April 4, 2025 • 49 mins
My Favorite Murder presents the premiere of our newest true crime podcast, The Knife: A True Crime Podcast, on the Exactly Right network. The Knife is a storytelling show that cuts deep into the most fascinating, chilling and complex cases, bringing you the sharpest true crime analysis with a cinematic edge.
In the first episode of The Knife, hosts Hannah and Patia speak with Darun Henry. While on a morning run through her neighborhood park, Darun is attacked by a stranger and makes a split-second decision that will lead to her assailant’s capture.
Listen on the iHeartRadio App, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And for updates, behind-the-scenes content and more, follow @theknifepod on Instagram and Bluesky.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hell, big news, everybody.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
The premiere episode of our new show, The Knife, a
true crime podcast, is out now.
Speaker 3 (00:07):
If you love deep dives, empathetic storytelling, and the cases
that stay with you long after the episode ends, this
will be the true crime podcast for you.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
That's right, and now you're about to get an exclusive.
Listen to their premiere episode.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Hosts Hannah Smith and patia Eton take you inside the
gripping story of Darun Henry, whose routine morning run took
a sudden and terrifying turn, altering the course of her life.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
So sit back and enjoy the first episode of The Knife,
the newest member of our exactly right family, and don't forget.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Once you listen to this episode and you love it,
head over to The Knife's feed in your podcast app
to check out the next episode. Trust us, you won't
want to stop at just one.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
And while you're there, don't forget to follow, rate and review.
It really helps. Goodbye.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 5 (00:59):
So there was a silent moment between us where we
were both trying to process what just happened.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
After you punched him.
Speaker 5 (01:07):
Yeah, like just a still moment where I was like,
oh my god, I just punch a human in the phase.
Speaker 4 (01:31):
Welcome to the Knife. I am Patia Eton. I'm Hannah
Smith and this week we speak with a woman named
Darun Henry. She is a personal trainer, influencer, and mother
of two who lives in Toronto, Canada.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
In September of twenty twenty one, Drune had just moved
into a new home with her kids and then husband.
It was a nice, safe, family friendly area of Toronto,
and then on September fifteenth, she went for a jog
at eleven am in a park near her home and
experienced something terrifying. We speak with Darune about her experience
and the lasting impact of what happened to her, including
(02:05):
a video of the incident that went viral. We will
be back with you after the interview to give you
some updates on Darun's story, which is still ongoing today.
As a note, this conversation with Darune happened on October fourteenth,
twenty twenty four.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Let's get into the interview.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Let's start off with you telling us a little bit
about yourself and your background.
Speaker 5 (02:33):
I'm Darune Henry. I am an online fitness coach. I'm
a mother of two beautiful girls who are thirteen and seven,
and I'm just a very passionate entrepreneur. I had a
very hard upbringing. I was born in Iraq. I'm Kurdish,
(02:53):
so I uh not to go too deep, but I
lost my brother. My brother was killed by a landmine
when I was five, so and then I was like
a refugee until we came to Canada at the age
of seven or eight, so in ninety six, and so
a lot of my conditioning was limiting beliefs. I was
(03:16):
very insecure because I didn't do too well in school.
I never got like my university degree. I got pregnant
at a young age. And so when I had my
spiritual awakening and I was on my own personal development
journey and I discovered who I am and how powerful
I am and how limitless I am. I wanted to
(03:40):
help women like discover that part of themselves, regardless of
what you've been through, that you can become the best
version of yourself. And so like that's where my passion
lies right now. Right before the attack, I would say
I was at the peak of my career, was just
(04:00):
the happiest version of myself.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
In September of twenty twenty one, Darun and her family
had just moved into a new home in Brampton, a
city in the Greater Toronto area. Darune was delighted to
find out that she was in walking distance to Massy Park,
which is a small park that sits in the middle
of a heavily trafficked area, but still feels remote due
(04:24):
to the density of the trees. So she started to
do her daily workouts at Massy Park.
Speaker 5 (04:31):
So it's September fifteenth, twenty twenty one, so school had
just started. Yeah, Like I had taken the kids to
school that day and I went for my jog around
like nine point thirty. Being in the forest, I would
often like do walking meditations, I'd connect with God. So
on that day it was different because I needed more content.
(04:55):
So that was the only day I had taken my
tribod because I do believe that having my tripod kind
of saves me in a way. That day, I believe
I got there around nine fifty ish. I shot content.
I took pictures for about twenty thirty minutes. I was
getting the right shots. I had my jump rope with
(05:15):
me that day, so I was jump roping.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
So you know, when is the first moment that you
thought like something is wrong.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
So this was towards the end of my workout. So
I was around eleven am when I saw an elderly
man who was maybe like eighty years old, with a walker,
and I saw him walking very slowly, and I actually
noticed a random person. I noticed he was walking very
(05:48):
slowly behind the elderly man, like almost as if he
was just like with him, but you can tell they
weren't together. I found him a little suspicious because he
was dressed in all black, like black sweatpants, black speatter,
a fitted hat, and he was wearing a mask. It
(06:08):
was pretty warm day, it was it was September fifteenth.
I was wearing shorts, so it was kind of like
unusual to see somebody dressed like in a hoodie and
like sweatpants and just fully covered and also like wearing
a COVID mask. Not a lot of people wore the
masks outside in the parks, so I did. I noticed
(06:31):
him immediately as he was walking. I had his bike,
but he wasn't on his bike, like he wasn't riding
his bike, he was walking. They passed by right like
they left, and I just continued doing what I was doing.
And then at this point I was stretching and looking
(06:52):
at the sunshine, you know, shining through the leaves, and
just breathing, and just I was stretching, and I felt
this like immense pain in my hamstrings, and like something
told me to bend over, like to stretch my hamstrings.
And when I bent over, I literally saw him through
(07:15):
my legs. So I jumped. And I was off to
the side of the walking path so that people can
pass by me. And when I bent over, I saw
him like through my legs. Literally he was like right
behind me, maybe eight feet away, and I jumped. I
(07:37):
turn around. I wasn't scared though, I just thought he
was on a walk because it was just so I
didn't know there was someone there. Yeah, yeah, I had
no idea. I was wearing these headphones so I couldn't
hear anything. And when I turned around and he was
right directly right behind me, my tripod was like it
was on the ground, and I think that I I
(08:00):
don't think he was sure that like if it was
recording or not. It wasn't recording, but he did notice
my tripod. And then when I turned around, I said, oh,
I'm so sorry. Like I was just like, so sorry,
I'm in your way, right even though there's a huge
walking pathway, like you could go around me, Like there's
(08:20):
no reason you should be directly behind me, and so
like that's when I realized, oh, like he really was
trying to get really close to me, but I caught
him before he got too close. And as soon as
I said sorry to him, he was very strange. He
was just like, didn't say anything, and then looks at
(08:43):
my tripod and was like asking me if I did YouTube.
He's like, oh, do you do YouTube? And I was
like no. I couldn't really hear him because he had
his mask on. So then I was like, what what
are you saying? And he was like do you do YouTube?
And then he took his mask off, so he put
(09:04):
it down to below his chin, and he kept asking
me if if I did YouTube, and I said no,
I don't do YouTube. He was like, are you are
you a fitness instructor. I was like yes, I'm a
personal trainer. He's like, well, can I get your information
like my Facebook or like my socials? And I was
like no, like I only work with women. And then
(09:27):
I just kind of like looked at him like walk away,
like go now, and so like I was just getting
annoyed of him, like it was. The conversation probably took
like thirty seconds, and so I was waiting for him
to walk off, and I was like, no, like I
only work with women, you can't have my information. And
(09:49):
so he got the point, and it was in that moment,
like he didn't say anything more, he just put his
mask back on. In this moment, I realized, oh my god,
he's going to try and rape me, because he looks around,
he looked in my eyes, and in that moment, I
(10:12):
felt that realization, like that moment where you're like I'm
in danger, like I'm something bad is going to happen
to me right now, and like I have to like fight.
So I went into fight mode immediately because he looked around.
He put his mask back on, and then he came
(10:33):
to strangle me. So he came at me with his
hands to strangle me. But before he could get to me,
I cost him. So I punched him with my right arm,
my rightness. I punched him in his jaw, like I
just I don't know, I don't remember how hard it was.
(10:55):
I mean in that moment. I'm sure I punched him
really really hard, not enough to knock him out, but
he was shocked. So there was a silent moment between
us where we were both trying to process what just happened,
Like after you punched him, Yeah, like just a still
moment where I was like, oh my god, I just
(11:17):
punch a human, like in the face. Like I was
taking boxing lessons, but I always had gloves on. I
never punched a human before, like flesh and bone, So like,
there were so many thoughts running through my head, like,
oh my god, he's going to kill me. I just
punched a man in the face, and he's going to
(11:41):
kill me.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
So because you say, like, and you did this motion
which people can't see on the podcast, but you're saying
that he was coming at you with his hands out
in a clear way, that like he was going for
your throat.
