A young life was extinguished on a University of Toronto campus, a tragedy that has ignited a furious debate about a system seemingly designed for repeated failures. The man now accused of the senseless killing of 20-year-old Shivank Avasthi, Babatunde Afuwape, was free – despite a history riddled with violence and a blatant disregard for the law.
The timeline is a chilling sequence of releases and re-offenses. Just weeks after his day parole was extended, Afuwape allegedly carried out the shooting, having spent roughly an hour on campus seemingly searching for a victim. This wasn’t a spontaneous act; it was a terrifying culmination of years of escalating criminal behavior.
Afuwape’s record stretches back years, beginning with a five-year, three-month sentence for robbery and weapons offenses. A ten-year weapons ban was imposed, yet the cycle continued. Convictions for forcible confinement followed, then a brutal attack on a 67-year-old pizza delivery driver – stabbed twice and left bleeding while his car was stolen.
The details of that attack are particularly disturbing. One assailant straddled the driver, while the other wielded a knife, inflicting gratuitous and unnecessary wounds. Afuwape was later found driving the stolen vehicle, his boots stained with the victim’s blood. Even while awaiting trial for this crime, the pattern persisted.
Surveillance footage captured him fleeing an area where gunshots had been reported. A subsequent search of his home revealed a loaded handgun, ammunition, and spent shell casings. Released on bail again, he repeatedly violated his conditions, cutting off his electronic monitoring bracelet and disappearing from his father’s apartment.
Despite these repeated breaches and a psychological assessment that placed him in the “high-risk range for violent recidivism,” Afuwape was granted day parole in March 2025. The board acknowledged the violent nature of his past, yet seemingly gambled with public safety, citing statistical probabilities of non-offense.
He was released to a halfway house and enrolled in a trade program, presenting as “motivated.” The parole board saw no indication of negative influences or further violations. This assessment proved tragically flawed. A full parole hearing was scheduled, but it will now never happen.
Instead, Afuwape sits in jail, facing a murder charge, and a promising young student is gone. The board had ordered a panel hearing, acknowledging the “significantly violent nature” of his crimes – the stabbing, the gunfire in a residential area, the repeated breaches. But the hearing was rendered tragically unnecessary by a final, devastating act.
The question now isn’t simply about one individual’s failures, but about a system that repeatedly allowed a dangerous offender to walk free, a system that, in this case, failed to protect an innocent life.
