1. Glad you say that. As recently as 2020 in the book La Source/Inside the Montreal Mafia a RCMP agent says they're under the Bonanno Family.

2. When Jerry Caoeci states something he cites a source. Canadian journalists authors and experts throw around Mafia titles and labels incorrectly constantly. Several authors journalists and experts have and keep making mistakes with this on subjects that aren't even in question. Their word isn't law. Them saying something doesn’t make it so.

Once again because it's very apparent that reading isn't your strong suit. I never said I was a expert. I am not making a claim of anything except that we do not know what the people in Montreal are.

You have to prove it to me because you're making unsubstantiated claims and I am asking for the evidence that supports your claim. This shouldn't have to be explained. When you say something is so the burden of proof is on you not the person who disagrees with it.

Follow your own 3 steps of presenting your claim. How do we know Montreal is their own Family? In the very first it was asked if they're their own Family and some of you said they were but not one of you have provided any sort of evidence of it.

were the stidda and sacra corona unita immediately recognized by la cosa nostra in sicily as separate distinct mafia families? or the nuova cammorra for that matter.
and official to whom...recognized by whom. the commission? please.it no longer functions as some overall governing body that sets down rules for the entirety of mafia groups in north america. it may serve this purpose currently for the remaining american families but not continent wide and hasnt for a very long time.
if? montagna was in contact with ny bonannos they gave him little help on that account and on trying to take over montreal.

and by yer reasoning the rizzuto crime family was that in 2012 at time of VITO RIZZUTOS release. V.R. was BOSS of said family with connections and equal status amongst both american families as u allege (bonanno,gambino) and toronto based 'ndrangheta groups. however there is no proof of who he met with amongst toronto based bonannos or gambinos. i know of none in 2012 operating in toronto. at least not members who could meet one on one with V.R. same can be said for 'ndrangheta groups. one on one with a commisso or carmine verduci perhaps one of the figliomenis for sure but we do not know.

in sept 2012 just before release an alliance was created t control drug trafficking amongst the rizzuto crime family,hells angels montreal chapter and gregory woolley allied street gangs. this alliance lasted until 2015.

so we are to believe that V.R. was BOSS of this family fully recognized by american mafia and 'ndrangheta with an existing alliance with local crime groups in montreal from 2012 to his death in dec 2013 but upon his death nobody recognized there strength,power and legitimacy since. absurd. if that was case why did HA and woolley continue to import distribute and make large amounts of money selling cocaine and other drugs on the streets of montreal with them?

why havent the bonannos,gambinos,'ndrangheta or anyone outside of quebec made a push to get rid of them and install a legit family. i was of the belief that the violis may have been behind some of it in the past. but there has been no valid proof of this. there also is no proof of who if anyone backed the scoppas in there attempt to overthrow the rizzutos. there has been claims of visits to toronto and meetings amongst the scoppas and 'ndrangheta in toronto but no names have ever come up. the same can be said for vittorio mirarchi. no proof to this day that he is a member of 'ndrangheta. none. he has only be described as a member of the montreal mafia.

They're recognized as another criminal organization just as bikers or Albanian or whoever but they are not recognized as Amico Nostra. That's completely different than recognizing another LCN Family. Rochester operated as a LCN Family but they didn't have recognition by the Commission and other Families. To them they were just Italian criminals. The Commission never acted as a governing body for all Mafia groups in North America it was only for LCN Families. The Commission is still said to be around John Pennisi has talked about it and Project Otremens had recorded conversations of Dom Violi talking about it and how they invited Joe Todaro to be apart of it.

What help were the Bonanno Family suppose to give? They're not shipping guys out to fight some war. Them giving Sal Montagna the authority to go to Montreal and try to reorganize the crew could of been all it was.

Vito Rizzuto has only ever been recognized as a Bonanno Soldier or maybe a Bonanno Acting Captain. In 2012 when he met with alleged Bonanno and Gambino members presumably that's still what he was recognized as. I never said he met with Toronto based Bonanno and Gambino members.

What does the Hells Angels street gang and Mafia alliance have to do with anything that we're talking about? I never said Vito Rizzuto was recognized as a Boss when he got out of prison. What are you even talking about? I never said no one recognized their strength or power I actually said the exact opposite of that. You're having trouble understanding what being recognized by LCN means.