Speaker 5 (11:53):
Yeah, he was coming for my throat. Yeah. Like that
was hands down the scariest moment of my life. I
didn't even react, Like I didn't even think. I just
reacted and I punched him. And I honestly believe that,
like punching him in the face was the best thing
I could have ever done, because it completely threw him off.
(12:16):
And after I punched him, I did freeze because I
was like, at the end of the day, I'm five
to one and he's really tall. He's in I don't
know who he is, what he's capable of. I don't
know if he has a weapon on him. But then
right after I punched him and we had that silent
moment for maybe five seconds, you know, it aggravated him,
(12:39):
so he tried to take me down. And so I
always mentioned that like my boxing lessons saved my life,
I was able to fight him. So I literally heard
my coach his name is Jerry, and I literally heard
Jerry in my head. I heard him say, put power
(13:00):
behind it, like as I was punching, because that was
something he'd often say to me, put power behind it.
And it's that repetition of punching over and over and
over and even I don't know how it happened, but
he was on the ground. At one point I kicked
him really hard in his ribs. I wish I had
(13:23):
kicked him in his balls, but I kicked him in
his ribs. There was a point where he was looking
for something on the ground, so he was searching for
something on the ground. And in that moment, I thought,
oh my god, he's looking for a rock, like to
knock me out, right, Like that was my thought. It
was like he's looking for something to like knock me out,
(13:46):
and like that was the moment I remembered a head
of voice, because you know when you're fighting for your
life and that you don't remember that, like I didn't
remember I was in a public park. In that moment,
I remembered, like, you're in a public park. There's people,
(14:08):
somebody's gonna hear you. And so I literally started screaming
bloody murder. I started screaming for help like as loud
as I could. And yeah, like that was something it's
hard to relive. But yeah, like I thought, like if
(14:29):
like that was my last resort, was just screaming for
my life, it was really hard, really scary. So yeah,
and then as soon as I started screaming for help,
like his eyes bulged out, and yeah, and then he
ran away. But when he ran away, he ran towards
(14:54):
the right side of the forest. And then I think
he got maybe ten twenty steps in and he stopped
and he ran the opposite direction. And that's when I
pulled out my phone and I started recording him because
I needed evidence of him running away. I needed evidence
(15:19):
of what he looked like, what he was wearing, like,
I just needed something to show the police. I had
no idea why he stopped and ran the opposite direction.
But then I realized when he picked up his bike
that it was the same person who had walked by
me ten minutes prior to and I realized that he
(15:44):
had hid his bike and was watching me for about
ten minutes.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
After Duron was able to fight off this attacker, she
somehow had the presence of mind to take out her
phone and hit record, capturing him running into the woods.
Then a man in the park who had heard her
scream showed up and called the police. The following moments
were a blur for Drone as multiple police officers and
(16:13):
her husband arrived at the park.
Speaker 5 (16:16):
When I had somebody there, like I was able to
just kind of like break out of that shell, and
I went into shock immediately. I just started wailing, like
I couldn't help it, Like I just started screaming. There
was a lot of police around, and that police officer
(16:37):
showed up within two minutes. He was there the search
started immediately. They were looking for him because we gave
a description. But yeah, he got away with it. Yeah,
and then I somehow walked back home. My street was
filled with police cars and my neighbors had no idea
(16:59):
what happened. There was just a lot of police in
the area and they kind of gave me a minute.
And when I got home, that's when like the shock
just kept getting worse. When I was like realized, like
realize what just happened. The first thing I did was
like go to the bathroom and puke. I don't know
(17:22):
how to describe it, but it felt like I puked
like this evil like it just came out of me,
and like it just I puked, and I was messed up.
I was really messed up because I kept thinking like,
oh my god, what if I didn't turn around, Like
what if he had just knocked me out before I
(17:44):
had turned around.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
There's obviously this range of emotions that you're then experiencing
directly following the attack. What do logistically the hours and
the days following the attack look like, Yeah, that.
Speaker 5 (17:56):
Was a huge ordeal. When we get into the police
there's a lot to say because you know, I essentially
risked my life capturing that video because I should have
been running to safety, but I took an extra ten
to fifteen seconds just to get him on camera. Yeah,
(18:19):
when I was very disappointed when they told me that
they couldn't do anything with that evidence. Like I had
this fantasy that like they were going to put it
on the news that night and show the clip of
him running through the woods and my neighborhood's going to
be safer place, maybe like somebody can recognize him. And like,
(18:43):
I was so disappointed and so shocked when the police
were like, no, like, we can't do anything with that evidence.
Speaker 4 (18:50):
What was their reason when they said we can't do anything.
Speaker 5 (18:54):
Why, Well, because it's alleged. They can't prove what he did.
They just have a video of a guy running through
the woods and it's an alleged attack, and yeah, like
they just don't do that. So I was like, Okay, well,
what are you going to do, Like there's a guy
(19:16):
out there attacking women at eleven am? He is one
million percent going to do it again, And they're like, yeah,
we're going to put it up on our website. And
then I was angry. I was like, what fucking website
are you talking about? Like I live in this neighborhood,
I don't know about your website. I doubt anyone here
knows that you have a website, or that anyone goes
(19:39):
on there daily to check. They questioned me for about
half an hour, and I was like, yeah, I was
just messed up, right, Like they gave me maybe ten
minutes to myself, and like during that ten minutes, I
was puking. Then we were talking and I was angry.
I was so angry. I was like, what do you
mean You're not going to do anything? What do you
(19:59):
mean You're just gonna put it on a website? Like
what good is that? And they literally told me like,
like the best thing you could do is just not
go back and see the woods. And I was like,
I was like fucking kidding me, Like what am I
a caged up animal? I can't even go for a
walk in my neighborhood in the park where I take
(20:21):
my kids every day, Like I walk my kids to
the park.
Speaker 4 (20:24):
Well, also, this is our advice to women on how
to stay safe. Don't leave your house.
Speaker 5 (20:28):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
According to Derune, the police said they would post the
report on their website. To alert the neighborhood, but she
didn't feel that this was good enough. After all, she
lived in the neighborhood and she'd never heard of the website.
Darune has a significant following on social media, and so
the next day, when the police report still wasn't up online,
Darune decided to post the video that she recorded in
(20:53):
the park of her attacker. This is the first part.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
Of that video.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Darune screams as a blurry fit, your darts through the woods.
Speaker 5 (21:03):
Wow, wow, w.
Speaker 6 (21:07):
I have you one video your pisi. I just pushed
him a fucking face.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
The video then cuts from the park to Darun sitting
on her front porch the following day, speaking directly to
her followers, I want.
Speaker 5 (21:24):
To make this video for my predator. I want him
to know that when I punched him in the face,
I wasn't scared at all. I wasn't scared. I'm crying
because I fucking took my sanctuary from me. It went
(21:46):
viral within hours, and at one point it was at
thirty thousand views, and it was at three hundred thousand views,
and it was at five hundred thousand views, and it
was just like a snowball effect and it just kept
getting bigger and bigger, and that was extremely hard to
(22:06):
navigate through as I'm trying to like collect myself. I
was getting messages from all over the world like a
went viral, and India I went viral, and Europe it
went viral, and on South America. For some people it
was like entertainment. I experienced a lot of victim blaming,
but I have to say I did also feel like
(22:28):
the support of the world behind me, and they ended
up posting the police report after it went viral. But
I also felt like the system really failed me because
if they had just taken me seriously, if they had
publicized my report, then the second attack wouldn't have happened,
(22:52):
which was just six days after mine.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Do you know what happened with that attack and how
did you learn about that attack?
Speaker 5 (22:58):
I found out about the second attack through a follower.
Somebody sent me the report. What happened was literally the
same exact scenario. He attacked her on a Tuesday, was
around the same exact time, like eleven am. It was
in another nearby park. He was on a bike, same thing.
(23:22):
He was dressed in sweats, but he had escalated it
to he had taken a knife, so a box cutter
to this next attack.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
After the second attack, Darun was asked to come into
the police station and look through a series of photographs
to identify the attacker. He was like the second lost picture.
So I had to go through all those pictures. But
as soon as his picture came up and I looked
at his eyes, this energy rushed over me and like
every cell in my body streamed and was like that's him.
Speaker 5 (24:01):
Like I knew it was him because of his eyes,
because I can never forget that look he gave me
right before he came to strangle me. And you know,
even though it was a picture, I felt those emotions.
And then after they made me go through that, they
were like, well, we have a disturbing question to ask you.
(24:22):
I was like what, And they were like did he
steal anything from you? Like does he? Are you missing anything?
And I was like no, no, I'm not missing anything.
But when they told me, like they found him, he
had a backpack on him and he had a bunch
of women's items in there, and they told me that
(24:43):
he goes out there looking for the opportunity to attack,
and then that he is also a trophy keeper. So
then he keeps something from his victims. And when they
said that to me, I realized that when I thought
he was looking for a rock to knock me out,
(25:06):
he wasn't actually looking for a rock. He was looking
to steal something to keep as a trophy.
Speaker 6 (25:15):
Nineteen year old Paul Yusif of Brampton was charged this
week with assault, assault with a weapon, and assault causing
bodily harm in connection to two alleged incidents, Henry's and
another that happened six days later. That incident taking place
at nearby Jayfield Park.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Law enforcement was able to identify and charge Paul Yusef.
