Latest news with #DeMaria
Hamilton Spectator
4 days ago
- Politics
- Hamilton Spectator
Government bid to deport Italian man accused of money laundering postponed
GTA grandfather and convicted killer Vincenzo (Jimmy) DeMaria was scheduled to take the witness stand to fight his deportation to Italy on Friday when his hearing was abruptly postponed over abuse of process accusations. DeMaria, 71, a former Mississauga financial services manager and baker, has been accused by Canadian authorities of laundering money for international organized criminals. DeMaria never got the chance to testify on Friday, after a dispute broke out over the use of secret recordings made by Italian police between himself and Italian visitor Vincenzo Muià in 2019, while DeMaria was in custody at Collins Bay Institution in Kingston. The secret recordings were made as Italian police investigated the slaying of a leader of the 'Ndrangheta, or Calabrian Mafia, in Italy. Italian police came to Canada in 2019 as they probed the murder of Muià's brother, Carmelo (Mino) Muià, in Italy. Things heated up at the online hearing on Friday when Andrej Rustja, a lawyer for the minister of public safety, said that the government will not longer be relying on those intercepted conversations in DeMaria's deportation appeal. For years, DeMaria's lawyers have called the surveillance an example of 'foreign interference' which breaches Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms and amounts to abuse of process. They should not be admissible in a Canadian legal proceeding, DeMaria's lawyers argued. On Friday, they argued that the surprise announcement that the government would no longer be relying on the intercepted conversations disrupted their defence plans and amounted to abuse of process. The hearing has been postponed to Oct. 20. DeMaria moved to Canada with his family from Siderno, Italy in 1955 but never applied for citizenship. The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) has been seeking his deportation for years, alleging he is tightly connected to the 'Ndrangheta, or Calabrian Mafia, which authorities say has global scope. DeMaria served eight years in prison in Canada after he was convicted of second-degree murder for a 1981 shooting, which police said was over a $2,000 drug debt, police say. DeMaria's parole conditions bar his association with organized crime figures. He was detained in Collins Bay penitentiary after he was ordered deported in April 2018. He was released in 2020 over health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Vancouver Sun
4 days ago
- Politics
- Vancouver Sun
Deportation hearing for alleged Mafia boss in Canada derailed by wiretap decision
In the middle of a high-stakes deportation hearing against an alleged Mafia boss living in Canada, the government unexpectedly declared it will no longer rely on any evidence obtained from controversial Italian police wiretaps covertly made using the phones of visiting members of a mob family to Canada. The announcement Friday threatens to derail yet another attempt to deport Vincenzo (Jimmy) DeMaria, a man accused of being a Mafia boss in Ontario who has successfully fought off deportation for more than 40 years. An Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) hearing is underway on the government's latest attempt to deport DeMaria based on allegations he is a member of the 'Ndrangheta, the proper name of the powerful Mafia that formed in Italy's region of Calabria. DeMaria has denied the allegation. Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Sunrise will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. Lawyers for DeMaria had repeatedly called for the Italian police wiretaps to be rejected, calling them illegal foreign interference. On Friday, however, they said the government's sudden agreement in the middle of the hearing was absurd. 'What we have here is an abuse of process by the minister (of public safety),' said Shoshana Green, one of DeMaria's three lawyers at the hearing. 'It is an absurdity that the minister, on a whim, is changing the nature of this entire hearing. How can Mr. DeMaria properly prepare for a matter when they are literally changing the foundation of their case four days in?' Green said information from the wiretaps has already been extensively 'co-mingled' with other evidence entered in the case over years, including in two days of testimony earlier this week by a senior police officer from Italy who was the government's first witness at this hearing against DeMaria. Green asked Benjamin Dolin, the IRB member deciding the matter, to issue a stay of proceedings, which would suspend the government's appeal of an earlier immigration board decision to allow DeMaria to remain in Canada , where he has lived since moving from Italy as an infant. 'Or in the alternative, we would certainly consent to the minister abandoning their appeal,' Green said. Andrej Rustja, arguing on behalf of Canada Border Services Agency, said that after reviewing its strategy for the case Thursday night, the government decided to not rely on the wiretaps recorded by Italian police in Canada in 2019 and told DeMaria's lawyers as a courtesy and to save time at the hearing. Neither Rustja nor government lawyer Daniel Morse said why they shifted their strategy. Dolin told Green the government's change 'would seem to benefit' her client. 