Cotroni crime family
The Cotroni crime family, originally Cotrone (Italian: [koˈtroːne]), is an Italian-Canadian 'Ndrangheta-type organized crime syndicate (or 'Ndrina) based in Montreal, Quebec. The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) considers the family a branch of the Bonanno crime family of New York City.
Family founder Vincenzo Cotroni | |
| Founded | c. 1940s |
|---|---|
| Founder | Vincenzo Cotroni |
| Founding location | Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
| Years active | c. 1940s–2000s |
| Territory | Quebec and Ontario |
| Ethnicity | Italians as "made men" and other ethnicities as associates |
| Activities | Racketeering, drug trafficking, murder, illegal gambling, corruption, extortion, theft, loan sharking, fraud |
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The organization was established in the 1940s by Vincenzo Cotroni, a Calabrian immigrant from Mammola. Its territory once covered most of southern Quebec and Ontario. An internal war broke out between the Calabrian and Sicilian factions of the family in the late 1970s, which resulted in the death of acting captain Paolo Violi and his brothers. This allowed the Sicilian Rizzuto faction, a Sicilian Mafia crime family, to overtake the Cotroni's Calabrian faction as the preeminent crime family in Montreal. Vincenzo died of cancer in 1984, followed by his brother Frank in 2004.