We don't have any information about the other victim, as
she was a miner at the time. Paul Yusef was
arrested on September twenty eighth, twenty twenty one. Darune now
had a name for her attacker, and while she waited
to see what would happened to him, she tried to
continue living her life. I didn't sleep for maybe two weeks.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
I just couldn't. Although he wasn't successful, I went through
a lot of the after effects.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
You know, it's interesting to use this word successful, and
I know what you mean by it because he wasn't
able to, you know, do what he planned to do,
which when you were in that moment, was very clear
to you. Looking in his eyes, you knew what he
wanted to do. It's still just like he still attacked you.
You know, you still had to go through that experience.
Speaker 5 (26:24):
He wasn't successful, but he was successful in breaking me
and you know, making me feel violated. I still feel
very violated. For the first two weeks before he was caught,
I went through this intense like PTSD where I felt
(26:46):
like he was in my kitchen every night, Like I
couldn't even go downstairs to like get a glass of
water because I felt like he was just there. There
were many times where I would just be sitting on
my front porch and like a man would walk by,
and I thought that man was going to come attack me,
and I would just run back into my home. The
(27:07):
PTSD was so intense that I literally jumped one day
and like almost freaked out on an elderly man at
the beach.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Something that's important to note in Canada, you are not
allowed to carry a weapon or any tool that is
specifically for the purpose of self defense, which would include
pepper spray. It was difficult for Derune to feel safe
out in the world, even during the day. After all,
she'd been attacked in a public park at eleven am.
(27:40):
She feared something like this would happen again, knowing her
only recourse if it ever did happen would be to fight.
Speaker 5 (27:48):
One of the triggers I had is that, like when
a man is walking towards me and making eye contact,
I get triggered, or if there's somebody behind me, I
will get triggered and it will bring back that moment
and I'll go into like defense mode, Like I didn't
(28:09):
want to be touched, like even by my husband, Like
he couldn't even tap me on the shoulder without me jumping.
I dressed in baggy clothes for weeks, like my body
was I felt so violated. There's a lot that victims
go through that is not talked about.
Speaker 4 (28:30):
Have you learned anything else about him throughout this process?
Like what does he do for work?
Speaker 5 (28:35):
Oh? Yeah, Like when we discovered who he was and
it went public and I saw a few comments like oh,
I went to high school with this guy. So I
went and I liked did my own research. I found
out that he's Iraqi, which is crazy because I'm Iraqi.
(28:56):
I found out that he's my own people, and that
was very disturbing. And that was one thing I found
out about him. A lot of the girls I spoke
to from his high school, I think I spoke to
like two or three of them, all told me he
was a creep in that like he didn't handle rejection
(29:18):
very well.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Darune waited in anticipation to see what would happen to
her attacker, paul Yusif. The waiting, she said, was uncomfortable,
but it was also not a new feeling for her.
This experience flooded her with memories from a different incident
that happened when she was a child. This is also
not my first predator. When I was eleven, I was
(29:44):
groomed by my teacher, my drama teacher, like every kid
wanted to be around him, like because he was cool
and he was you know, like if mister Tulanko liked you,
like you're cool. And I didn't know he was grooming
me until he made it so obvious and he was like, well,
I have a question for you.
Speaker 5 (30:05):
Do you have pubic care? I was like WHOA? And
I was going through puberty, and like, I didn't even
talk about that stuff with my own parents, so like
for you to ask me as a teacher, I legitimately
ran home that day. I think I answered him. I
have no idea what my reaction was. I just was like,
(30:29):
what the fuck, dude, and I ran at it there,
Like I went home, and then I just avoided him
for the remainder of the year. You know, I noticed
he always had like a favorite student that was always
a female who was always in grade six. And the
reason he targeted grade six students, And this is just
(30:50):
all my theory was because the year like that was
the last year of elementary and then you go to
middle school and so you can kind of get away
with doing what ever, and then they were off to
the next school, which is exactly what happened with me.
I just moved on and I went to the next school,
and I forgot about it.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Darune was clear that although her sixth grade teacher, Greg
Talenko had not physically abused her, his actions were harmful.
He was a teacher, someone in a trusted position of authority,
and he'd used that power to manipulate her. At the time,
Darune didn't know the term grooming, but she does now
and that is exactly what Greg Tlanko was doing. Darune
(31:34):
listened to her instincts and distanced herself from Tlanko, never
telling anyone what happened. That is until two years later
when she learned that she was not Tlanko's only target.
Speaker 5 (31:47):
And then two years later it came up that like
the after the year I left, there was like five
girls that he was you know, grooming and had invited
back to his house and shown them porn on his computer.
He had shown them his privates and like he took
(32:10):
it so far with those girls, you know, they, I
guess thought it was a joke. They didn't realize what
was happening. And they told me, like we were on
the bus going to school, like they were in grade seven.
I was in grade eight, and they were telling me
all these stories and I was like, you guys, like
(32:30):
we have to come forward. And it was my idea
to come forward because I have his younger sister and
he used to call her little Darun, and I just
knew that like she was his next target. So I
really did it for my sister. And yeah, at a
young age, I had to get questioned I felt like
(32:53):
I was getting interrogated by the police. There was like
victim blaming involved at that time as well with the
new teachers in grade eight, like I remember getting treated
differently because of coming forward, and so yeah, this is
this cuts deep because I still have trauma from the
(33:15):
age of eleven twelve thirteen.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
Darun was in middle school, a time wrought with difficulties
and insecurities for most of us, but still she decided
to speak out and lead the charge in bringing Greg
Talanko's actions to light. Drune's younger sister was going into
sixth grade the next year, and she did not want
her to have the same experiences with Tilanco. As a
(33:39):
result of Durune and others speaking out, in two thousand
and one, Greg Talanco was arrested and charged with sexual assault,
invitation to sexual touching, sexual interference, and criminal harassment. He
had been teaching at Cedar Drive Public School for twelve years.
Speaker 5 (33:55):
At that point, I was very afraid of like coming
out because child, you think that like you did something
wrong for the teacher to ask me a question like that,
Like what did what did you do for him to
ask you that? Right? Like that was how my mind worked.
At the end of the day, I feel like my
voice is there, like this time around, like I fought
(34:18):
so hard because of little Darun, because like little Daru
never got justice. Like I was just like, yeah, I'm
just like a witness in all this, but really I
was a victim and I was groomed and my innocence
was stolen. But I was okay with like not getting
the justice as long as he was in trouble and
(34:40):
as long as like there was other victims to help
me prove that this guy was shouldn't be a teacher,
shouldn't even be around kids.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
I asked Aarune what she meant when she said she
never got justice as a child, and what came to
light was that she felt she missed out on the process.
She wasn't considered a main victim in the case, which
she understands, but as a result, her story wasn't part
of the case and she did not attend any of
the hearings. She didn't get to see it. She was
(35:13):
just left to process what had happened to her alone.
As a result of this, even years later, she explained
that she still has questions and she never really got
closure and when she was attacked on September fifteenth, twenty
twenty one, in Massy Park, Suddenly this incident from middle
school came back into her mind.
Speaker 5 (35:34):
I actually thought about mister Telango on my walk back home,
like it happened immediately, like after the attack and I
was walking back home, I thought of him, and I
remembered that experience. It just came up, and I was
just so angry about the world, Like I was just
(35:57):
so angry. It just it just came. I guess it
was just like that blocked trauma that was still in there.
It all came up.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Darune spoke up in middle school and again as an
adult after she was attacked in Massy Park. Her motivation
to warn others, to advocate for victims, and perhaps to
make a big deal about something that is a big deal.
Sometimes though, you can do all the right things and
still be let down. When I first spoke with Darune
(36:30):
in the fall of twenty twenty four, she told me
that she was still waiting to know the results of
Paul Yusiff's case. I decided to see what I could
find out, so I called the Peel Regional Police and
then they directed me to the Davis Courthouse in Brampton.
We don't directly talk about this in the interview, but
what happened was I was emailed the case documents the
(36:52):
day before we recorded this interview with Darune. I found
out that the sentence seene hearing had already happened. It
happened in May of twenty twenty four. Paul Yusef was
sentenced to four months of conditional sentence, house arrest and
two years probation. I didn't want to spring this information
on Drune during the recording, so I sent her an
(37:15):
email the night before the interview with the case information.
She later told me that while she is glad to
have this information, it was also very difficult to receive
and it opened up a whole new set of worries
for her.
Speaker 5 (37:29):
I have been waiting for three years. Nobody has updated
me on anything. He only got four months of house arrest.
He also lives in our neighborhood, so he lives within
five kilometers of us. So that's the other scary part
is like, yeah, like he's he's three now, and I
(37:54):
had no idea.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
Yeah, I mean, I think it's pretty like ridiculous that
they didn't update you on all of that, even just
to keep you informed. I feel like that should have happened.
Speaker 5 (38:05):
I can't believe it. I legitimately had a mental breakdown
last night when I saw your message. I was like,
what that is impossible? Like how could how could they
not tell me?