What do you mean why haven't the Bonanno or Gambinos or Ndrangheta pushed them put and take over Montreal for themselves? I could ask why have the Bonanno or Gambino or Ndrangheta gone to any place and take over the rackets. What kind of question is that?

I completely agree with everyone you said in that last little bit. There's no proof the Violi brothers have had anything to do with anything that happened in Montreal except for some meetings that took place with Sal Montagna. The Mafia in Italy and Toronto that was said to have backed Sal and Andrea Scoppa is unknown. Vittorio Mirarchi has been called a member of the Ndrangheta but there has been no proof of it. Glad we finally agree on something here.

Vito, take my advice here your dealing with a TROLL, here all he wants to do is argue with every and anyone.
I usually do not let myself get dragged into something like this but he made a JERKED OFF comment, I since BITCH-SLAPPED HIM, he admitted he was wrong in front of the Forum.

That is the best I think anyone is going to get out of him.

REMEMBER - TROLLS GET OFF WHEN YOU ARGUE BACK WITH THEM.
He has not been on here very long; my guess is that he WAS BANNED not too long ago waited a minute and started a new account.
He is doing his best to keep his TROLLING to a minimum, so nobody catches on.
He just is not able to totally control himself, from his mommy's basement.

I see a couple of posters are making the point I believe that there was a total collapse of the Rizzutto family, who was once the ALL MIGHTY, and we do not know what is left. AGREED.

My response was/is the most that we have is LE and Expert Opinions that we have traditionally accepted as fact.

You are one of most knowledgeable posters on here when it comes to Canada and your opinion is respected as far as I am concerned.

If we minus this JO out of the THREAD it was actually a pretty good one, alot of posters voicing their opinions, and disagreeing amicably.

After this post I am going to put 101 on the 'SHELF" by blocking him, anyone can do this through our own account, the result is when he posts something you will never see it.

So, moving forward I will never know what he has to say again I will never see it.
AND THATS THAT.

I agree decentralized organization can work out fine, but there is also a great risk of instability. Look for example at the current violence in Napels.

Spend some time with your families people lol. Life's too short to argue over such petty things. I'm sure at some point Leonardo Rizzuto or some other high-level player will rat his ass off and set the record straight for every disgruntled poster in here

All these insults Benny but no evidence supporting what you're saying I'll say it again disagreeing is not being a troll. Some of you guys just read stuff of off Wikipedia and call it gospel. I've asked how many times for some proof and still haven't received it.

I respect Vito and consider him one of the best posters here on Montreal and we've spoken privately about this before and we obviously disagree. But with all due respect to him he hasn't provided any evidence Montreal was their own Family with their own administration either becuase he can't.

It's not a coincidence whenever this question is asked anywhere on here or other forums mob groups or reddit the people who make the claim of this can't provide anything to back it up.

It's interesting that there are a Moreno Gallo Jr and Lorenzo Giordano Jr..
And 5 Sollecito brothers.

Bruh... they technically don't HAVE to recognize Sicilian mafia members on American territory, if they arnt on record with an American LCN family. This is basic shit, it's how they hold onto their sovereignty.

Pennisi said this on one of his shows. It's like what Violi did way back in the 70s, same shit.

That same book Scoppa said it was lip service and thst being a made man meant nothing up there. Don't do that, cherry picking....

Lip service or not it doesn't matter and someone who wasn't a member and very vindictive said it didn't matter anymore. Not a very credible source so it isn't cherry picking and how many times have we've heard from non members that being made meant nothing anymore? I think we could find sources from going back to 1970s of that and every time we later find out by people who were actually made that it meant everything in that life. If anything that just proves my point more that we don't know what's going on with the current guys who run things.

In another wire-tapped phone conversation with Giacomo Luppino, Paolo Violi berated Bill Bonanno, the son of Joseph Bonanno, as he stated, "I told you that if I was to know that Bonanno was coming up again, I would tell him what a dishonest man he is. I would have gone myself and shown him what I thought of him...I would have told him, 'I'm not with you nor with him. I'm by myself. I don't want to have anything to do with anyone, because you're all a bunch of bastards'. The way things stand today that the abboccatoes [regions] will split and everyone will be on their own. I'm telling you that, in Montreal, we will be alone by ourselves."
Violi's brash, cocky and arrogant approach and lack of respect for his elders did not make him friends in the underworld.

