of broker for the person who had shot the video. What followed was a protracted discussion between the man and Star reporters. The broker said he represented two Somali men who had supplied crack cocaine to the mayor in the Dixon Rd. area. The Star was not able to verify those claims. 
 
 The man said his two associates (one had been present when the video was made and had done the filming) wanted “six figures for the video.” At another point he said they had originally wanted $1 million, but he had convinced them to lower the price. Asked why they were selling the video, the man said the two who claimed ownership of the video wanted to make a change in their lives and use the money to move out west to Calgary. 
 
 The Star did not pay money and did not obtain a copy of the video. 
 
 Initially, the Somali man who contacted the Star said he had information about “a Toronto politician.” When the Star met him the first time, he showed a photo of Ford dressed in sweatpants, standing in the driveway of a brick house with three other men. The one on the left in the picture had apparently been killed the previous week on King St. near the Loki Lounge. The man, with his strong forehead and distinctive jaw line, looked like Anthony Smith, 21, who indeed had been killed recently. 
 
 Over the last month the Star has had several meetings with the man who was acting as a broker, culminating with the May 3 meeting at the Dixon Rd. apartment complex. 
 
 The reporters had told the man that they wanted to see the video. A meeting was arranged. First, the reporters were told to drive to the parking lot of an Etobicoke strip mall. They were told to leave their bags and cellphones in their own cars and get in his. The drive lasted less than five minutes. They pulled into the parking lot of the Dixon Rd. highrise complex. 
 
 The man got out of his car and returned with his associate. 
 
 The associate, also Somali, was a man in his early to mid-20s. He looked nervous and was shaking slightly. He had thick scabs on his arm. 
 
 He pulled out an iPhone — he would not let the reporters hold it. At first he wouldn’t let the sound play, but then relented. 
 
 In a video clip less than two minutes long, an incoherent and rambling Mayor Rob Ford can clearly be seen smoking what appears to be crack cocaine. 
 
 He is sitting on a chair holding a glass pipe with a blackened top and a lighter. Ford is the only person on the video, but there are at least two other people in the room — one, a man who said he is his dealer, secretly recording him, and another, an anonymous voice asking him questions. 
 
 The footage begins with the mayor mumbling. His eyes are half-closed. He waves his arms around erratically. A man’s voice tells him he should be coaching football because that’s what he’s good at. 
 
 Ford agrees and nods his head, bobbing on his chair. 
 
 He says something like “Yeah, I take these kids . . . minorities” but soon he rambles off again. 
 
 Ford says something like: “Everyone expects me to be right-wing, I’m . . .” and again he trails off. 
 
 At one point he raises the lighter and moves it in a circle motion beneath the pipe, inhaling deeply. 
 
 Next, the voice raises the name of Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau. The man says he can’t stand him and that he wants to shove his foot up the young leader’s “ass so far it comes out the other end.” 
 
 Ford nods and bobs on his chair and appears to say, “Justin Trudeau’s a fag.” 
 
 The man taping the mayor keeps the video trained on him. Then the phone rings. Ford looks at the camera and says something like “that better not be on.” 
 
 The phone shuts off. 
 
 Public Editor Note: This article was edited from a previous version to remove several unnecessary “Somali” references. The Star has apologized for using “Somali” too heavily in its first report. See the May 24 Public Editor column for further explanation. ||||| Rob Ford, Toronto's conservative mayor, is a wild lunatic given to making bizarre racist pronouncements and randomly slapping refrigerator magnets on cars. One reason for this is that he smokes crack cocaine. I know this because I watched him do it, on a videotape. He was fucking hiiiiigh. It's for sale if you've got six figures. 
 
 It began like this: We've made fun of Ford before for his bizarre pronouncements and nude pictures. Last week, we got a tip from someone claiming to have a videotape of Ford smoking crack. Would we like to buy it? 
 
 Update: Go here to contribute to the Rob Ford Crackstarter. We are crowdsourcing $200,000 to buy and publish the video. 
 
 The tipster made the following claims: 
 
 • Toronto Mayor Rob Ford smokes crack cocaine. 
 
 • There is a video of Rob Ford smoking crack cocaine, taken within the last six months. 
 
