Montreal arsons part of mob war, experts say

Fires followed high-profile killings in 2016

• A spate of recent Montreal- area arsons linked to organized crime suggests the battle for Mafia leadership in Quebec remains fractured, experts say.

What is likely, they say, is the era that saw charismatic peacemaker Vito Rizzuto rule for three decades will be replaced by something altogether different.

Author and university lecturer Antonio Nicaso says the Mafia will regenerate through the conflicts and death. What will emerge, he suggests, will be a structure that is more democratic and open to joint ventures with other criminal groups.

“It won’t be the same type of organization that controlled Montreal for 30 years,” Nicaso said.

Rizzuto, who died of natural causes in 2013, was viewed as a unifying underworld force, and instability has been the order of the day since his time in a U.S. prison and his death.

Andre Cedilot, a former journalist who writes about organized crime, said the battle now appears to pit Calabrian clans that are battling for power against the last remnants of the Rizzuto loyalists, many of whom are Sicilian. The Calabrians are being assisted by Ontariobased groups.

Cedilot said there is a move to seek a more equitable division of territory and rackets through partnerships with street gangs and the reemerging Hells Angels.

“For sure, it’s changing because the clans that were all-powerful, like the Rizzuto clan ... are in the process of disappearing,” Cedilot said.

The various arsons this year, including one that levelled a strip mall in Laval, followed a handful of highprofile killings last year.

Lorenzo Giordano, described as a Rizzuto underboss, was killed last March, while Rocco Sollecito, a former Rizzuto right-hand man according to police documents, was slain in May.