Wow I guess we know why what happened to him happened to him.
This was after Galante was gone or was in jail I am assuming?

Don’t think he would have been talking that way with Galante still around?

I don't know the timeframe I believe somewhere around 74/75.
He was wiretapped for some time, and they did the same with his son Domenico recently.
After being promoted to underboss, Violi is heard on wiretaps boasting that "he had beaten out 30 other people for the position,"

To say Scoppa isn't credible, isn't credible. Anything the authors couldn't verify, they didn't publish. Everything they could find verified sources for, they provided in triplicate, from what I remember...
It's like I like the Cicale book. I think some stuff true, other stuff silly. This guy presents Vito like he's completely under Massinos thumb, and yet this same guy thinks the Bronx more remote than Montreal to a Brooklyn guy ( he described the Bronx being like a foreign planet, in comparison to Montreal being an ACTUAL foreign city in another country..) he recently called Lilo " Carmine Gigante" on his podcast. Does this insanity invalidate everything he's said? No, but I don't just buy everything either. Thst goes for Scoppa too...



Bro... have you seen the last, I dunno... 5 or 6 assessments of the OC landscape up there? Rhetorical question, I'm not tryna troll you. Bonnanos haven't been mentioned in at least 2 or 3 years. This is part of what baffles me about current conversations about it. After Morena....Just tell me the Bonnanos man in Montreal and I'll leave it alone...


That thing with Buffalo I believe was them realizing they essentially allowed their Montreal asset to first decay and atrophy, then abdicated control to the Rizzutos who saw themselves more as Sicilian mafia than American LCN. And NY only ever cared about Montreal so far as the drugs were coming, and even THAT was primarily the Sicilian contingent. After the Pizza Connection bust wiped out the NY Bonnano Sicilians, did any Americans step in?

It's very telling to me the Bonnanos picked cocaine to move into when they took the first steps toward maybe rebuilding if not their regime, at least repairing their influence up there. Why not gambling? Why not the Construction? Because I don't believe they had the pressence to move into those activities. They don't have the active members, the muscle...

In this specific instant of Andrea Scoppa speaking about ceremonies and inductions he is not that credible as a source because he isn't a LCN member and is a vindictive person. You read his opinion on anyone who slighted him so maybe if he didn't get button he would downplay it saying it means nothing. We see this time and time again from non members who down play being made and then we get accounts from people who were actually made and they tell us your button means everything in that life. I'm not dismissing it but we can't take it at face value and say that's that because Andrea Scoppa said so.

I have read all the recent reporting on Montreal. Now answer my question did you read this thread and see what I was actually saying? I never said the Bonanno Family still controls Montreal. I'm saying we don't know what is going on in terms of the organization up there. If you're Sicilian you're called Cosa Nostra and if you're Calabrian you're called Ndrangheta and if you're any other Italian no you're not. We have absolutely no info about what these guys actually are. We don't know if they're considered LCN or Ndrangheta or if they even have any formal membership in any organization. For all we know they could be groups of ragtag Italians playing Mafia.

This post is about whether there is a official Mafia Family in Montreal and for the people who say there is you guys still haven't seen provide evidence of that. The drugs construction and gambling isn't relevant to the questions at hand so I have no desire to talk about it.

https://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/...us-florissante-dans-un-libre-echange.php

a very good article posted on this site before about current structure of mafia and OC in general in montreal.

mafia101 i dont understand the central question of being officially recognized. if there is no overall ruling body that makes said decisions who is this authority deciding which mafia/criminal groups are official or not?

my inclusion of the info about the alliance with HA and woolley street gangs was only to illustrate that of all the mafia cells,factions or groups the hells angels and woolley could have teamed up with they chose rizzuto/sollecito and those allied with them. rizzuto/sollecito must then carry some significant weight in the milieu for said alliance.

i always enjoy current topics such as this and we can all disagree without being so disagreeable. i was without power for a couple days and would have enjoyed to jump in sooner. alas could not summon enough interweb particles to do so. it may have taken hours to post even this with the sludgy inconsistent power lately.

oh well.

https://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/...se-montrealais/la-nouvelle-normalite.php

another very good article describing current structure and administration.