'I don't see any prejudice to Mr. DeMaria,' but he adjourned the hearing to allow DeMaria's lawyers to file a written motion for a stay and for the government to respond. DeMaria had been scheduled to testify in the case Friday morning. The Italian wiretaps have been under scrutiny for years. The recordings provided an intriguing and colourful peek into activities of the 'Ndrangheta and revealed links between those under investigation in Italy to alleged affiliates in Canada. In 2019, Italian police learned that a mobster in Calabria named Vincenza Muià was coming to Toronto to speak with people here to find out who within the 'Ndrangheta had murdered his brother in Italy, so that he could properly avenge his death. Muià said he needed to be 100 per cent certain before enacting his vicious retribution for his dead brother because of organizational volatility. He wanted to check with DeMaria and other alleged 'Ndrangheta bosses in Canada about it, according to Italian police testimony heard earlier . In one recording, according to a transcript translated into English, Muià told a Canadian who was travelling between Toronto and Calabria to tell 'Jimmy' (who police identified as meaning DeMaria): 'For my brother, once I know who it was, if I can, I'll eat him in pieces, in pieces, but I have to be sure…. I'll eat him in small pieces, small pieces on the barbecue, and I invite him to come eat.' Police could listen to Muià's plotting because they inserted a Trojan house virus into his phone that turned it into a microphone — recording not just what was said in phone calls but all sound in the room where the phone was, even when it was not in use. The recordings are controversial because while the bugging was approved by an Italian judge, there was no judicial authorization by a Canadian court for communications to be intercepted in Canada when Muià visited, bringing his bugged phone with him. The hearing heard this week that Italian police had asked police in Canada to help them bug the airplane that the visitors were arriving and departing on so they could hear what they said during the flights. The Italian authorities were told by Ontario prosecutors that intercepting such communications in Canada without judicial authorization was illegal. While Canadian police helped Italian police retrieve a listening device that had been installed in Italy on an Alitalia jet once it landed in Toronto, they refused to help install bugs for the return flight. Complaints were made about the wiretaps in Italy, as well. Some of those charged in Calabria based in part on the recordings made in Canada appealed their conviction, but Italy's high court accepted the operation was legal in Italy because the bugs were installed on the phones in Italy and the recordings captured on them in Canada were transmitted to Italy before they were listened to by police. In Canada last year, in anticipation of this deportation hearing, DeMaria's lawyers asked the IRB to exclude the wiretaps, along with other evidence, from the record of the case. They said the wiretaps would be considered illegal in Canada's courts. Dolin refused their motion in October, saying that under Canadian law, immigration hearings used different rules of evidence than criminal courts. 'When it comes to entering documentation as evidence, almost anything will be admissible as long as it is relevant to an issue to be decided by the IAD (Immigration Appeal Division),' Dolin wrote in that ruling. The interruption to this hearing and complaints and arguments over evidence and process are not as surprising in a case against DeMaria as they might otherwise be. Ottawa has been trying and failing to kick him out of the country for more than 40 years. DeMaria has lived in Canada for almost all his 71 years after emigrating from Italy with his parents when he was nine months old, but he never became a Canadian citizen. The door to citizenship slammed shut after he was convicted of shooting a man who owed him money, killing him at a fruit store in Toronto in 1981. Ever since his second-degree murder conviction, the government has been trying to deport him, with each attempt fully challenged and litigated by DeMaria and a battery of lawyers. He was released from prison on full parole in 1992 and lived without legal problems for some time. Over the years, however, various police investigators alleged he grew to become an influential member of the 'Ndrangheta in Toronto. At one immigration hearing a police officer named him as the mob's 'top guy in Toronto.' At a previous immigration hearing in 2023, DeMaria denied being a mobster, or knowing anything about the 'Ndrangheta, apart from what he had read in newspapers. He claimed ethnic profiling and anti-Italian prejudice was behind efforts to deport him. Dolin gave lawyers for both sides at this hearing until the end of August to send him all of their arguments and responses in writing for him to rule on DeMaria's stay motion. The hearing was scheduled to reconvene in October unless he told the lawyers otherwise. • Email: ahumphreys@ | Twitter: AD_Humphreys Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here .