 • Rob Ford purchases his crack cocaine from a crew of Toronto drug dealers that service a veritable who's who of A-list...Torontonians? Torontites? Anyway, a lot of prominent people in Toronto purchase and enjoy crack and powder cocaine, and they all buy it from the same folks. The same folks Ford buys it from. Ford's longtime friend, people on his staff, his brother, a prominent hockey analyst, and more. 
 
 As evidence of his claims, our tipster provided the photo above. It shows Ford hanging out with a number of people. The gentleman standing to his right, flipping the camera the bird, is Anthony Smith. Smith, a 21-year-old college student, was killed two months ago outside a Toronto nightclub in a gangland-style shooting. A photo, from a CBC story on his murder, is at left. Smith was, according to our tipster, a kid from the same neighborhood as the dealers who service Ford, and the photo was taken while Ford was going to the neighborhood to purchase and smoke crack cocaine. 
 
 If you're curious about the photo's veracity, at left is another photo, from the National Post, of Ford wearing the same sweatshirt. 
 
 Needless to say, the story intrigued me. I asked the tipster for a screengrab of the video to verify that he had what he claimed to have. He refused. If I wanted to see the video, I was going to have to go to Toronto. He sounded confident enough. Certain things that he told me checked out. So off I went. 
 
 Toronto is lovely. Our first effort to meet up, at a Toronto bus station at night, fizzled. The tipster was there, but the person who actually had possession of the video was a no-show. The tipster and I retired to a coffee shop to talk Toronto politics and Rob Ford's curious history—his rise as a sort of oddly drunken, brazenly honest conservative voice in a decidedly liberal and polite city. It was a nice night, but I was beginning to worry I'd been had. 
 
 The next morning, I connected again with the tipster. He was going to locate the owner of the video, he told me. Last night, there had been a mix-up. The video was being stored in a safe place, but the person who had access to the safe place had briefly disappeared, and so the owner couldn't get access to the safe place to get the device on which the video was stored. By the morning, however, the tipster and the owner had located the person who had access to the safe place. This was going to happen. 
 
 Checkout time was at noon. My flight was at 7:30 p.m. I loitered around downtown Toronto, checking out the mall, until I got the text: We were to meet up at a chain restaurant near the airport. The tipster picked me up from the restaurant and drove me to a housing development. The owner of the video would meet us there. 
 
 We sit idling in his car, making small talk. The tipster calls the owner and talks in language other than English. "He'll be right down," he says. Fifteen minutes pass. "Waiting for the elevator," he says. Ten minutes pass. A young gentleman opens the rear door of the car and gets in. The two men speak in a language other than English. The young gentleman immediately exits the vehicle. No video. 
 
 The tipster looks at me: "The battery is dead." The young gentleman—the owner of the video—needed to go back upstairs to charge the battery on the device that contained the video. We wait. More small talk. 
 
 The owner of the video returns. He thrusts a device, a phone with a touchscreen, in my face. "Can I hold it?" I ask. 
 
 "No." 
 
 I crane my neck. It plays. 
 
 Here is what the video shows: Rob Ford, the mayor of Toronto, is the only person visible in the frame. Prior to the trip, I spent a lot of time looking at photographs of Rob Ford. The man in the video is Rob Ford. It is well-lit, clear. Ford is seated, in a room in a house. In one hand is a a clear, glass pipe. The kind with a big globe and two glass cylinders sticking out of it. In the other hand is a lighter. A slurred voice off-camera is ranting about Canadian politics in what sounds like an attempt to goad Ford. "Pierre Trudeau was a faggot!" is the one phrase the lodges in my mind. Ford, pipe in one hand and lighter in the other, is laughing, and mildly protesting at the sacrilege. He seems to keep trying to light the pipe, but keeps stopping to laugh. He is red-faced and sweaty, heaving with each breath. Finally, he finds his moment and lights up. He inhales. 
 
 Update: The Toronto Star, whose reporters have also seen the video, say that it's Justin Trudeau—Pierre's son and the leader of the Liberal Party in Canada—and not Pierre getting called a "faggot." It's hard to keep all these Canadians apart. The Star also has Ford himself, and not the voice off-screen, making the "faggot" remark, though that's not how I remember it. 
 
 In one move, the owner stops the video and draws the device back into his pocket. 
 
