Casino operator linked to Montreal mafia denied parole

By PAUL CHERRY, The Gazette CRIME REPORTER

August 1, 2012

 

Nicola Di Marco (right) arrives at his sentence hearing with attorney Gary Martin (left) at the Montreal Courthouse in Montreal on Friday, April 1, 2011.

Photograph by: Dario Ayala , THE GAZETTE

MONTREAL- A man convicted of a series crimes committed while he helped run a clandestine casino for the Mafia in Montreal has been denied parole.

Nicola Di Marco, 43, had a hearing before the Parole Board of Canada on Wednesday while trying to obtain a release on the 4-year prison term he received last year for helping to operate a casino, between October 2005 and November 2006, financed by several heavyweights within the Mafia, including Nick (The Ritz) Rizzuto, the now deceased son of reputed mob boss Vito Rizzuto. Di Marco was convicted of conspiracy, committing a crime for the benefit of a criminal organization and possession of property obtained through crime. The hearing was presided over by board members Anne-Marie Asselin and Richard Belisle and was heard at the Drummond Institution, a medium-security penitentiary in Drummondville.

Part of his current sentence includes another conviction from when police caught him, while out on bail in the casino case, moving around Montreal with two firearms, including a loaded 9 mm handgun, while people involved with the Mafia in the city were embroiled in a violent internal conflict. When he was arrested in July 2010, Di Marco was already subject to a court order prohibiting him from possessing any firearms.

The conflict was created, in part, by the vacuum generated after the elder Rizzuto was extradited to the U.S. and convicted in a racketeering case. Vito Rizzuto is currently serving a 10-year in that case and is scheduled to be released in October. Several people have been murdered in recent years over what police believe was an attempt to take over the reins of the Mafia from the Rizzuto family. One of the recent victims of the conflict was Giuseppe (Closure) Colapelle, a man who was also involved in the secret casino where gamblers could take part in high-stakes poker games. Colapelle was murdered in March in St. Leonard. His death is mentioned in the parole decision as having caused concerns for Di Marco’s security behind bars.

According to a written summary of the parole board’s decision, Di Marco claims he is not concerned for his safety because he received the stiffest sentence of anyone arrested in connection with the casino and, he claims, he never told police who the firearms actually belonged to.

He also continues to deny being part of the Mafia, or being an influential figure within it. However, he continues to hang out with “influential members of traditional Italian organized crime” while he serves his sentence in Drummondville.

The parole board determined that while Di Marco takes part in, and even initiates, meetings with his case management team - the people who help inmates prepare for an eventual release - he appears to be superficial during them by refusing to discuss his ties to the Mafia. Di Marco was hoping to be released to halfway house and do community service but Asselin and Belisle were not convinced.

“It is clear to the parole board that you continue to favour the values of organized crime,” the author of the summary noted while listing the reasons for denying Di Marco a release. “Also, it was demonstrated that you know important members of the Italian Mafia and that you were a high-level intermediary. The people you frequent constitute a significant risk factor and the board is not convinced that you have made the decision to disassociate from them in a definitive manner.”
Di Marco has the right to appeal the decision.

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Casino+operator+linked+Montreal+mafia+denied+parole/7025640/story.html#ixzz22ORy55za

What can Toronto learn from Montreal’s downtown casino?

“I lost everything,” he said in French. His eyes turned red and welled up with tears when he mentioned a friend who killed himself after doing the same.

Casino employees are not permitted to speak to media on the record, but three confirmed that a few gamblers, not wanting to leave their seats for the washrooms, have been known to relieve themselves on the carpets. Others wear diapers into the building.

Long-standing rumours of suicides on the premises persist. But according to Quebec coroner’s office, there is only one on record: 46-year-old Daniel Naudi shot himself in the head in the casino parking lot in 2001 after, according to his family, he lost a large sum of money.

Naudi had signed up for the self-exclusion list — whereby gamblers ask the casino not to let them in any more — but had taken himself off the list one year before his death. “There is place to question whether inclusion of Naudi on the self-exclusion list could have prevented his suicide,” reads the coroner’s report.

Wherever the deaths occur, there’s a clear link between gambling and suicide in the province. Between 2001 and 2009, the most recent available data, 246 people killed themselves due to problem gambling. (The death is considered gambling-related if a suicide note mentions gambling, or if family confirm the death was related to a gambling addiction.)


What can Toronto learn from Montreal’s downtown casino?
Wendy Gillis Staff Reporter
The Star

MONTREAL — It’s 1:22 a.m. and Marie, holding a cup of stale coffee in her left hand, repeatedly hits the green ‘Play’ button with her right. She doesn’t dare take her eyes off the glowing purple screen a few inches from her face.