Edmonton Journal
4 days ago
- Politics
- Edmonton Journal
Deportation hearing for alleged Mafia boss in Canada derailed by wiretap decision
In the middle of a high-stakes deportation hearing against an alleged Mafia boss living in Canada, the government unexpectedly declared it will no longer rely on any evidence obtained from controversial Italian police wiretaps covertly made using the phones of visiting members of a mob family to Canada. Article content The announcement Friday threatens to derail yet another attempt to deport Vincenzo (Jimmy) DeMaria, a man accused of being a Mafia boss in Ontario who has successfully fought off deportation for more than 40 years. Article content Article content Article content An Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) hearing is underway on the government's latest attempt to deport DeMaria based on allegations he is a member of the 'Ndrangheta, the proper name of the powerful Mafia that formed in Italy's region of Calabria. DeMaria has denied the allegation. Article content Article content Lawyers for DeMaria had repeatedly called for the Italian police wiretaps to be rejected, calling them illegal foreign interference. On Friday, however, they said the government's sudden agreement in the middle of the hearing was absurd. Article content 'What we have here is an abuse of process by the minister (of public safety),' said Shoshana Green, one of DeMaria's three lawyers at the hearing. Article content 'It is an absurdity that the minister, on a whim, is changing the nature of this entire hearing. How can Mr. DeMaria properly prepare for a matter when they are literally changing the foundation of their case four days in?' Article content Article content Green said information from the wiretaps has already been extensively 'co-mingled' with other evidence entered in the case over years, including in two days of testimony earlier this week by a senior police officer from Italy who was the government's first witness at this hearing against DeMaria. Article content Article content Green asked Benjamin Dolin, the IRB member deciding the matter, to issue a stay of proceedings, which would suspend the government's appeal of an earlier immigration board decision to allow DeMaria to remain in Canada, where he has lived since moving from Italy as an infant. Article content 'Or in the alternative, we would certainly consent to the minister abandoning their appeal,' Green said. Article content Andrej Rustja, arguing on behalf of Canada Border Services Agency, said that after reviewing its strategy for the case Thursday night, the government decided to not rely on the wiretaps recorded by Italian police in Canada in 2019 and told DeMaria's lawyers as a courtesy and to save time at the hearing.
Hamilton Spectator
4 days ago
- Politics
- Hamilton Spectator
Killer's deportation hearing abruptly postponed
GTA grandfather and convicted killer Vincenzo (Jimmy) DeMaria was scheduled to take the witness stand to fight his deportation to Italy on Friday when his hearing was abruptly postponed over abuse of process accusations. DeMaria, 71, a former Mississauga financial services manager and baker, has been accused by Canadian authorities of laundering money for international organized criminals. DeMaria never got the chance to testify on Friday, after a dispute broke out over the use of secret recordings made by Italian police between himself and Italian visitor Vincenzo Muià in 2019, while DeMaria was in custody at Collins Bay Institution in Kingston. The secret recordings were made as Italian police investigated the slaying of a leader of the 'Ndrangheta, or Calabrian Mafia, in Italy. Italian police came to Canada in 2019 as they probed the murder of Muià's brother, Carmelo (Mino) Muià, in Italy. Things heated up at the online hearing on Friday when Andrej Rustja, a lawyer for the minister of public safety, said that the government will not longer be relying on those intercepted conversations in DeMaria's deportation appeal. For years, DeMaria's lawyers have called the surveillance an example of 'foreign interference' which breaches Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms and amounts to abuse of process. They should not be admissible in a Canadian legal proceeding, DeMaria's lawyers argued. On Friday, they argued that the surprise announcement that the government would no longer be relying on the intercepted conversations disrupted their defence plans and amounted to abuse of process. The hearing has been postponed to Oct. 20. DeMaria moved to Canada with his family from Siderno, Italy in 1955 but never applied for citizenship. The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) has been seeking his deportation for years, alleging he is tightly connected to the 'Ndrangheta, or Calabrian Mafia, which authorities say has global scope. DeMaria served eight years in prison in Canada after he was convicted of second-degree murder for a 1981 shooting, which police said was over a $2,000 drug debt, police say. DeMaria's parole conditions bar his association with organized crime figures. He was detained in Collins Bay penitentiary after he was ordered deported in April 2018. He was released in 2020 over health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic. Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google privacy policy and terms of service apply. Want more of the latest from us? Sign up for more at our newsletter page .
