Breadcrumb Trail Links
The Crown contends Jonathan Massari carried out the hits to prove his loyalty to the boss of the Calabrian clan.
Author of the article:
• Montreal Gazette
Publishing date:
Sep 13, 2022 • September 13, 2022 • 4 minute read • 
Jonathan Massari, 41, faces seven charges in the trial being heard by a jury at the Gouin courthouse in northern Montreal. Court files
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The trial of a man accused of taking part in four killings linked to a conflict within the Montreal Mafia began Tuesday morning at the Gouin courthouse.
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Jonathan Massari, 41, faces seven charges in the trial being heard by a jury.
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Massari is charged with first-degree murder in the killings of Lorenzo Giordano and Rocco Sollecito, Mob leaders gunned down in Laval on March 1, 2016 and May 27, 2016, respectively.
Massari is also charged in the deaths of brothers Giuseppe Falduto, 23, and Vincenzo Falduto, 30. The brothers were killed on June 30, 2016 on a farm in St-Jude, a small town near St-Hyacinthe.
As well, Massari faces three counts of conspiracy, alleging he planned the killings with Dominico Scarfo, 50, and the late Salvatore Scoppa.
In the Crown’s opening statement, prosecutor Karine Cordeau described Scoppa as the leader of a Calabrian clan in the internal conflict who managed a hit list of people he wanted eliminated.
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A police officer watches over the crime scene in Laval where Montreal Mafia leader Rocco Sollecito was shot dead in 2016. Photo by Phil Carpenter /Montreal Gazette
The conspiracy charge involving the Falduto brothers alleges Massari planned the killings with Marie-Josée Viau.
Giordano was killed while he was in the passenger seat of a vehicle outside a gym in Laval where he and his girlfriend were members.
Sollecito was fatally shot through the front passenger window of his sport utility vehicle shortly after he left his residence in Laval. A hit man shot Sollecito several times and escaped on a motorcycle driven by another person.
Cordeau said the Falduto brothers were killed by the same hit man inside a garage on the farm in St-Jude. Their bodies have not been found.
The hit man, whose name cannot be published, is expected to testify.
Cordeau told the jury the hit man decided to work with police in 2019 and secretly recorded a conversation with Massari during which the accused discussed his role in all four homicides.
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“What is the link between these four murders? That is what we will show you in the coming weeks, in particular the participation of the accused, Jonathan Massari, in the goal to kill those four people for the benefit of Italian organized crime,” Cordeau said.
“What the prosecution has the intention of showing is the key and determining role of the accused, Jonathan Massari, in the four murders.
“The (prosecution’s) evidence will plunge you in a war of clans that took place in 2016 within the Italian Mafia. Jonathan Massari was the right-hand man of Salvatore Scoppa, the head of the Calabrian clan.”
Cordeau said Massari’s ambition was to become someone Scoppa could rely on.
“The evidence will show that, to prove his loyalty, certain people had to be killed. The targets chosen were on a list that was established by, among others, Salvatore Scoppa,” Cordeau said.
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A Laval police officer works the scene of Montreal Mafia leader Lorenzo Giordano’s killing in March 2016. Photo by Dario Ayala /Montreal Gazette
The first witness called to testify was a Sûreté du Québec investigator who was the controller for the hit man-turned-informant. The investigator’s name is also protected by a publication ban. Civilians who were following the trial at the Gouin courthouse on Tuesday were asked to leave the courtroom and follow the proceedings through a video conference set up in the lobby to listen to the investigator’s testimony.
The SQ investigator said he was in charge of the informant’s security.
“(The informant) came from organized crime and worked on murders related to the Italian Mafia. If the milieu found out that he was working for the police … well, it would be certain that they would try to eliminate him,” the investigator said. “For about eight months, we interacted with (the informant) on a daily basis.
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“We had to be vigilant to make sure (the informant) wasn’t being followed, that our vehicles didn’t have GPS locators on them.”
The investigator said the SQ was interested in working with the hit man because he had information about five homicides. The hit man admitted that he killed Sollecito and the Falduto brothers and had information about Giordano’s death as well as another murder. The witness said slayings carried out in the organized crime milieu are difficult to solve and, before the informant approached them, the SQ didn’t have enough evidence to generate charges in any of the five homicides.
“(The people in charge at the SQ) decided that we wanted to solve those five murders, so they decided to go ahead with the civilian infiltration agent. We said: ‘Yes, we understand that he participated in the murders.’ But we decided to take him anyway to infiltrate the organization and to prevent other murders, and to arrest the other people involved in the murders,” the investigator said.
“But above all, we wanted to arrest the heads of the organization, because they were the people giving the orders. In organized crime, you have individuals who offer contracts worth $100,000 or $200,000 to kill people. There are always people in line to execute those murders. So our goal was to get to the leaders.”
The trial is presided over by Superior Court Justice Michel Pennou.
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