Speaker 1 (38:21):
I wasn't able to get a hold of anyone to
ask them these questions, but it started, you know, it
was so shocking to me when I heard that, because
he attacked two people. Clearly he was past you, hit
his bike, was watching you. And maybe it goes back
to this idea of was he quote unquote successful and
if he, you know, because he wasn't, then he gets
(38:43):
a lesser sentence. But it really brings up this question
of justice, because how is that justice? Yeah, it's not.
Speaker 5 (38:52):
It's a nightmare, yeah, Like it's it's almost as if
like you have to end up like dead in the
woods for them to actually care or like do anything.
And that's truly how I feel, like, Oh, you've thought
a tax, Well shit happens every day, d Arune, Like
move on right, Like that's that's how I took it, Like, well,
(39:16):
you're lucky enough you could fight and fight right, like
you're lucky you got away, Like it's all luck. It's
like a game of luck. Like, I just kind of
want to reiterate my message to women, and it's that
you have a voice, right and like that you're powerful,
(39:36):
and that you're stronger than you believe to be, and
that you can also punch a man in the face
and survive, and that it's okay to freeze. I think
that was one thing that like, I felt like a
lot of victims came forward and kept saying, like I
(39:57):
wish I had your strength. I wish I had done something,
But like I want to remind women that I also
froze in that moment, like right after I punched him,
and like that it's a very natural reaction to have.
But the more prepared you are, right, Like I just
feel like I was prepared and that you know, at
(40:18):
the end of the day, I feel like, you know,
I was very successful quote unquote in getting him captured
and you know, all that stuff because it rarely goes
that far. Right.
Speaker 4 (40:44):
Wow, that was an incredible interview. I'm so I feel
so lucky she shared her story with us.
Speaker 5 (40:49):
Me too.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Yeah, it was really powerful and I'm so glad that
she spoke with us.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
Going into these interviews, we have to do some level
of prep. And in this case, you discovered that Paul
Yusuf had already actually had his court proceedings. So do
you want to talk a little bit about how you
navigated that going into the interview with Durun.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Yeah, it's not something I think I would have known
how to do or felt comfortable doing before we started
working in podcasting, because basically I couldn't find any information
about it online. Neither could Durune, which is why she
believed that the case was still open. And so I
called the police station where the article I did find
(41:32):
where he was arrested, and then they told me the courthouse,
which was like in a different county. So then I
called the courthouse and got ahold of them, and then
I was able to get the court documents, and I
was really surprised to learn that the case was closed,
that his sentencing hearing had already happened like six months before.
And I don't know exactly why why he got a
(41:54):
four month conditional sentence in two years probation. But the
most shocking thing to me was that Darun had not
been updated and had not been able to find this information.
Speaker 4 (42:05):
And lived so close to him, lives.
Speaker 1 (42:08):
Like a few miles away, and had no idea.
Speaker 4 (42:11):
Such a nightmare.
Speaker 1 (42:12):
Okay, So this takes place in Canada, which is different
than the US, and I'm not as familiar with the
laws there. It was difficult, honestly, even getting the court paperwork,
much more difficult than I found in the US when
I've sat out records. So I reached out to a
few different reporters. Essentially I didn't get a clear answer
on this, on what the process is and also why
(42:35):
a victim wouldn't be informed, but you might have some
information about this.
Speaker 4 (42:39):
Yeah, Well, after we talked about this and came to
this sort of realization that we weren't even clear on
what Durune's rights were as a victim of someone who
physically assaulted her, probably with the intent to sexually assault her.
You know, it was really alarming, and so I went
ahead and contacted a victim advocacy group called the Canadian
(43:00):
Resource Center for Victims of Crime, and I spoke with
the representative there and she had some really interesting information. Essentially,
in Canada there exists the Canadian Victim's Bill of Rights,
and Darun had a lot more rights than I think
were exercised, and probably that's because she didn't even know
that she had those rights. And it also goes back
to well, she's the victim of a crime, and so
(43:23):
is the onus on the victim to go say, okay,
what are my rights? Or is it on law enforcement
to say, okay, here's your rights, or connect you to
someone who can make you aware so that you can
stay safe throughout this ordeal. And basically she has what's
called a right to information, which is about the status
of the investigation, the alleged defense, the location of proceedings,
(43:47):
available services, right to protection, right to participation, which is
conveying their views when decisions are made by authority.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Well, this is why I was shocked, because so many
cases we've covered before, victor will get a chance to
offer a victim impact statement at a sentencing hearing, which
can influence a sentence on someone. Right if a judge
hears that this was incredibly emotionally traumatic or whatever, that
could be informative in sentencing. Well, if the victim is
not informed about the sentencing hearing, they have no chance
(44:17):
to offer a victim impact statement.
Speaker 4 (44:20):
Right, And I think you know Drew and put it
so well in the interview when she was talking about
how you know this person attacked her in broad daylight,
in broad daylight, I think it was eleven thirty am.
She was like, of course he was going to do
this again, and she was right and was keeping trophies,
was keeping trophies like he was not someone who was
just going to be kind of come to the realization
(44:44):
that he shouldn't be doing this. He's dangerous and so
it was really scary, I'm sure for her to learn
that he actually lives quite close and she had no
idea what the status was of the case. No one
told her, and she, it turns out, did have a
right to that information. Now, when I spoke to the
representative from this advocacy group, they said that it's not
(45:05):
exactly clear whose job it is to say, here are
your rights, but that if you are a victim of
a crime in Canada, especially a violent crime, you should
be able to ask law enforcement what are some resources
I can have access to and they should be able
to point you in this direction of either an advocacy
group or paperwork that outlines or rights for you. And
(45:28):
it's unfortunate, but it sounds like you do have to
do some self advocating to get that information, but it
does exist, so you know, it's not ideal, but I
think that it's an important takeaway for anyone who might
find themselves in an unfortunate situation like this, because I
think had Dara known, she would have absolutely exercised those rights.
Speaker 5 (45:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
Absolutely, you know, it's a good practice to if you
find yourself in that situation to ask that of law enforcement,
who do I contact? What's the number? How often will
I be update it? You know, ask all the questions.
It's hard to also put that on a victim. When
hearing Duran's story, it's like the shock even right after
(46:09):
this attack. She doesn't have the presence of mind to
do that, I'm sure, but even to be able to
reach out after, you know, one of the things that
I feel like I've learned from trying to track information down,
calling courthouses, calling police stations is like, you know, bureaucratic
institutions are not just going to be like here, let
(46:30):
me help you and giving all this information. You just
have to be like, okay, keep asking, keep asking. Okay,
well you should contact this department? Cool, how do I
do that? What would that website or that phone number be.
You just have to ask a ton of questions, which
is unfortunate that's the case.
Speaker 4 (46:45):
But yeah, yeah, you have to be kind of a
bulldog about it. I mean, you and I have been
contacting courthouses and looking for court records and reaching out
to law enforcement for a long time now. But still
sometimes I have a really hard time figuring out, how
do I get to this person? Oh, you have to
go through this other person and you know, pretty soonior
following up three times, and you know, for us working
(47:08):
in podcasting, obviously that's a less important email than a victim.
But I think the same bureaucratic nightmare exists where you're like, Okay,
but who do I call? What is the number? And
they're like, let me look into that.
Speaker 5 (47:20):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
Yeah, well that sounds like a really helpful organization. We
should put that in the show notes.
Speaker 3 (47:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (47:26):
They're also you know, there's no cost to utilizing their services.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
Oh that's fantastic.
Speaker 5 (47:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
Do they serve all of Canada?
Speaker 4 (47:34):
I think they serve all of Canada, but I know
they serve Ontario and they help people who have experienced
violent crime. They have a Homicide Support Group. They really
have a lot of resources that I didn't even know
existed that are more specific. So the Canadian Resource Center
for Victims of Crime. I'm just reading from what it
says on our website. The CRCBC provides support, research and
(47:58):
education to survivors of serious crime and stakeholders in Canada.
So reach out to them if you need victim advocacy.
I think that it was so easy for me to
reach them and hop on a call. I have no
doubt that they would help point someone in the right direction.
Speaker 5 (48:12):
Love that.
Speaker 4 (48:12):
So if anyone is interested in reaching out to the
Canadian Resource Center for Victims of Crime, you can go
to their website. It's CRCVC dot Ca and there's a
contact gust link and that is how I reached them
and I heard back within a day.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
Amazing, Yeah, amazing.
Speaker 4 (48:27):
That was a great interview.
Speaker 1 (48:28):
Fantastic. We'll be back next week, all right, looking forward
to it.
Speaker 4 (48:33):
If you have a story for us, we would love
to hear it. Our email is The Knife at exactly
rightmedia dot com, or you can follow us on Instagram
at the Knife Podcast or a Blue Sky at the
Knife Podcast.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
This has been an exactly right production hosted and produced
by me Hannah Smith.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
And me Paytia Eating. Our producers are Tom Bryfogel and
Alexis Samarosi.
