Son of murdered Hamilton mob boss gets to stay on parole

Domenico Paolo Violi, 56, the Hamilton son of a murdered mob boss, has been granted a parole extension after pleading guilty five years ago to trafficking drugs with a made" member of a New York Mafia family.

The New Yorker was secretly working as a paid police agent in a three-year, RCMP-led police operation during which he was officially inducted into the Bonanno Mafia family, according to an agreed statement of facts presented in Violi's trial in Hamilton court in 2018.

The parole decision, which followed an automatic review, was released this week.

Violi's parole board decision calls on him to provide personal financial information, including income, debts, financial transactions, expenses and banking records to the satisfaction of his parole supervisor.

The decision also requires him not to associate or communicate with any person he knows or has reason to believe is involved in criminal activity.

Violi will stay on parole for another six months.

Violi was sentenced on Dec. 3, 2018, to serve six years, four months and 21 days for drug trafficking and possession of property obtained by crime.

The parole board decision states that Violi was arrested after a three-year RCMP investigation involving a police agent ... who was known to be a member of a criminal organization and engaged in criminal activities with other criminal organizations in Canada and the United States."

In 2017, you sold large quantities of pills (PCP, MDMA and methamphetamines) to the police agent," the parole decision states. Several of the meetings and sales took place at your home. File information indicated that you were paid over $400,000 for the pills and received over $24,000 USD as profit for supplying them. Police information indicated you were involved in Traditional Organized Crime (TOC) at the time."

The parole decision notes that Violi's father, Paolo, was murdered when he was a boy.

Two of his uncles were also slain in a Mafia war in Montreal with the Rizzuto crime family in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Domenico Violi is the married father of two children and has a positive family life, the recent parole board decision states.

You are described as being very involved in family activities and events with your children," the decision states.

The parole board notes that he didn't have a previous criminal record and that he was assessed as a low risk to reoffend."

As part of his plea, the Crown dropped charges of criminal organization against Violi, who in November 2017 was charged with his younger brother, Giuseppe (Joe) Violi, and seven others a massive drug bust, code-named Project OTremens.

At the time, the RCMP called the arrests a tremendous blow to organized crime in Canada."

Giuseppe Violi, 48, who managed a linen and laundry services company in Hamilton, was sentenced to 16 years in prison for fentanyl and cocaine trafficking.

At the time of their arrests, the RCMP said the Violi brothers were well-established organized criminals with an international reach."

After the murders of Paolo Violi and his brothers in Montreal, survivors in the Violi family moved back to Hamilton, where Domenico and Giuseppe Violi lived under the protection of their grandfather Giacomo Luppino, police said.

Police considered Luppino to be a long-standing associate of the Buffalo mob and a founding member of the Crimine, a governing body for criminals in the 'Ndrangheta.

Luppino died of natural causes in Hamilton in March 1988 at the age of 88.

Peter Edwards is a Toronto-based reporter primarily covering crime for the Star. Reach him via email: pedwards@thestar.ca