On either side of the frigid St. Lawrence river, most of Montreal is sleeping. But she and hundreds of others are slouched atop stools under flashing coloured lights, feeding $20s into one of 3,200 slot machines at the city’s island gambling mecca, Casino Montreal.

“I like to come late, around 11 or midnight,” Marie (not her real name) says in French over the dissonant chorus of ringing slot machines. “That’s when it’s less busy.”

If Torontonians want to see what could happen if a casino set up shop, this five-storey building on a man-made island may be the best place to look.

Related: Do casinos drive up the crime rate?


Nearly 20 years ago, Montreal became the first major Canadian city to open a casino. The same debate now dividing Toronto city hall raged in Quebec in 1992, when a gaming house was suggested as a way to help fill depleting provincial coffers.

Detractors predicted the casino would draw prostitutes and pimps, prompt pawn shops and create jobs, indeed — for loan sharks and drug pushers. The mayor of the Mount Royal suburb called it morally bankrupt; in a leaked confidential letter to the province’s tourism minister, Montreal’s chief of police warned of the potential for an increase in crime.

But with a growing number of Quebecers heading south for their gambling fix (between 1988 and 1992 alone, the number going to U.S. casinos doubled, according to Loto-Quebec) Montreal opted to take advantage of the huge profit potential. In a 1992 municipal vote, councillors resoundingly voted in a casino.

One year later, the building’s glass doors opened on Ile de Notre Dame, an island constructed for Expo ’67. It’s been a vache d’argent — cash cow — ever since, winning the Quebec government about $200 million per year, $4.1 billion since the first cards were dealt. Unlike a cut of the revenue expected for Toronto if the casino comes to town, the City of Montreal gets no portion of those profits.

The casino’s early success was thanks not to beginner’s luck but to Montreal’s insatiable gambling appetite. More than 12,000 people regularly flocked to the casino per day, far surpassing the anticipated 5,000. The enthusiasm persisted, and three years (and 10 million visits) later, Loto-Quebec, the government agency that operates the province’s four casinos, expanded its Montreal location into a nearby building.

Soon after, security guards stopped kicking out gamblers at the 5 a.m. closing time; in 1997 the government began hosting a 24-7 party.

“I’ve got nowhere else to be,” said smiling truck driver Klause Mueller, betting $25 on red at 4 a.m. on a recent Tuesday morning. The roulette tables teem with eager gamblers, some running around placing chips on various tables, jittery from the free coffee.

In the high-roller sections, the real money ($1,000 bets, anyone?) is spent at blackjack and poker tables.

“It’s going really well for us,” says Germain Guitor, vice-president of sales and marketing for Quebec’s casinos. “I think we’re managing a really good business, we have a great customer base, we’re doing some exciting things, and we’re contributing to the economy, to society.”

The casino’s close yet remote location has been an important factor. Though it’s near downtown, gamblers must drive or take the subway and a shuttle bus to the island facility. It’s what an Ontario Place casino might be: near the city centre, but not a five-minute trip you make on your lunch hour.

The relative isolation has allowed security and police to keep a watchful eye, said Lieut. Ian Lafrenière, a spokesperson for the Montreal police. Despite warnings of increased crime, there are zero statistics to suggest a spike in illegal activity, he said.

That said, “we’re not stupid,” Lafrenière added; organized crime can be present wherever there’s potential to make money. But the types of crimes that tend to be committed around casinos, such as loan sharking, are usually not reported, making them difficult to monitor. He also says the impact of the casino on crime may be felt in other parts of the city.

Nonetheless, police have barely had to increase their presence on the island, in the form of two paid-duty police officers who help direct traffic. The casino’s security staff and many cameras keep careful watch inside and outside the building.

The importance of the location became apparent when, in 2006, Loto-Quebec tried to move the casino. The ambitious project — a casino, hotel and entertainment project with Cirque du Soleil — was not possible on the island, so Loto-Quebec suggested Pointe St. Charles.

The inner-city neighbourhood near the downtown is populated by many low-income people, and there was a massive backlash from community groups and problem gambling experts who said the location could lead to trouble.

“Where it is now, it takes a certain amount of effort to get there, and we didn’t want that to change,” said Jean-François Biron, a researcher with Montreal’s health and social services agency and an author on a study of the possible casino move. “We concluded that it would not contribute to the health of Montrealers and, to the contrary, could have created problems.”

The project was shelved because of the opposition. Loto-Quebec has instead taken on a billion-dollar renovation project to keep the casino competitive in a market that it says has increased ten-fold in the past decade, with the explosion of casinos in Canada and the U.S., VLTs in bars and the proliferation of online gambling.