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Mafia bosses in Italy secretly voiced 'great respect' for Toronto man now fighting to stay in Canada
A man who police called Toronto's top Mafia boss was highly respected by Mafia bosses in Italy, a senior police officer from Italy told an immigration hearing for the man Canada has been trying — and failing — to deport for more than 40 years. Vincenzo (Jimmy) DeMaria, 71, is facing another deportation attempt over allegations he has secretly been a powerful boss helping oversee a shadowy global criminal cabal called the 'Ndrangheta. An immigration tribunal heard this week that accused Mafia bosses in Italy were caught on covert police recordings praising DeMaria, saying they 'consider him a person worthy of respect,' and he 'could carry a lot of weight within their organization,' the Italian police witness said. The hearing will decide if DeMaria should be deported to Italy. DeMaria was born in Siderno, Italy, and came to Canada in 1955 with his parents when he was nine months old and has lived here since, but he didn't become a Canadian citizen. His eligibility for citizenship ended in 1981 when he shot dead a man who owed him money. DeMaria was convicted of second-degree murder in 1982 and given a life sentence without parole for 10 years. He was first ordered out of Canada in 1984 because of his murder conviction. From that moment, DeMaria has mounted stubborn, well-resourced and remarkably successful challenges — in courts, at immigration tribunals, and at parole hearings — to rebut allegations of involvement in organized crime. In disputing, denying, and delaying, he has remained with his wife and children in Canada while periodically being yanked back into prison for alleged parole violations before fighting his way back out. The federal government is trying once again to deport him. All week, an Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) tribunal has been hearing the government's appeal of a prior decision that allowed DeMaria to remain in Canada. The adjudicator at that hearing ruled evidence of DeMaria's membership in the Mafia was 'circumstantial.' In pressing its case this time, the Canada Border Services Agency is trying to bolster allegations with evidence captured by Italian police in a probe against alleged members of 'Ndrangheta who, while under investigation, visited Canada in 2019. The wiretaps are contentious because, as first reported by National Post, the sneaky wiretaps were secretly recorded through the Italian visitors' own mobile phones that were turned into constant microphones, and these interceptions on Canadian soil were not authorized by a Canadian court. DeMaria's lawyers referred to them as 'foreign interference.' Called as the government's first witness was a senior officer who led several Italian probes that linked mobsters in Italy's Calabria region, which is the birthplace of the 'Ndrangheta, to affiliates in Canada, including the probe involving the Italian visitors who came to Toronto. Chief Commissioner Giampiero Muroni headed the Polizia di Stato's Central Anti-Crime Directorate from 2008 to 2019. He spoke in Italian, through an interpreter. Muroni said Italian operations showed that the 'Ndrangheta was based on individual family clans rooted in a geographic region that were linked by a centralized hierarchy in Italy with international branches in Canada, Germany, and Australia. He said information in police files, which included information from informers in Canada, disclosed the presence of nine 'Ndrangheta clans in Ontario, each based on a family originally from Calabria, mostly from the town of Siderno, where DeMaria was born. He said there was a powerful 'Camera di Controllo' — literally meaning 'control room,' which acts as a board of control for the 'Ndrangheta — in Canada that mirrored the structure in Italy. 'This is the highest and most important structure of 'Ndrangheta in Canada,' Muroni said. DeMaria was named in Italian court documents as one of the men allegedly sitting on the board. Under questioning by government lawyer Daniel Morse, Muroni said secretly recorded conversations heard that the 'Ndrangheta in Italy, including its top boss at the time, knew of DeMaria and spoke of him warmly. This is the highest and most important structure of 'Ndrangheta in Canada In another probe, in 2019, an alleged mobster named Vicenza Muià was coming to Canada to try to learn who within 'Ndrangheta had murdered his brother so he could avenge his death. Muià needed to be 100 per cent certain before seeking retribution and wanted to check in with DeMaria as well as other alleged 'Ndrangheta bosses in Canada. Muroni was asked why. 