Emilio Picariello

Emilio Picariello
Picariello in 1922
Born	1875 or 1879 Sicily, Italy
Died	May 2, 1923 Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta, Canada
Cause of death	Hanging
Other names	Emperor Pic, the Bottle King
Occupation	Bootlegger
Criminal penalty	Death by Hanging
Spouse(s)	Maria Marucci
Children	6
Conviction(s)	Murder

Emilio Picariello (also known as Emileo Picariello and Emil Picariello, 1875 or 1879 – May 2, 1923) was an Italian-Canadian bootlegger and convicted murderer, who was hanged at Fort Saskatchewan in 1923 for killing an Alberta police constable the previous year.

Picariello was born in Sicily and migrated to Canada in 1899. Settling in Toronto, he worked as an electrician and labourer until he had earned enough money to buy an Italian grocery. In 1900 he married Maria Marucci, who he had met at a boarding house at which she worked as a housekeeper; the couple went on to have seven children, the eldest of whom was Stefano (Steve) Picariello. In 1911 he moved to Fernie, British Columbia, where he worked in G. Maraniro's macaroni factory. When Maraniro moved to Lethbridge to open a factory there, Picariello rented the Fernie factory and hired women to roll cigars in it.

In 1916 he began to manufacture ice cream at a rate of 400 imperial gallons (1,800 l) per day. He sold this from a wagon during the summer of 1916 and shortly thereafter established ice cream parlours in Trail and Blairmore. He sometimes accepted payment in the form of bottles, which he then sold to bottlers; by 1916 he had achieved a local monopoly. This gained him a reputation as the "Bottle King", which he embraced with newspaper ads reading "E. Picariello, the Bottle King, requests that all persons selling bottles hold them until they see E. Picariello, who pays top prices."

In 1914, he became the local representative for the Pillock Wine Company. Two years later, prohibition was enacted in Alberta. It was initially still legal to import alcohol from outside the province, and Picarellio profited by transporting alcohol through the Crowsnest Pass.

In 1917, British Columbia also introduced prohibition, and Picariello decided to move to Alberta to be closer to Montana, which allowed the sale of alcohol, while remaining close to the British Columbia distilleries from which he purchased. He bought Blairmore's Alberta Hotel as a base of operations. In 1918 Alberta outlawed the importation of alcohol and Picariello was forced to operate covertly. He excavated a room under the hotel and dug a tunnel from it out to the road, so that alcohol could be smuggled directly into this cellar. He had a player piano in the hotel lounge, whose noise drowned out these activities.