Still, the St. Lawrence has not buffered the city from social problems. Signs of pathological gambling aren’t hard to spot in rooms where some gamblers spend hour after hour at the slots or so-called one-armed bandits, entranced and unmoving.

Casino employees are not permitted to speak to media on the record, but three confirmed that a few gamblers, not wanting to leave their seats for the washrooms, have been known to relieve themselves on the carpets. Others wear diapers into the building.

Long-standing rumours of suicides on the premises persist. But according to Quebec coroner’s office, there is only one on record: 46-year-old Daniel Naudi shot himself in the head in the casino parking lot in 2001 after, according to his family, he lost a large sum of money.

Naudi had signed up for the self-exclusion list — whereby gamblers ask the casino not to let them in any more — but had taken himself off the list one year before his death. “There is place to question whether inclusion of Naudi on the self-exclusion list could have prevented his suicide,” reads the coroner’s report.

Wherever the deaths occur, there’s a clear link between gambling and suicide in the province. Between 2001 and 2009, the most recent available data, 246 people killed themselves due to problem gambling. (The death is considered gambling-related if a suicide note mentions gambling, or if family confirm the death was related to a gambling addiction.)

Geneviève Guilbault, spokesperson for the provincial coroner, could not say if the casino’s presence prompted an increase in suicides because the office cannot get figures from 1993 without an access-to-information request, she said.

According to Sol Boxenbaum, a gambling addiction counsellor and critic of government-run gambling, many gambling suicides are not recorded as such because of the prevailing stigma. When one of his clients committed suicide a few years ago, the death was not documented as gambling-related because the man’s family would not confirm that he was an addict.

Gambling has also increased homelessness, said Matthew Pearce, executive director of Old Brewery Mission, a downtown Montreal homeless shelter.

“The casino, and state-sponsored gambling such as lottos, is — and I’ll say it categorically — a generator of homelessness,” he said. “The state is creating homelessness on one hand and then trying to support organizations like ours on the other.”

More than other types of addiction they see at the shelter, such as drinking and drugs, gambling is extremely difficult to resolve, Pearce said.

One man staying at Old Brewery Mission, who asked for anonymity, said he became addicted to gambling after the Montreal casino opened.

“I lost everything,” he said in French. His eyes turned red and welled up with tears when he mentioned a friend who killed himself after doing the same.

“It’s a very, very powerful addiction, gambling. And most addicted are the governments right now,” Boxenbaum said. “They don’t want to know about the consequences; they just want the instant gratification.”

Among the major criticisms of the Montreal casino is that just 10 per cent of the visits come from outside the province — meaning the majority of the money brought in is from Quebecers.

It’s what Quebec calls a voluntary tax — “you get the same services whether you play or not, it’s a choice,” said Jean-Pierre Roy, spokesperson with Loto-Quebec.

Both Roy and Guitor say that for the vast majority of their clients, a visit to the casino is like going to a show or out for dinner. People don’t feel they’re losing money, he says; they’re spending it, with the added bonus that they might get it back, and then some.

“The truth is, I personally think I have one of the most noble jobs in Quebec, because gambling is … a leisure activity,” said Guitor. “This company satisfies that need or that want for diversion or excitement, and the monies that we collect and contribute to society contribute positively to the collectivity of Quebec.”

That’s not to say that Loto-Quebec doesn’t acknowledge there are problem gamblers, he said. Casino staff are trained to watch for signs of addiction — there are employees whose full-time job is to watch for people who have put themselves on the self-exclusion list.

Loto-Quebec also contributes $22 million to the ministry of health and social services to help fund prevention and educational programs and hotlines, and the province recently earned the highest level of certification for responsible gambling by the World Lottery Association.

So what are the odds that Toronto will get a casino?

Montrealers at the casino, perhaps not surprisingly, can’t agree on whether it’s a good bet.

“Do it, and let me smoke, let me drink, and I’ll come,” said Louis Panichelli, enjoying a drink at the bar, the only place you’re allowed to consume alcohol at the casino. “Toronto will have to loosen up, though.”

Outside on a smoke break, Martine Laroche, disagrees, saying it will encourage too many people to come.

Back at the slots, where he’s just won $40 thanks to triple 7s, 78-year-old Andre Ouellette laughs uproariously upon learning Toronto doesn’t have a casino.

“Why not?” he says, regaining his composure. “Though I guess it’s really up to you.”

Montreal Casino, by the numbers

• Annual profits to Quebec government: $200 million

• Total profits since the casino opened in 1993: $4.1 billion

• Total visits since the casino opened: 108 million

• Visits per year: 6 million

• Visitors: 90% from Quebec; 10% out of province

• Average age of gambler: 57

• Employees: 3,000

• Average visit: 4 hours

Montreal, Homelessness and Gambling Addiction

Massachusetts Casino Proponents extol the virtues of Gambling's success in Canada to justify their support, even as Canada has removed loss limits and other sensible controls to maintain its flagging revenue source and cover escalating costs.