'Vincenza Muià, but also other persons, have great respect for Vincenza DeMaria. They consider him a person worthy of respect. They think he could carry a lot of weight within their organization,' Muroni said. Muià also thought DeMaria could have information on his brother's murder, Muroni said. Muià allegedly also said he hopes DeMaria remains free in Canada because 'they think that he alone could fix the situation that 'Ndrangheta has undergone in that city.' The men in Italy discussed several violent incidents in the Toronto area involving alleged 'Ndrangheta families, including a murder and an arson attack on DeMaria's family bakery. Under cross examination, Jessica Zita, one of DeMaria's three lawyers, questioned the legitimacy and accuracy of the police wiretaps and Muroni's explanations of what the men were talking about. She also suggested the officer misidentified the man they were speaking about as DeMaria. Zita also said the wiretap evidence would not be acceptable as evidence in criminal court because they were illegally obtained in Canada under Canadian law. The IRB, however, has different rules of evidence than a criminal court and a lower standard of proof. Earlier, Benjamin Dolin, the IRB member deciding the case, denied DeMaria's motion to exclude the wiretaps. DeMaria sat each day watching the testimony on a video screen at his lawyers' office, dressed in a shirt and tie underneath a suit jacket, with heavy-framed glasses attached to a loop of cord around his neck. He occasionally scribbled notes, typed on his phone and a laptop, and sometimes leaned to speak with a lawyer in a gravelly whisper. Documentation filed in the case is so voluminous — more than 20,000 pages — that the computer system the IRB used crashed when more than one of the huge files was opened at same time. Also called to testify this week was Mark Grenon, a federal government forensic accountant who does analysis for investigations into money laundering and other financial crimes. Grenon told the IRB his number crunching, requested by the Canada Border Services Agency, suggested several red flags for potential money laundering in the various financial accounts of members of the DeMaria family and their businesses. He studied transactions reported to Fintrac, Canada's anti-money-laundering agency, from 2006 to 2013, that included DeMaria's property management and investing companies, and those of Cash House, a money services business run at the time by DeMaria's son, Carlo DeMaria. Grenon said he found several red flags of potential money laundering after tracing about $143 million sent by Cash House to accounts in about 50 different countries, most of it in 2013. The top 10 destination countries were, in order: Barbados, China, Israel, United States, Mexico, Brazil, British Virgin Islands, Italy, Switzerland, and Greece. The Cash House business was sold in 2015 for about $1 million, the IRB was told. That seemed a low price for a company doing that volume of business, Grenon said. In her cross examination of Grenon, Zita highlighted rebuttal evidence explaining some of the transactions he found unusual, and noted potential flaws in the data and missing information. Grenon agreed that in all the financial transactions he studied, most involved DeMaria's family and family businesses; he found only two that were directly tied to DeMaria himself. Stephen Schneider, a criminology professor at Saint Mary's University in Halifax also testified to give expert opinion evidence on money laundering and organized crime. He described the 'Ndrangheta as a globally powerful, extraordinarily wealthy, and extensively active organization involved in a variety of crimes around the world. He said money services businesses were popular among money launderers. 'They are really the perfect money laundering vehicle,' Schneider said. The hearing continues. • Email: ahumphreys@ | X: AD_Humphreys When cops can't convict a 'top Mafia boss,' they turn to desperate measures Ottawa tries yet again to kick an alleged top Mafia boss out of Canada Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark and sign up for our newsletters here.
