Paolo Violi

Paolo Violi
Born	February 6, 1931 Sinopoli, Calabria, Italy
Died	January 22, 1978 Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Cause of death	Gunshots
Other names	Paul
Occupation	Mobster
Successor	Nicolo Rizzuto
Spouse(s)	Grazia Luppino Violi
Children	4
Allegiance	Cotroni crime family, Bonanno crime family

Paolo Violi (February 6, 1931 – January 22, 1978) was an Italian-Canadian mobster and acting capodecina of the Bonanno crime family's faction in Montreal, the Cotroni crime family.

Violi immigrated to Southern Ontario in 1951. In 1955, he shot dead Natale Brigante in Toronto, sustaining a stab wound from Brigante. He was charged with manslaughter in a Welland court, but was acquitted claiming it was self-defense, showing the stab wound as evidence. Violi gained Canadian citizenship in 1956 and by the early 1960s was running bootlegged liquor from Ontario to Quebec. He became associated with boss of the Hamilton Luppino crime family Giacomo Luppino, but left for Montreal in 1963 on Luppino's orders to avoid clashes with other Hamilton mobster Johnny Papalia.

In Quebec, Violi opened the Reggio Bar in Saint-Leonard in the mid 1960s, which he used as a base for extortion. He developed connections with the Cotroni crime family, while maintaining ties with the Luppino family; he married Giacomo Luppino's daughter, Grazia in 1965. In December 1970, his bar was bugged with wiretaps by an undercover police officer who rented the space above Violi's bar for several years, which were later used in subsequent cases. In 1974, Violi and Vincenzo Cotroni were overheard on a police wiretap threatening to kill Hamilton mobster Johnny Papalia and demanding $150,000 after he used their names in a $300,000 extortion plot without notifying or cutting them in on the score. The three were convicted of extortion in 1975 and sentenced to six years in prison. Violi and Cotroni appealed and got their sentences reduced to six months, but Papalia's appeal was rejected. The following year, Violi was arrested to stand before the Quebec government's Commission d'enquête sur le crime organisé (CECO) inquiry into organized crime; he was sent to jail for one year for contempt.

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Wikipedia