Speaker 1 (48:53):
This episode was mixed by Tom Bryfogel.
Speaker 4 (48:55):
Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
Our theme music is by Birds in the Airport.
Speaker 4 (49:00):
Artwork by Vanessa Lilac.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
Executive produced by Karen Kilgariff, Georgia Hardstark, and Danielle Kramer.
Hell, big news, everybody.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
The premiere episode of our new show, The Knife, a
true crime podcast, is out now.
Speaker 3 (00:07):
If you love deep dives, empathetic storytelling, and the cases
that stay with you long after the episode ends, this
will be the true crime podcast for you.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
That's right, and now you're about to get an exclusive.
Listen to their premiere episode.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Hosts Hannah Smith and patia Eton take you inside the
gripping story of Darun Henry, whose routine morning run took
a sudden and terrifying turn, altering the course of her life.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
So sit back and enjoy the first episode of The Knife,
the newest member of our exactly right family, and don't forget.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Once you listen to this episode and you love it,
head over to The Knife's feed in your podcast app
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Speaker 2 (00:46):
And while you're there, don't forget to follow, rate and review.
It really helps. Goodbye.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 5 (00:59):
So there was a silent moment between us where we
were both trying to process what just happened.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
After you punched him.
Speaker 5 (01:07):
Yeah, like just a still moment where I was like,
oh my god, I just punch a human in the phase.
Speaker 4 (01:31):
Welcome to the Knife. I am Patia Eton. I'm Hannah
Smith and this week we speak with a woman named
Darun Henry. She is a personal trainer, influencer, and mother
of two who lives in Toronto, Canada.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
In September of twenty twenty one, Drune had just moved
into a new home with her kids and then husband.
It was a nice, safe, family friendly area of Toronto,
and then on September fifteenth, she went for a jog
at eleven am in a park near her home and
experienced something terrifying. We speak with Darune about her experience
and the lasting impact of what happened to her, including
(02:05):
a video of the incident that went viral. We will
be back with you after the interview to give you
some updates on Darun's story, which is still ongoing today.
As a note, this conversation with Darune happened on October fourteenth,
twenty twenty four.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Let's get into the interview.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Let's start off with you telling us a little bit
about yourself and your background.
Speaker 5 (02:33):
I'm Darune Henry. I am an online fitness coach. I'm
a mother of two beautiful girls who are thirteen and seven,
and I'm just a very passionate entrepreneur. I had a
very hard upbringing. I was born in Iraq. I'm Kurdish,
(02:53):
so I uh not to go too deep, but I
lost my brother. My brother was killed by a landmine
when I was five, so and then I was like
a refugee until we came to Canada at the age
of seven or eight, so in ninety six, and so
a lot of my conditioning was limiting beliefs. I was
(03:16):
very insecure because I didn't do too well in school.
I never got like my university degree. I got pregnant
at a young age. And so when I had my
spiritual awakening and I was on my own personal development
journey and I discovered who I am and how powerful
I am and how limitless I am. I wanted to
(03:40):
help women like discover that part of themselves, regardless of
what you've been through, that you can become the best
version of yourself. And so like that's where my passion
lies right now. Right before the attack, I would say
I was at the peak of my career, was just
(04:00):
the happiest version of myself.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
In September of twenty twenty one, Darun and her family
had just moved into a new home in Brampton, a
city in the Greater Toronto area. Darune was delighted to
find out that she was in walking distance to Massy Park,
which is a small park that sits in the middle
of a heavily trafficked area, but still feels remote due
(04:24):
to the density of the trees. So she started to
do her daily workouts at Massy Park.
Speaker 5 (04:31):
So it's September fifteenth, twenty twenty one, so school had
just started. Yeah, Like I had taken the kids to
school that day and I went for my jog around
like nine point thirty. Being in the forest, I would
often like do walking meditations, I'd connect with God. So
on that day it was different because I needed more content.
(04:55):
So that was the only day I had taken my
tribod because I do believe that having my tripod kind
of saves me in a way. That day, I believe
I got there around nine fifty ish. I shot content.
I took pictures for about twenty thirty minutes. I was
getting the right shots. I had my jump rope with
(05:15):
me that day, so I was jump roping.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
So you know, when is the first moment that you
thought like something is wrong.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
So this was towards the end of my workout. So
I was around eleven am when I saw an elderly
man who was maybe like eighty years old, with a walker,
and I saw him walking very slowly, and I actually
noticed a random person. I noticed he was walking very
(05:48):
slowly behind the elderly man, like almost as if he
was just like with him, but you can tell they
weren't together. I found him a little suspicious because he
was dressed in all black, like black sweatpants, black speatter,
a fitted hat, and he was wearing a mask. It
(06:08):
was pretty warm day, it was it was September fifteenth.
I was wearing shorts, so it was kind of like
unusual to see somebody dressed like in a hoodie and
like sweatpants and just fully covered and also like wearing
a COVID mask. Not a lot of people wore the
masks outside in the parks, so I did. I noticed
(06:31):
him immediately as he was walking. I had his bike,
but he wasn't on his bike, like he wasn't riding
his bike, he was walking. They passed by right like
they left, and I just continued doing what I was doing.
And then at this point I was stretching and looking
(06:52):
at the sunshine, you know, shining through the leaves, and
just breathing, and just I was stretching, and I felt
this like immense pain in my hamstrings, and like something
told me to bend over, like to stretch my hamstrings.
And when I bent over, I literally saw him through
(07:15):
my legs. So I jumped. And I was off to
the side of the walking path so that people can
pass by me. And when I bent over, I saw
him like through my legs. Literally he was like right
behind me, maybe eight feet away, and I jumped. I
(07:37):
turn around. I wasn't scared though, I just thought he
was on a walk because it was just so I
didn't know there was someone there. Yeah, yeah, I had
no idea. I was wearing these headphones so I couldn't
hear anything. And when I turned around and he was
right directly right behind me, my tripod was like it
was on the ground, and I think that I I
(08:00):
don't think he was sure that like if it was
recording or not. It wasn't recording, but he did notice
my tripod. And then when I turned around, I said, oh,
I'm so sorry. Like I was just like, so sorry,
I'm in your way, right even though there's a huge
walking pathway, like you could go around me, Like there's
(08:20):
no reason you should be directly behind me, and so
like that's when I realized, oh, like he really was
trying to get really close to me, but I caught
him before he got too close. And as soon as
I said sorry to him, he was very strange. He
was just like, didn't say anything, and then looks at
(08:43):
my tripod and was like asking me if I did YouTube.
He's like, oh, do you do YouTube? And I was
like no. I couldn't really hear him because he had
his mask on. So then I was like, what what
are you saying? And he was like do you do YouTube?
And then he took his mask off, so he put
(09:04):
it down to below his chin, and he kept asking
me if if I did YouTube, and I said no,
I don't do YouTube. He was like, are you are
you a fitness instructor. I was like yes, I'm a
personal trainer. He's like, well, can I get your information
like my Facebook or like my socials? And I was
like no, like I only work with women. And then
(09:27):
I just kind of like looked at him like walk away,
like go now, and so like I was just getting
annoyed of him, like it was. The conversation probably took
like thirty seconds, and so I was waiting for him
to walk off, and I was like, no, like I
only work with women, you can't have my information. And
(09:49):
so he got the point, and it was in that moment,
like he didn't say anything more, he just put his
mask back on. In this moment, I realized, oh my god,
he's going to try and rape me, because he looks around,
he looked in my eyes, and in that moment, I
(10:12):
felt that realization, like that moment where you're like I'm
in danger, like I'm something bad is going to happen
to me right now, and like I have to like fight.
So I went into fight mode immediately because he looked around.
He put his mask back on, and then he came
(10:33):
to strangle me. So he came at me with his
hands to strangle me. But before he could get to me,
I cost him. So I punched him with my right arm,
my rightness. I punched him in his jaw, like I
just I don't know, I don't remember how hard it was.
(10:55):
I mean in that moment. I'm sure I punched him
really really hard, not enough to knock him out, but
he was shocked. So there was a silent moment between
us where we were both trying to process what just happened,
Like after you punched him, Yeah, like just a still
moment where I was like, oh my god, I just
(11:17):
punch a human, like in the face. Like I was
taking boxing lessons, but I always had gloves on. I
never punched a human before, like flesh and bone, So like,
there were so many thoughts running through my head, like,
oh my god, he's going to kill me. I just
punched a man in the face, and he's going to
(11:41):
kill me.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
So because you say, like, and you did this motion
which people can't see on the podcast, but you're saying
that he was coming at you with his hands out
in a clear way, that like he was going for
your throat.
Speaker 5 (11:53):
Yeah, he was coming for my throat. Yeah. Like that
was hands down the scariest moment of my life. I
didn't even react, Like I didn't even think. I just
reacted and I punched him. And I honestly believe that,
like punching him in the face was the best thing
I could have ever done, because it completely threw him off.