I already brought up how in Project Otremens there were recordings discussing the Commission during that time period and how Joe Todaro was invited to join it. There's much more needed to observe what role the Commission plays today but based on this it does look like it's still functioning.

Vito to me it looks like you're thinking if other LCN Families don't recognize the group led by Leonardo Rizzuto and Stefano Sollecito as a official Mafia Family or even Amico Nostra meaning LCN members then they have no status in the criminal underworld. That is not the case as we clearly see they're considered 2nd only behind the Hells Angels in Montreal. I use Rochester as a example again because they didn't have recognition but they still ran rackets in their city without issue. They were still respected criminals just as Leonardo Rizzuto and Stefano Sollecito are but in the eyes of LCN members they are not members of the organization. That is what I'm trying to drive at here.

mafia101 assuming you r correct that the mafia in montreal is not "officially" a recognized mafia family along the same criteria as the genovese for example. does it change anything? the murder,arson,gambling and drug dealing will not stop. nothing changes. we will never know either way regardless. is there an official opening ribbon cutting of a commission sanctioned amico nostra family? whether the are or arent we will never know without a cooperating witness to confirm.

if the commission or some other body exists that would make such a judgement does indeed still exist those in the montreal mafia are not listening and not following any of the rules. so for those that want to include the mtl mafia in a list of current active families in north america they can. and those that dont recognize it dont include. seems easy. and hardly worth all the arguing.

and to another of yer points about being italian,associating with other italians and committing crimes does not make u a mafia family you r correct it does not...but its a good start.

i find montreal the most interesting OC city because of all the questions it still poses about structure,administration the sheer number of intersecting criminal groups and rackets.

I agree that MTL as well as the Buffalo-Ontario family are remarkable topics given their fluidity in terms of affiliations and criminal identity

That helps put things into perspective a little.
So the theory of that the Rizzutto family is just a few of the sons of Italian decent dealing drugs should be out to rest after that article.

The MOST POWERFUL I think rebuts that theory.

The second part is that we are talking about the Rizzutto Crime Family.

They were NEVER A LCN FAMILY.

About a dozen or so members of the Rizzutto Crime Family were also members of the Bonanno Crime Family.

Big difference.

As such the Rizzutto’s never followed LCN rules to begin with.

They made all their own rules and NOBODY had the right to tell them what to do or how to do it.
And NOBODY DID.

So the fact that SCOPPA said they no longer had an initiation ceremony SO WHAT?

Or the fact that some member of L.E. said they were under the thumb of the Bonnano’s.
SO WHAT?

Maybe the guy is new, Maybe is just stupid, Maybe he was misquoted.
SO WHAT? Everyone knows he is wrong.

The fact remains that The Rizzutto Crime Family made their own rules back then at their height under Vito, and they are doing the same under Vito’s son.

And we now have confirmation that they are again the most powerful.

Also, I stated earlier that “THINGS WERE ALWAYS DONE DIFFERENTLY IN CANADA”

So just about every member of the Canada Crew of the Bonanno Family was also a member of the Rizzutto Crime Family.

A lot of the members of the Buffalo Canadian Crew were also members of other families.

That was the norm in Canada, members were members of two families.

Where in American LCN, has that happened?

Almost never maybe a few members were also memebers of the Sicilian Mafia, very few certainly not common.

As I stated things were ALWAYS done differently in Canada, so to point to that now as something really means nothing.

Things in Canada today are the same as they always were which is DIFFERENT.

So if you point to something different as they say “ There is NO, THERE, THERE.

Vito again I'm not saying they aren't recognized. I'm saying we do not know. If they are not officially recognized nothing changes in the sense of what they're currently doing and you're acting like I'm saying it does. The topic of this post was asking if there is a official Mafia Family in Montreal and some are say there is without providing any evidence of it. I've been trying to make it clear if they aren't recognized it isn't a official Mafia Family.

If there is a Commission or not doesn't really matter. You said there wasn't and I said we actually have recent recordings of LCN members talking about the Commission.

