Sollecito, Suffering from Cancer, Granted Bail

Leonardo Rizzuto wasn't -- but then the son of deceased Montreal Cosa Nostra boss Vito Rizzuto isn't suffering what seems to be, in Stefano's case, terminal cancer.
Leonardo Rizzuto was denied ball again, though a judge allowed it for a dying Stefano Sollecito.

Alleged Montreal Mafia leader Stefano Sollecito was granted bail, the Montreal Gazette reported.

Leonardo Rizzuto wasn't -- but then the son of deceased Montreal Cosa Nostra boss Vito Rizzuto isn't suffering what seems to be, in Stefano's case, terminal cancer.

The reported reason for Sollecito's bail: the judge agreed "he cannot adequately be treated for the cancer he is suffering from inside a provincial detention centre."


Justice André Vincent, in another ruling yesterday, ordered that Leonardo Rizzuto, 47, deceased mob boss Vito Rizzuto's son, should remain behind bars prior to trial.

Quebec Court Judge Daniel Bédard had denied bail for both mobsters on March 4.

The court imposed a publishing ban on evidence presented at the hearing, which likely regarded Sollecito's medical condition, of which Judge Vincent said "well-informed people would not be alarmed to learn Sollecito was being released if they were aware of his condition," the Gazette noted.

"Sollecito was unable to attend the hearing and had to appear via a video linkup... "

As per his mandated restrictions, Sollecito is required to be home 24 hours a day; he can only depart his home for medical reasons.

The Gazette further noted that Sollecito "was unable to attend the funeral held for his father, Rocco, at a church in Montreal this month. The elder Sollecito, a longtime leader in the Montreal Mafia, was shot dead in Laval in May."

The next hearing is slated for October.


Operations Magot and Mastiff
Last November, Rizzuto and Sollecito were arrested as part of a series of predawn raids in Quebec. Law enforcement swept up nearly 50, including members of the Montreal Mafia and the Hells Angels, as part of Operations Magot and Mastiff, which were designed to dismantle the drug-trafficking alliance that involved the Hells Angels, Mafia and street gangs.

Rizzuto's son, an attorney reportedly not involved in organized crime (Leonardo took over after his father's death; specifically he and Sollecito belonged to the crime family's ruling panel). The case also included the arrest of Maurice "Mom" Boucher, a legendary former president of the Hells Angels' Montreal chapter, for plotting the murder of Raynald Desjardins, who continues to cool his heels in prison awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to conspiring to commit the 2011 murder of Salvatore "The Ironworker" Montagna, a former street boss of New York's Bonanno crime family.

Boucher himself was arrested in his jail cell, where he's serving multiple life sentences for killing two prison guards.

All those arrested face a range of charges related to a drug-trafficking alliance between the mob, outlaw bikers and street gangs, as well as the alleged conspiracy to murder Desjardins.

Desjardins pled guilty earlier this year to conspiring to murder
Sal The Iron Worker Montagna in 2011.


Desjardins was a key player in an insurrection within the Montreal Mafia that allied elements of the Cosa Nostra and Ndrangheta against the Rizzuto organization. The war erupted while Vito was serving time in an American prison and in 2010 claimed the lives of his father and son Nick Jr., who had entered the family business. Rizzuto, knowing he was dying of cancer, returned home and quickly reignited the war, seemingly devoting what time he had left to killing as many of his enemies as possible.

Boucher's daughter Alexandra Mongeau and Gregory Wooley, a longtime Boucher confidant also nabbed, were central members of the Desjardins murder plot. Boucher met his daughter at the federal prison in Ste-Anne-des-Plaines and used a coded language to send messages through her to Wooley.

"There was an aspect of vengeance in the conspiracy, but it was mainly to keep (drug territory) and if there was competition, it was to eliminate it and if there was thought to be competition, it was to eliminate it," said provincial police Lt. Benoit Dube.

Authorities said the alliance of the Italian Mafia, outlaw bikers and street gangs was established as a means to control drug trafficking and money laundering in Montreal.

"We arrested all the persons who were making the decisions," Dubé said at a news conference today.
Woolley while under arrest last November.


Woolley, a Hells Angels member and boss of the Syndicates street gang, is charged with multiple counts of drug trafficking, plus the murder conspiracy.

Recent Rizzuto Hits
On March 1, 2016, Lorenzo "Skunk" Giordano, 52, was fatally shot in Laval, not far from where Rocco Sollecito was more recently shot to death.




Francesco (Chit) Del Balso, 46, Giordano’s close friend, and Francesco Arcadi, 62, a longtime lieutenant in the Rizzuto organization are the only two key members to have survived to the present.

Both were released earlier this year when they reached their statutory release dates (as happened with Giordano.)

But following Giordano’s murder, both men were returned to federal penitentiaries out of concern for their safety.

As for Sollecito, he'd been given a shorter sentence than Arcadi, Del Balso and Giordano. This was mostly because, based on Colisée, he seemed not to involve himself in large-scale drug trafficking.

Paolo Renda, a trusted Rizzuto inlaw and inner circle member,
disappeared off face of the earth in 2010. 

Sollecito’s expertise was bookmaking. On Sept. 24, 2004, with the Colisée investigation well underway, police secretly recorded a conversation between Giordano and Sollecito inside the St-Léonard-based headquarters. The two mobsters lamented how the long summer had helped shrink their NHL-related bookmaking operations.








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