Quebec nurse had to clean up after husband's death in Montreal hospital
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
A new book detailing the links between Mexico’s drug cartels and the tech-savvy, diverse and widespread organized crime group in Canada known as the “Wolfpack,” was released Tuesday.
In “The Wolfpack,” authors Luis Horacio Najera and Peter Edwards use their decades of experience writing about organized crime, both in Canada and Mexico, to detail how organized crime operates in Canada after a group of millennial hotshot gangsters sought to fill the void left by the death of Montreal godfather Vito Rizzuto.
The Wolfpack, made up of an ethnically diverse, geographically distant hodgepodge of Canadian underground criminals, worked to bring in a steady supply of cocaine from El Chapo Guzman’s Sinaloa cartel to Canada through the ports and skies of Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal.
“They're bonded by the internet, not by geography,” said Edwards, describing the Wolfpack in an interview with CTVNews.ca Tuesday. “Some are in Vancouver, some are in Montreal, some are in Toronto and it doesn’t really matter – they can move around.”
Edwards said that greatly distinguished them from the organized crime groups he wrote about decades ago that operated in a “geographic centre.”
“You could say, ‘that group is from Woodbridge, those groups from Simcoe Street and Oshawa,’” he said. “With the Wolfpack, there isn’t a place, there’s just a shared feeling or need for the internet.”
Najera said in an interview with CTVNews.ca that the internet has changed everything when it comes to organized crime.
“Technology, the internet, changes a lot of dynamics of power, relationships, contacts and businesses, both legal and illegal…the internet became a platform where they don’t necessarily need to be physically together always,” he said. “Do you remember in the old days or in the movies where the Mafiosos got together in a dark place, or ugly warehouse, and they sit and discuss business? Those times are pretty much over now.”
The book details just how much technology played a part in how the Wolfpack operated, with pages of encrypted texts included, showing how the members planned to move tonnes of cocaine, vented about girlfriend troubles, and planned assassinations.
The cast of Canadian characters include the head of the Wolfpack, Rabih “Robby” Alkhalil, Hells Angel Larry Amero, hit-man Dean Michael Wiwchar, gangsters John Raposo and Martino Caputo, plus other members of the Red Scorpions, Hells Angels and the United Nations gang, and factions from Italian, Irish and Portuguese crime family syndicates.
The authors managed to gain access to those texts and a myriad of other intricate details thanks to one of the criminals, Niagara cocaine kingpin and Wolfpack member Nick Nero, who left a Blackberry in the open with a sticky note listing his encrypted login and password - something that was promptly picked up by police upon his arrest in 2013.
“Nero,” as he is referred to in the book, holds the dubious honour of being described as “dumb as a bag of hair,” a title that the authors said can’t be extended to the Wolfpack’s Mexican cartel counterparts.
“The level of sophistication of the cartels surprised me,” Edwards said. “These aren’t drug users, these aren’t dumb guys, these are smart people who know what they are doing…they’re holding back cocaine so that they can influence the market so they can sell it to both sides...the pandemic didn’t seem to hurt them one bit.”
Mexico has been in the grip of cartel violence for decades and the book details the graphic violence that has become all too regular in the headlines.
On occasion, a Canadian gets swept up, such as the off-duty Montreal police officer on vacation in 2011 who was beaten so badly for taking pictures of another officer exchanging niceties with Hells Angels and other gang members that he required extensive surgery.
The Wolfpack book reveals the officer was near a notorious meeting place in Cancun for gang members from around the world, and gives a more nuanced idea of how tightly wound organized crime in Canada is to Mexico’s underworld.
The authors said they hope their book outlines just how extensive the illegal drug trade is in Canada, how authorities need to move beyond busts, and how the narrative on drugs and substance abuse need to change.
“It's not just the Wolfpack as a group, it's them as a process,” Edwards said. “Even when the Wolfpack is long forgotten, what they've done is show the new way of moving drugs.”
“You've got to be looking at where the money goes, how much gets invested here, how much goes into real estate, how much goes into other things, I mean, that's the next phase,” he continued.
Najera echoed that sentiment.
“You need to follow the money and also to rethink the way that the government, but also… society, are perceiving the use and abuse of illegal drugs…this is a public health problem and the narrative has to change,” Najera said.
And for those who think the violence that has plagued Mexico couldn’t make its way to Canada, Najera, who dedicated the book to 12 fellow journalists who had been assassinated or lost their lives writing about the cartels, had a grim warning.
“Don't underestimate the power of criminal organizations,” Najera said of the cartels and their Canadian counterparts. “Sometimes you think, ‘these guys are killing each other in Mexico, we are safe here.’
“No…they have tentacles all over the world and they have muscle that, if required, they are going to flex,” he continued. “The consequences are going to be terrible.”
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
A North Bay, Ont., lawyer who abandoned 15 clients – many of them child protection cases – has lost his licence to practise law.
Members of the Bank of Canada's governing council were split on how long the central bank should wait before it starts cutting interest rates when they met earlier this month.
Brad Marchand scored twice, including the winner in the third period, and added an assist as the Boston Bruins downed the Toronto Maple Leafs 4-2 to take a 2-1 lead in their first-round playoff series Wednesday
Cuba's foreign affairs minister has apologized to a Montreal-area family after they were sent the wrong body following the death of a loved one.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
The federal government's proposed change to capital gains taxation is expected to increase taxes on investments and mainly affect wealthy Canadians and businesses. Here's what you need to know about the move.
Canada's Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland was among the 1,700 delegates attending the two-day First Nations Major Projects Coalition (FNMPC) conference that concluded Tuesday in Toronto.
The daughter of a New Brunswick man recently exonerated from murder, is remembering her father as somebody who, despite a wrongful conviction, never became bitter or angry.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.