TORONTO — A years-long investigation into Toronto's shadowy protest infrastructure reached a stunning breakthrough this week after Caryma Sa’d discovered that people who regularly attend protests sometimes attend other protests.

The discovery came during the annual Grassy Narrows demonstration over mercury contamination. Sa’d noted that some participants travelled roughly 1,700 kilometres from Grassy Narrows to Toronto.

But investigators quickly uncovered something apparently more important:

Some Toronto activists were also there.

Sa’d identified familiar members of Toronto's “protest circuit” acting as “marshals” and “legal observers.”

For inexperienced readers, a marshal helps keep a demonstration organized and may liaise with police.

A legal observer observes.

Both become considerably more sinister when quotation marks are added.

ProtestMania blows the case wide open

Until now, Torontonians may have assumed that every demonstration recruits an entirely new group of politically engaged people who have never previously expressed an opinion outdoors.

ProtestMania suggests otherwise.

Sources now believe Toronto may contain a finite number of people who are particularly interested in activism and consequently attend multiple activist events.

Some may even know each other.

Investigators are calling this phenomenon “having a community.”

The implications could extend far beyond activists.

The same police officers have reportedly been spotted at multiple protests. Journalists have covered more than one demonstration. There are even unconfirmed reports of TTC vehicles transporting people to completely unrelated political events.

Researchers fear the network could eventually encompass anyone with a PRESTO card.

Meanwhile, the demonstration's actual subject — mercury contamination in Grassy Narrows — briefly resurfaced before investigators returned their attention to the Toronto volunteers helping people who had travelled 1,700 kilometres to protest it.

Scientists have reportedly ordered a larger corkboard and more red string.

At press time, Caryma’s ProtestMania investigation was getting dangerously close to discovering the concept of a volunteer.