This summer, blessed with opportunities to do 'tourist' things, we encountered a number of Canadians who had nothing nice to say about the community degradation caused by 'government sponsored addiction,' the failure to fulfill the promises of 'economic development,' and the growing enslavement of people the Industry depends on for their profitability - the Gambling Addict.

Studies have linked HOMELESSNESS to Gambling Addiction. Our resident Addiction Expert will explain the connection of Gambling Addiction and incarceration.

We CAN do better!


The face of hardship in Montreal is getting younger

It's a good neighbourhood for pleading innocent and feeling guilty.

On a small patch of green space a couple blocks from the Palais de Justice, I was enjoying the Friday morning sun and tapping out a text message. Two benches over, a man wearing a coat too heavy for the weather was asleep, using a battered knapsack for a pillow.

Isn't progress wonderful?

There was a time, in the not-too-distant past, when the clacking of typewriter keys made it impossible to sleep near a working journalist. Now I can write silently and transmit stories from anywhere.

But some things never change. People are still sleeping on park benches.

Punch up Matthew 26:11 on your Bible app. "For ye have the poor always with you," Jesus told his disciples.

Poverty is stubborn. It resists technological change, and if you're sufficiently engrossed in your newest tech toy, you can ignore people who don't have fixed addresses, let alone phone numbers.

I was down at the edge of Chinatown looking for a column. Every Monday into late December, this space will be pegged (as we used to say in the typewriter era) to the Gazette Christmas Fund.

In urging Montrealers to open their hearts and their chequebooks, I thought it might be useful to raise their awareness of poverty in this city. Matthew Pearce, director general of the Old Brewery Mission, is a good source for a snapshot of hard times in Montreal.

Pearce's office is at the northwest corner of St. Antoine St. and St. Lawrence Blvd., kitty-corner to the courthouse. Pearce pointed out the irony of a space that used to be a tavern becoming headquarters of a shelter that deals with the consequences of alcoholism -and much else.

He is 56 and has run the Old Brewery Mission for 21/2 years. Pearce was born in Calgary to expatriate Montrealers who moved back here in 1960 because "with the business savvy my family is famous for, my father saw no future in the oil business."

Pearce grew up in Rosemere. Fluently bilingual, he has a background in international development and the promotion of corporate responsibility.

Hardship in Montreal, Pearce said, is changing. He highlighted the surprising demographics of the Mission's clientele.

Fifteen years ago, the average age of a homeless person was about 55 -conforming, Pearce said, to stereotype. Today the average age is 37.

"To bring the average age down that quickly," Pearce said, "means a lot of young people are not able to find their place in society and don't have resources, like a supportive family, to fall back on. If you're on the streets at a young age and you don't get the support needed, you can become a chronic, self-identified street person."

Another change over the last 10 years: people are ending up at the Old Brewery Mission as a consequence of gambling addiction.

"This is not a drug addict or an alcoholic or a person who is mentally ill and off their meds," Pearce said. "We've had a police officer and a doctor whose lives collapsed because of gambling. They've burned their bridges and they come to us when they have nothing left."

-in the news

There are also more women needing shelter than there is space available. The Old Brewery Missions's women's service, the largest is Canada, is regularly over 100 per cent capacity. This winter, the Mission will add 14 beds to the 30 in its women's shelter.

Pearce said drug addiction has become more of a problem because of worse living through chemistry. Drugs are stronger, behaviour is more radically altered, addiction is deeper and harder to kick.

The Mission has a new mission, Pearce explained: "not just to soothe homelessness but to solve homelessness." On the floor above his office is the Marcelle and Jean Coutu Pavilion, where 30 men are living in apartments and going through the Old Brewery Mission's transition programs to get them back into society.

"They pay modest rent," Pearce said. "They make their meals and they live an autonomous life. But they benefit from the support of our counsellors.

"They don't need just a key to an apartment. They need support with the kind of issues that caused them to be homeless in the first place."

The economic downturn has not had a negative impact on donations. Pearce describes the Old Brewery Mission as a "Montreal institution, kind of like Schwartz's."

With healthier food. Montrealers, Pearce said, "like our institutions - they're part of our identity."

"Our donors are loyal," he added, "They see us as a place where you make a donation and it hits the ground running. There's not much waste around here."

As is the case with another great institution, the Gazette Christmas Fund. Every dollar donated is passed on to people in need.

And a survey of downtown park benches indicates the needy are still with us.