(12:16):
And after I punched him, I did freeze because I
was like, at the end of the day, I'm five
to one and he's really tall. He's in I don't
know who he is, what he's capable of. I don't
know if he has a weapon on him. But then
right after I punched him and we had that silent
moment for maybe five seconds, you know, it aggravated him,
(12:39):
so he tried to take me down. And so I
always mentioned that like my boxing lessons saved my life,
I was able to fight him. So I literally heard
my coach his name is Jerry, and I literally heard
Jerry in my head. I heard him say, put power
(13:00):
behind it, like as I was punching, because that was
something he'd often say to me, put power behind it.
And it's that repetition of punching over and over and
over and even I don't know how it happened, but
he was on the ground. At one point I kicked
him really hard in his ribs. I wish I had
(13:23):
kicked him in his balls, but I kicked him in
his ribs. There was a point where he was looking
for something on the ground, so he was searching for
something on the ground. And in that moment, I thought,
oh my god, he's looking for a rock, like to
knock me out, right, Like that was my thought. It
was like he's looking for something to like knock me out,
(13:46):
and like that was the moment I remembered a head
of voice, because you know when you're fighting for your
life and that you don't remember that, like I didn't
remember I was in a public park. In that moment,
I remembered, like, you're in a public park. There's people,
(14:08):
somebody's gonna hear you. And so I literally started screaming
bloody murder. I started screaming for help like as loud
as I could. And yeah, like that was something it's
hard to relive. But yeah, like I thought, like if
(14:29):
like that was my last resort, was just screaming for
my life, it was really hard, really scary. So yeah,
and then as soon as I started screaming for help,
like his eyes bulged out, and yeah, and then he
ran away. But when he ran away, he ran towards
(14:54):
the right side of the forest. And then I think
he got maybe ten twenty steps in and he stopped
and he ran the opposite direction. And that's when I
pulled out my phone and I started recording him because
I needed evidence of him running away. I needed evidence
(15:19):
of what he looked like, what he was wearing, like,
I just needed something to show the police. I had
no idea why he stopped and ran the opposite direction.
But then I realized when he picked up his bike
that it was the same person who had walked by
me ten minutes prior to and I realized that he
(15:44):
had hid his bike and was watching me for about
ten minutes.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
After Duron was able to fight off this attacker, she
somehow had the presence of mind to take out her
phone and hit record, capturing him running into the woods.
Then a man in the park who had heard her
scream showed up and called the police. The following moments
were a blur for Drone as multiple police officers and
(16:13):
her husband arrived at the park.
Speaker 5 (16:16):
When I had somebody there, like I was able to
just kind of like break out of that shell, and
I went into shock immediately. I just started wailing, like
I couldn't help it, Like I just started screaming. There
was a lot of police around, and that police officer
(16:37):
showed up within two minutes. He was there the search
started immediately. They were looking for him because we gave
a description. But yeah, he got away with it. Yeah,
and then I somehow walked back home. My street was
filled with police cars and my neighbors had no idea
(16:59):
what happened. There was just a lot of police in
the area and they kind of gave me a minute.
And when I got home, that's when like the shock
just kept getting worse. When I was like realized, like
realize what just happened. The first thing I did was
like go to the bathroom and puke. I don't know
(17:22):
how to describe it, but it felt like I puked
like this evil like it just came out of me,
and like it just I puked, and I was messed up.
I was really messed up because I kept thinking like,
oh my god, what if I didn't turn around, Like
what if he had just knocked me out before I
(17:44):
had turned around.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
There's obviously this range of emotions that you're then experiencing
directly following the attack. What do logistically the hours and
the days following the attack look like, Yeah, that.
Speaker 5 (17:56):
Was a huge ordeal. When we get into the police
there's a lot to say because you know, I essentially
risked my life capturing that video because I should have
been running to safety, but I took an extra ten
to fifteen seconds just to get him on camera. Yeah,
(18:19):
when I was very disappointed when they told me that
they couldn't do anything with that evidence. Like I had
this fantasy that like they were going to put it
on the news that night and show the clip of
him running through the woods and my neighborhood's going to
be safer place, maybe like somebody can recognize him. And like,
(18:43):
I was so disappointed and so shocked when the police
were like, no, like, we can't do anything with that evidence.
Speaker 4 (18:50):
What was their reason when they said we can't do anything.
Speaker 5 (18:54):
Why, Well, because it's alleged. They can't prove what he did.
They just have a video of a guy running through
the woods and it's an alleged attack, and yeah, like
they just don't do that. So I was like, Okay, well,
what are you going to do, Like there's a guy
(19:16):
out there attacking women at eleven am? He is one
million percent going to do it again, And they're like, yeah,
we're going to put it up on our website. And
then I was angry. I was like, what fucking website
are you talking about? Like I live in this neighborhood,
I don't know about your website. I doubt anyone here
knows that you have a website, or that anyone goes
(19:39):
on there daily to check. They questioned me for about
half an hour, and I was like, yeah, I was
just messed up, right, Like they gave me maybe ten
minutes to myself, and like during that ten minutes, I
was puking. Then we were talking and I was angry.
I was so angry. I was like, what do you
mean You're not going to do anything? What do you
(19:59):
mean You're just gonna put it on a website? Like
what good is that? And they literally told me like,
like the best thing you could do is just not
go back and see the woods. And I was like,
I was like fucking kidding me, Like what am I
a caged up animal? I can't even go for a
walk in my neighborhood in the park where I take
(20:21):
my kids every day, Like I walk my kids to
the park.
Speaker 4 (20:24):
Well, also, this is our advice to women on how
to stay safe. Don't leave your house.
Speaker 5 (20:28):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
According to Derune, the police said they would post the
report on their website. To alert the neighborhood, but she
didn't feel that this was good enough. After all, she
lived in the neighborhood and she'd never heard of the website.
Darune has a significant following on social media, and so
the next day, when the police report still wasn't up online,
Darune decided to post the video that she recorded in
(20:53):
the park of her attacker. This is the first part.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
Of that video.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Darune screams as a blurry fit, your darts through the woods.
Speaker 5 (21:03):
Wow, wow, w.
Speaker 6 (21:07):
I have you one video your pisi. I just pushed
him a fucking face.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
The video then cuts from the park to Darun sitting
on her front porch the following day, speaking directly to
her followers, I want.
Speaker 5 (21:24):
To make this video for my predator. I want him
to know that when I punched him in the face,
I wasn't scared at all. I wasn't scared. I'm crying
because I fucking took my sanctuary from me. It went
(21:46):
viral within hours, and at one point it was at
thirty thousand views, and it was at three hundred thousand views,
and it was at five hundred thousand views, and it
was just like a snowball effect and it just kept
getting bigger and bigger, and that was extremely hard to
(22:06):
navigate through as I'm trying to like collect myself. I
was getting messages from all over the world like a
went viral, and India I went viral, and Europe it
went viral, and on South America. For some people it
was like entertainment. I experienced a lot of victim blaming,
but I have to say I did also feel like
(22:28):
the support of the world behind me, and they ended
up posting the police report after it went viral. But
I also felt like the system really failed me because
if they had just taken me seriously, if they had
publicized my report, then the second attack wouldn't have happened,
(22:52):
which was just six days after mine.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Do you know what happened with that attack and how
did you learn about that attack?
Speaker 5 (22:58):
I found out about the second attack through a follower.
Somebody sent me the report. What happened was literally the
same exact scenario. He attacked her on a Tuesday, was
around the same exact time, like eleven am. It was
in another nearby park. He was on a bike, same thing.
(23:22):
He was dressed in sweats, but he had escalated it
to he had taken a knife, so a box cutter
to this next attack.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
After the second attack, Darun was asked to come into
the police station and look through a series of photographs
to identify the attacker. He was like the second lost picture.
So I had to go through all those pictures. But
as soon as his picture came up and I looked
at his eyes, this energy rushed over me and like
every cell in my body streamed and was like that's him.
Speaker 5 (24:01):
Like I knew it was him because of his eyes,
because I can never forget that look he gave me
right before he came to strangle me. And you know,
even though it was a picture, I felt those emotions.
And then after they made me go through that, they
were like, well, we have a disturbing question to ask you.
(24:22):
I was like what, And they were like did he
steal anything from you? Like does he? Are you missing anything?
And I was like no, no, I'm not missing anything.
But when they told me, like they found him, he
had a backpack on him and he had a bunch
of women's items in there, and they told me that
(24:43):
he goes out there looking for the opportunity to attack,
and then that he is also a trophy keeper. So
then he keeps something from his victims. And when they
said that to me, I realized that when I thought
he was looking for a rock to knock me out,
(25:06):
he wasn't actually looking for a rock. He was looking
to steal something to keep as a trophy.
Speaker 6 (25:15):
Nineteen year old Paul Yusif of Brampton was charged this
week with assault, assault with a weapon, and assault causing
bodily harm in connection to two alleged incidents, Henry's and
another that happened six days later. That incident taking place
at nearby Jayfield Park.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Law enforcement was able to identify and charge Paul Yusef.
