BY RATTAN MALL
A massive power struggle in the violent world of organized crime in southern Ontario is going on and Peter Edwards, who has authored 10 books on organized crime, in an article in Toronto Star on Monday reported that B.C.’s notorious Wolfpack alliance is involved in it.
Edwards, noting that some of the violence this year is blamed on “a culture clash between the old and the new,” added: “On one side are the aggressive young computer-friendly newcomers from B.C. and Quebec allied to a gang called The Wolfpack Alliance. On the other side are the old guard — the GTA [Greater Toronto Area] arm of the traditional ’Ndrangheta family of Cosimo (The Quail) Commisso of Siderno, Italy.”
There have been about a dozen unsolved shootings, explosions and killings in Ontario this year as the result of a power struggle that was sparked off by the December 2013 death of Vito Rizzuto, who was regarded as Canada’s most powerful mobster, in Montreal.
Sgt. Brenda Winpenny of the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit – BC (CFSEU-BC) told The VOICE: “We’ve publicly confirmed in the past that the Wolfpack has a presence not only across Canada but internationally. They have had a presence in other provinces, like Ontario, for at least a couple years … and several gang members who have ties to the Wolfpack, like Hells Angel Larry Amero, have been back east for several years – albeit Larry’s in jail but he has spent a lot of time between here and
Ontario and Quebec.”
AS has been reported in the VOICE and other B.C. media for some years now, certain groups of the Hells Angels, the Red Scorpions and the Independent Soldiers formed the Wolfpack alliance and have been battling against the Duhres, the Dhaks and some United Nations members here in B.C.
Last January, gang expert CFSEU-BC Staff-Sgt. Lindsey Houghton told The VOICE: “As we get another year removed from the Dhaks and Sandip Duhre, we always get questioned about why we are still using their names [as both the Dhak brothers and Sandip Duhre have been killed]. I think it’s fair to say – and how I qualify it is it’s the legacy of those groups – but I think if we want to start to remove ourselves from using their names, it’s more the United Nations … The Dhak associates and the Duhres associates are still scattered around, but the dominant side of that is now the United Nations and the United Nations-aligned people. They still exist. They are still around.”
He said the other side is the Wolfpack that consists of certain Hells Angels like Larry Amero and their allies and associates, the Independent Soldiers and the people that they brought to the equation and the Red Scorpions [the Bacon bothers].
Houghton noted: “We’ve seen and heard the name Wolfpack over the last year [2016]. We’ve heard their name come up in places like
Kamloops and Surrey. So they are still very active and groups like the Red Scorpions and Independent Soldiers – these groups are still active and prominent in that world.”
NOW the Wolfpack alliance is in the thick of the power struggle in Ontario.
Edwards reported: “By contrast, the ’Ndrangheta is steeped in a highly structured, quasi-religious criminal tradition that reaches back more than a century to the southern Italian region of Calabria.”
And he also pointed out: “Italian investigative journalist Giulio Rubino wrote earlier this month that the ’Ndrangheta made $70.41 billion (U.S.) worldwide in 2013.”
Edwards wrote: “The violence between the newcomers aligned with the Wolfpack, and the old guard in the ’Ndrangheta, isn’t expected to end anytime soon, as the Wolfpack has aligned itself with enemies of the GTA ’Ndrangheta, sources say.”
He noted: “Computer skills are vital as organized crime groups reach out across borders, journalist/ academic Luis Horacio Najera said in an interview.
“Mexican drug cartels connect with the new small aggressive groups like the Wolfpack Alliance with encrypted messaging systems as they push into Canada.”
We will have to wait and see how much bloodier the power struggle will get.