I agree Montreal and Canada in general is among the most intriguing topics because of all of the mysteries and the activity in these areas. It's just annoying there's all of these inaccurate descriptions of these guys with people making claims that aren't supported at all and even go against what is already known about them.


Almost everything Bensonhurst just said is wrong he has no understanding of LCN and just a few posts ago was saying he goes by what law enforcement says but when I quote a RCMP agent and it doesnt support what he has claimed he says it doesn't matter now anymore

And yet, the Sicilian Mafia killed Fernandez. Was it for Rizzuto? Or because he bullshitted on being able to arrange exctasy imports? Did Sicily recognize Vito? Remember he was at the head of that failed bridge consortium... what were the Rizzutos seen as in Sicily?

The Bonannos are probably the most Sicilian family of the 5 families connections with Canada and Sicily are still there.

Gambino’s are headed by Sicilians they are more than in bed with the INZERELLO’s that are Sicilian family.

I mean bro, to me it doesn't matter how vindictive Scoppa was or wasn't, because thats not the only thing I'm going off. You think Cicale wasn't vindictive? He ratted, lol just like Scoppa. Again, stop cherry picking bro. REALITY has shown non made guys having power over, and authority over men who are in fact made. Seriously, name one NY connected Bonnano of consequence, TODAY. Go ahead, you say it means something...NOT if they don't establish a " Market share" on violence, which the Hells Angels pretty much " own" after that Biker War. The Rizzutos showing such indecision when Nick Jr. was hit hurt their standing in the streets in a way I don't think they ever recovered from.



Its like we cant ever get anywhere beyond this tired ass whos made discussion.... Like what is this obsession with what ever the Sixth family authors wrote? All the books say the same shit, do we throw them ALL out? The Commision never ratified a Montreal family. Facts. The Cupola never ratified a Montreal family. FACTS. The Bonnanos had an official decina, but it's ONE DECINA! It was for a time THE dominant aspect of Montreal OC, but not the ONLY aspect. To use Canadian parlance, they don't have, maybe never had the numbers to take up that much space in the milieu......they ruled by a kind of consensus...I don't think people realize, this will be a hot ass take, but the Mafia doesn't even rule all of Sicily. It's the most dominant group, but you got Stiddari, those independent Catanian clans, clans in Messina, many groups are capable of consolidating both territorial control, and economic viability, these things are not impossible in absence of LCN ranks. I actually tried to make a thread "across the street" about how the OC landscape in Messina was eerily similar to Canada.

TELL ME THIS DOESNT SOUND LIKE THE STRUCTURE IN CANADA...
Cosa Nostra and the division of the areas in the Messina capital
In the capital, a “cell” of the Cosa Nostra in Catania was reported to be operating, attributable to the Romeo-Santapaola family, capable of coexisting with other clans mainly oriented in drug trafficking and in the management of clandestine bets;
Replace the Santapaolo decina, with a Bonnano decina, swap Messina for Montreal, and substitute the Bikers, French Canadians, Lebanese or whoever with the Messina organizations and the overall Organized crime STRUCTURE is pretty similar, at least to me....

At some point, the Central reference for ORGANIZED CRIME IN QUEBEC, became this weird Caruana- Cuntrera/Rizzuto- Renda- Manno alliance, which to me, STRUCTURALLY, is VERY similar to the transatlantic Ndrangheta clans, very similar to the transatlantic Gambino- Inzerillo clan, very similar to the family based structure you see in Naples.

This same family based structure is outlined in the first few pages of Business and Blood..... but throw it out, it's all nonsense, right?

Without question, the Rizzutos bucked Bonnano leadership, ( and actually, initially, I don't think they resisted Bonnano leadership, more like VIOLIS leadership, it was more personal I think..) and seemed to take direction from the Caruana- Cuntreras. Which Nicolo did on direction from Tommasso Buscetta when he consulted him about his official affiliation, and was encouraged to "assert himself". Bonnano influence diminished over time, and everything started to revolve around business, not the rigidity of mafia structure. Why the Hell else would they be revolving around powerful Hells Angels today? How does Del Balso get his house raided, and questioned in a murder attempt of his supposed to be sitting boss and meet with a Biker about after? Like... what?