We don't have any information about the other victim, as
she was a miner at the time. Paul Yusef was
arrested on September twenty eighth, twenty twenty one. Darune now
had a name for her attacker, and while she waited
to see what would happened to him, she tried to
continue living her life. I didn't sleep for maybe two weeks.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
I just couldn't. Although he wasn't successful, I went through
a lot of the after effects.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
You know, it's interesting to use this word successful, and
I know what you mean by it because he wasn't
able to, you know, do what he planned to do,
which when you were in that moment, was very clear
to you. Looking in his eyes, you knew what he
wanted to do. It's still just like he still attacked you.
You know, you still had to go through that experience.
Speaker 5 (26:24):
He wasn't successful, but he was successful in breaking me
and you know, making me feel violated. I still feel
very violated. For the first two weeks before he was caught,
I went through this intense like PTSD where I felt
(26:46):
like he was in my kitchen every night, Like I
couldn't even go downstairs to like get a glass of
water because I felt like he was just there. There
were many times where I would just be sitting on
my front porch and like a man would walk by,
and I thought that man was going to come attack me,
and I would just run back into my home. The
(27:07):
PTSD was so intense that I literally jumped one day
and like almost freaked out on an elderly man at
the beach.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Something that's important to note in Canada, you are not
allowed to carry a weapon or any tool that is
specifically for the purpose of self defense, which would include
pepper spray. It was difficult for Derune to feel safe
out in the world, even during the day. After all,
she'd been attacked in a public park at eleven am.
(27:40):
She feared something like this would happen again, knowing her
only recourse if it ever did happen would be to fight.
Speaker 5 (27:48):
One of the triggers I had is that, like when
a man is walking towards me and making eye contact,
I get triggered, or if there's somebody behind me, I
will get triggered and it will bring back that moment
and I'll go into like defense mode, Like I didn't
(28:09):
want to be touched, like even by my husband, Like
he couldn't even tap me on the shoulder without me jumping.
I dressed in baggy clothes for weeks, like my body
was I felt so violated. There's a lot that victims
go through that is not talked about.
Speaker 4 (28:30):
Have you learned anything else about him throughout this process?
Like what does he do for work?
Speaker 5 (28:35):
Oh? Yeah, Like when we discovered who he was and
it went public and I saw a few comments like oh,
I went to high school with this guy. So I
went and I liked did my own research. I found
out that he's Iraqi, which is crazy because I'm Iraqi.
(28:56):
I found out that he's my own people, and that
was very disturbing. And that was one thing I found
out about him. A lot of the girls I spoke
to from his high school, I think I spoke to
like two or three of them, all told me he
was a creep in that like he didn't handle rejection
(29:18):
very well.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Darune waited in anticipation to see what would happen to
her attacker, paul Yusif. The waiting, she said, was uncomfortable,
but it was also not a new feeling for her.
This experience flooded her with memories from a different incident
that happened when she was a child. This is also
not my first predator. When I was eleven, I was
(29:44):
groomed by my teacher, my drama teacher, like every kid
wanted to be around him, like because he was cool
and he was you know, like if mister Tulanko liked you,
like you're cool. And I didn't know he was grooming
me until he made it so obvious and he was like, well,
I have a question for you.
Speaker 5 (30:05):
Do you have pubic care? I was like WHOA? And
I was going through puberty, and like, I didn't even
talk about that stuff with my own parents, so like
for you to ask me as a teacher, I legitimately
ran home that day. I think I answered him. I
have no idea what my reaction was. I just was like,
(30:29):
what the fuck, dude, and I ran at it there,
Like I went home, and then I just avoided him
for the remainder of the year. You know, I noticed
he always had like a favorite student that was always
a female who was always in grade six. And the
reason he targeted grade six students, And this is just
(30:50):
all my theory was because the year like that was
the last year of elementary and then you go to
middle school and so you can kind of get away
with doing what ever, and then they were off to
the next school, which is exactly what happened with me.
I just moved on and I went to the next school,
and I forgot about it.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Darune was clear that although her sixth grade teacher, Greg
Talenko had not physically abused her, his actions were harmful.
He was a teacher, someone in a trusted position of authority,
and he'd used that power to manipulate her. At the time,
Darune didn't know the term grooming, but she does now
and that is exactly what Greg Tlanko was doing. Darune
(31:34):
listened to her instincts and distanced herself from Tlanko, never
telling anyone what happened. That is until two years later
when she learned that she was not Tlanko's only target.
Speaker 5 (31:47):
And then two years later it came up that like
the after the year I left, there was like five
girls that he was you know, grooming and had invited
back to his house and shown them porn on his computer.
He had shown them his privates and like he took
(32:10):
it so far with those girls, you know, they, I
guess thought it was a joke. They didn't realize what
was happening. And they told me, like we were on
the bus going to school, like they were in grade seven.
I was in grade eight, and they were telling me
all these stories and I was like, you guys, like
(32:30):
we have to come forward. And it was my idea
to come forward because I have his younger sister and
he used to call her little Darun, and I just
knew that like she was his next target. So I
really did it for my sister. And yeah, at a
young age, I had to get questioned I felt like
(32:53):
I was getting interrogated by the police. There was like
victim blaming involved at that time as well with the
new teachers in grade eight, like I remember getting treated
differently because of coming forward, and so yeah, this is
this cuts deep because I still have trauma from the
(33:15):
age of eleven twelve thirteen.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
Darun was in middle school, a time wrought with difficulties
and insecurities for most of us, but still she decided
to speak out and lead the charge in bringing Greg
Talanko's actions to light. Drune's younger sister was going into
sixth grade the next year, and she did not want
her to have the same experiences with Tilanco. As a
(33:39):
result of Durune and others speaking out, in two thousand
and one, Greg Talanco was arrested and charged with sexual assault,
invitation to sexual touching, sexual interference, and criminal harassment. He
had been teaching at Cedar Drive Public School for twelve years.
Speaker 5 (33:55):
At that point, I was very afraid of like coming
out because child, you think that like you did something
wrong for the teacher to ask me a question like that,
Like what did what did you do for him to
ask you that? Right? Like that was how my mind worked.
At the end of the day, I feel like my
voice is there, like this time around, like I fought
(34:18):
so hard because of little Darun, because like little Daru
never got justice. Like I was just like, yeah, I'm
just like a witness in all this, but really I
was a victim and I was groomed and my innocence
was stolen. But I was okay with like not getting
the justice as long as he was in trouble and
(34:40):
as long as like there was other victims to help
me prove that this guy was shouldn't be a teacher,
shouldn't even be around kids.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
I asked Aarune what she meant when she said she
never got justice as a child, and what came to
light was that she felt she missed out on the process.
She wasn't considered a main victim in the case, which
she understands, but as a result, her story wasn't part
of the case and she did not attend any of
the hearings. She didn't get to see it. She was
(35:13):
just left to process what had happened to her alone.
As a result of this, even years later, she explained
that she still has questions and she never really got
closure and when she was attacked on September fifteenth, twenty
twenty one, in Massy Park, Suddenly this incident from middle
school came back into her mind.
Speaker 5 (35:34):
I actually thought about mister Telango on my walk back home,
like it happened immediately, like after the attack and I
was walking back home, I thought of him, and I
remembered that experience. It just came up, and I was
just so angry about the world, Like I was just
(35:57):
so angry. It just it just came. I guess it
was just like that blocked trauma that was still in there.
It all came up.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Darune spoke up in middle school and again as an
adult after she was attacked in Massy Park. Her motivation
to warn others, to advocate for victims, and perhaps to
make a big deal about something that is a big deal.
Sometimes though, you can do all the right things and
still be let down. When I first spoke with Darune
(36:30):
in the fall of twenty twenty four, she told me
that she was still waiting to know the results of
Paul Yusiff's case. I decided to see what I could
find out, so I called the Peel Regional Police and
then they directed me to the Davis Courthouse in Brampton.
We don't directly talk about this in the interview, but
what happened was I was emailed the case documents the
(36:52):
day before we recorded this interview with Darune. I found
out that the sentence seene hearing had already happened. It
happened in May of twenty twenty four. Paul Yusef was
sentenced to four months of conditional sentence, house arrest and
two years probation. I didn't want to spring this information
on Drune during the recording, so I sent her an
(37:15):
email the night before the interview with the case information.
She later told me that while she is glad to
have this information, it was also very difficult to receive
and it opened up a whole new set of worries
for her.
Speaker 5 (37:29):
I have been waiting for three years. Nobody has updated
me on anything. He only got four months of house arrest.
He also lives in our neighborhood, so he lives within
five kilometers of us. So that's the other scary part
is like, yeah, like he's he's three now, and I
(37:54):
had no idea.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
Yeah, I mean, I think it's pretty like ridiculous that
they didn't update you on all of that, even just
to keep you informed. I feel like that should have happened.
Speaker 5 (38:05):
I can't believe it. I legitimately had a mental breakdown
last night when I saw your message. I was like,
what that is impossible? Like how could how could they
not tell me?
Speaker 1 (38:21):
I wasn't able to get a hold of anyone to
ask them these questions, but it started, you know, it
was so shocking to me when I heard that, because
he attacked two people. Clearly he was past you, hit
his bike, was watching you. And maybe it goes back
to this idea of was he quote unquote successful and
if he, you know, because he wasn't, then he gets
(38:43):
a lesser sentence. But it really brings up this question
of justice, because how is that justice? Yeah, it's not.