 "You took this?" I ask. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "Within the last six months." 
 
 "You're sure it's crack?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "You've seen him smoke crack before?" 
 
 "Yes. Gotta jet." 
 
 And he is gone. 
 
 So: That was a video of the mayor of Toronto smoking crack. The trouble is, the owner wants money. More money than I am willing to pay. The tipster has already reached out to one other news outlet, a Canadian organization that he refused to name, which offered $40,000. The owner rejected that. He thinks he can get six figures. It's unlikely he's going to get six figures. 
 
 But I am going to try. The tipster wants this video out. Rob Ford needs to be held to account. The owner just wants money—preferably enough to get out of town after this blows up, since he doesn't think it will be safe for him. The tipster and I both fear that the owner will try to sell the video back to Ford. That would be a shame. 
 
 So if Gawker can't come up with enough money to ring this owner's bell, perhaps we can find a partner. This isn't just the mayor of Toronto smoking crack cocaine, after all: This is Toronto Confidential. There are a host of important local officials wrapped up in this drug ring. 60 Minutes? No. Dateline NBC? No. Inside Edition? No. National Enquirer? No. CNN? Maybe! 
 
 Well, no. But when I emailed an acquaintance at CNN this afternoon, laying out much the same information I've offered above and asking for discretion and confidentiality lest we screw up a pretty fucking great story about the mayor of the fifth-largest city in North America smoking crack cocaine on camera, he forwarded the email to his producer. The producer, in turn, asked CNN's Canada reporter about it. The Canada reporter—and this was a pretty fucking big mistake—called a source who used to work in Ford's office. Within 40 minutes, word had gotten back to me that "CNN called Ford's office asking about a crack tape." 
 
 And so here we are. The owner still hasn't found a buyer with pockets deep enough to meet his demands. But word is out around Toronto now that the tape exist, and Ford's circle knows about it courtesy a CNN reporter. So, with permission, I am laying out everything I know about the Rob Ford Crack Tape in the hopes that a) everyone knows that Rob Ford, the mayor of Toronto, smokes crack, and b) this knowledge might hasten the arrival of the Rob Ford Crack Tape on the internet or broadcast television, because really, it is something to behold. 
 
 If you want to buy it, let me know. I can put you in touch with a guy. 
 
 Ford's office did not immediately respond to an email. 
 
 Update: We've received an email from Dennis Morris, a gentleman with a hotmail.com email address purporting to be Ford's attorney. Here is the message. We haven't corrected its formatting. 
 
 Greetings;I am a lawyer,and have been contacted by Mayor Ford's office in reference to your indicating you will post a photo of Mayor Ford smoking crack cocaine. Mayor Ford denies such took place,and if such posting occurs,it is false and defamatory,and you will be held legally accountable.In reference to the photo,you wish to publish, Mayor Ford has his photo taken daily,sometimes with others. If the person you mention is now deceased,it is sad,regardless of his alleged background. Please govern yourself accordingly. Dennis Morris. 
 
 To contact the author of this post, email john@gawker.com. 
 
 [Images via National Post and CBC]
– Just one day after Rob Ford's office confirmed that the former Toronto mayor was in palliative care, his family says Ford has died. He was 46. Ford dropped his 2014 bid for re-election when he was diagnosed with a rare, aggressive form of cancer. In a lengthy obituary, the Star recounts the treatment he undertook in his quest to beat pleomorphic liposarcoma over the course of 18 months, including a May 2015 surgery, chemotherapy, and a clinical trial. It also traces his political career, from his role as a "plain-spoken champion of the little guy, always eager to get a pothole fixed" to his 2010 mayoral win, which ushered in a "wild, scandal-filled term." As mayor, the headlines grew less positive: He was ordered removed from office in November 2012 over an alleged violation of conflict of interest rules (an appeal court overturned it). In May 2013 both the Toronto Star and Gawker said they had viewed a video that showed Ford smoking crack cocaine; that November he admitted that he had smoked the drug and had bought illegal drugs while in office. He was stripped of most of his powers. In October 2014, the father of two had this to say about how he would be recalled: "People know that I saved a lot of money, and people are going to know that I had a few personal struggles. So you can remember it for what you want, but they're definitely going to remember it."