Speaker 5 (38:52):
It's a nightmare, yeah, Like it's it's almost as if
like you have to end up like dead in the
woods for them to actually care or like do anything.
And that's truly how I feel, like, Oh, you've thought
a tax, Well shit happens every day, d Arune, Like
move on right, Like that's that's how I took it, Like, well,
(39:16):
you're lucky enough you could fight and fight right, like
you're lucky you got away, Like it's all luck. It's
like a game of luck. Like, I just kind of
want to reiterate my message to women, and it's that
you have a voice, right and like that you're powerful,
(39:36):
and that you're stronger than you believe to be, and
that you can also punch a man in the face
and survive, and that it's okay to freeze. I think
that was one thing that like, I felt like a
lot of victims came forward and kept saying, like I
(39:57):
wish I had your strength. I wish I had done something,
But like I want to remind women that I also
froze in that moment, like right after I punched him,
and like that it's a very natural reaction to have.
But the more prepared you are, right, Like I just
feel like I was prepared and that you know, at
(40:18):
the end of the day, I feel like, you know,
I was very successful quote unquote in getting him captured
and you know, all that stuff because it rarely goes
that far. Right.
Speaker 4 (40:44):
Wow, that was an incredible interview. I'm so I feel
so lucky she shared her story with us.
Speaker 5 (40:49):
Me too.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Yeah, it was really powerful and I'm so glad that
she spoke with us.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
Going into these interviews, we have to do some level
of prep. And in this case, you discovered that Paul
Yusuf had already actually had his court proceedings. So do
you want to talk a little bit about how you
navigated that going into the interview with Durun.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Yeah, it's not something I think I would have known
how to do or felt comfortable doing before we started
working in podcasting, because basically I couldn't find any information
about it online. Neither could Durune, which is why she
believed that the case was still open. And so I
called the police station where the article I did find
(41:32):
where he was arrested, and then they told me the courthouse,
which was like in a different county. So then I
called the courthouse and got ahold of them, and then
I was able to get the court documents, and I
was really surprised to learn that the case was closed,
that his sentencing hearing had already happened like six months before.
And I don't know exactly why why he got a
(41:54):
four month conditional sentence in two years probation. But the
most shocking thing to me was that Darun had not
been updated and had not been able to find this information.
Speaker 4 (42:05):
And lived so close to him, lives.
Speaker 1 (42:08):
Like a few miles away, and had no idea.
Speaker 4 (42:11):
Such a nightmare.
Speaker 1 (42:12):
Okay, So this takes place in Canada, which is different
than the US, and I'm not as familiar with the
laws there. It was difficult, honestly, even getting the court paperwork,
much more difficult than I found in the US when
I've sat out records. So I reached out to a
few different reporters. Essentially I didn't get a clear answer
on this, on what the process is and also why
(42:35):
a victim wouldn't be informed, but you might have some
information about this.
Speaker 4 (42:39):
Yeah, Well, after we talked about this and came to
this sort of realization that we weren't even clear on
what Durune's rights were as a victim of someone who
physically assaulted her, probably with the intent to sexually assault her.
You know, it was really alarming, and so I went
ahead and contacted a victim advocacy group called the Canadian
(43:00):
Resource Center for Victims of Crime, and I spoke with
the representative there and she had some really interesting information. Essentially,
in Canada there exists the Canadian Victim's Bill of Rights,
and Darun had a lot more rights than I think
were exercised, and probably that's because she didn't even know
that she had those rights. And it also goes back
to well, she's the victim of a crime, and so
(43:23):
is the onus on the victim to go say, okay,
what are my rights? Or is it on law enforcement
to say, okay, here's your rights, or connect you to
someone who can make you aware so that you can
stay safe throughout this ordeal. And basically she has what's
called a right to information, which is about the status
of the investigation, the alleged defense, the location of proceedings,
(43:47):
available services, right to protection, right to participation, which is
conveying their views when decisions are made by authority.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Well, this is why I was shocked, because so many
cases we've covered before, victor will get a chance to
offer a victim impact statement at a sentencing hearing, which
can influence a sentence on someone. Right if a judge
hears that this was incredibly emotionally traumatic or whatever, that
could be informative in sentencing. Well, if the victim is
not informed about the sentencing hearing, they have no chance
(44:17):
to offer a victim impact statement.
Speaker 4 (44:20):
Right, And I think you know Drew and put it
so well in the interview when she was talking about
how you know this person attacked her in broad daylight,
in broad daylight, I think it was eleven thirty am.
She was like, of course he was going to do
this again, and she was right and was keeping trophies,
was keeping trophies like he was not someone who was
just going to be kind of come to the realization
(44:44):
that he shouldn't be doing this. He's dangerous and so
it was really scary, I'm sure for her to learn
that he actually lives quite close and she had no
idea what the status was of the case. No one
told her, and she, it turns out, did have a
right to that information. Now, when I spoke to the
representative from this advocacy group, they said that it's not
(45:05):
exactly clear whose job it is to say, here are
your rights, but that if you are a victim of
a crime in Canada, especially a violent crime, you should
be able to ask law enforcement what are some resources
I can have access to and they should be able
to point you in this direction of either an advocacy
group or paperwork that outlines or rights for you. And
(45:28):
it's unfortunate, but it sounds like you do have to
do some self advocating to get that information, but it
does exist, so you know, it's not ideal, but I
think that it's an important takeaway for anyone who might
find themselves in an unfortunate situation like this, because I
think had Dara known, she would have absolutely exercised those rights.
Speaker 5 (45:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
Absolutely, you know, it's a good practice to if you
find yourself in that situation to ask that of law enforcement,
who do I contact? What's the number? How often will
I be update it? You know, ask all the questions.
It's hard to also put that on a victim. When
hearing Duran's story, it's like the shock even right after
(46:09):
this attack. She doesn't have the presence of mind to
do that, I'm sure, but even to be able to
reach out after, you know, one of the things that
I feel like I've learned from trying to track information down,
calling courthouses, calling police stations is like, you know, bureaucratic
institutions are not just going to be like here, let
(46:30):
me help you and giving all this information. You just
have to be like, okay, keep asking, keep asking. Okay,
well you should contact this department? Cool, how do I
do that? What would that website or that phone number be.
You just have to ask a ton of questions, which
is unfortunate that's the case.
Speaker 4 (46:45):
But yeah, yeah, you have to be kind of a
bulldog about it. I mean, you and I have been
contacting courthouses and looking for court records and reaching out
to law enforcement for a long time now. But still
sometimes I have a really hard time figuring out, how
do I get to this person? Oh, you have to
go through this other person and you know, pretty soonior
following up three times, and you know, for us working
(47:08):
in podcasting, obviously that's a less important email than a victim.
But I think the same bureaucratic nightmare exists where you're like, Okay,
but who do I call? What is the number? And
they're like, let me look into that.
Speaker 5 (47:20):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
Yeah, well that sounds like a really helpful organization. We
should put that in the show notes.
Speaker 3 (47:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (47:26):
They're also you know, there's no cost to utilizing their services.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
Oh that's fantastic.
Speaker 5 (47:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
Do they serve all of Canada?
Speaker 4 (47:34):
I think they serve all of Canada, but I know
they serve Ontario and they help people who have experienced
violent crime. They have a Homicide Support Group. They really
have a lot of resources that I didn't even know
existed that are more specific. So the Canadian Resource Center
for Victims of Crime. I'm just reading from what it
says on our website. The CRCBC provides support, research and
(47:58):
education to survivors of serious crime and stakeholders in Canada.
So reach out to them if you need victim advocacy.
I think that it was so easy for me to
reach them and hop on a call. I have no
doubt that they would help point someone in the right direction.
Speaker 5 (48:12):
Love that.
Speaker 4 (48:12):
So if anyone is interested in reaching out to the
Canadian Resource Center for Victims of Crime, you can go
to their website. It's CRCVC dot Ca and there's a
contact gust link and that is how I reached them
and I heard back within a day.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
Amazing, Yeah, amazing.
Speaker 4 (48:27):
That was a great interview.
Speaker 1 (48:28):
Fantastic. We'll be back next week, all right, looking forward
to it.
Speaker 4 (48:33):
If you have a story for us, we would love
to hear it. Our email is The Knife at exactly
rightmedia dot com, or you can follow us on Instagram
at the Knife Podcast or a Blue Sky at the
Knife Podcast.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
This has been an exactly right production hosted and produced
by me Hannah Smith.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
And me Paytia Eating. Our producers are Tom Bryfogel and
Alexis Samarosi.
Speaker 1 (48:53):
This episode was mixed by Tom Bryfogel.
Speaker 4 (48:55):
Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
Our theme music is by Birds in the Airport.
Speaker 4 (49:00):
Artwork by Vanessa Lilac.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
Executive produced by Karen Kilgariff, Georgia Hardstark, and Danielle Kramer.
Hosts And Creators
Georgia Hardstark
Karen Kilgariff
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