The Mob: History Connects to OPP

In honour of OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino and his lack of understanding of Ontario's Occupational Health and Safety Act and his threats to pull his officers out of Caledonia in case they get hurt because a protester wants to peacefully protest - I thought I'd come back to HR after such a long hiatus to repost this article. (Sorry folks - I got distracted from other blogs and other local political and legal stuff that I lost interest in posting for awhile).

This is what the Act says:

The right to stop dangerous work does not apply to police, firefighters or those employed in correctional institutions [section 14(2)(a)].

Even the Minister of Labour confirmed it in a letter he sent to me but to show a lack of Liberal leadership he left it to me to make a complaint instead of looking into it himself.

If we can go back a few years when Julian Fantino was the Chief of Police with the City of London's police service, he was throwing his weight around then by arresting peaceful protesters making their displeasure known about the drastic cuts to medical services at London Health Sciences Centres. When I'm able to get a copy of that back issue I'll be back here posting it.

Let's not forget that Fantino got his position with the OPP by a good friend of his former Crown Attorney and convicted money launderer Peter Shoniker - who was arrested after an RCMP sting to get him to launder money taken from the pensions of the United Steelworkers in Hamilton. Apparently there was an elected city counselor that was involved and they weren't from Toronto...

Updated September 21, 2006: here is a report to compliment the KPMG Report linked below.

It's called 'Medicine in Ontario Needs Glasnost' a review to the Government of Ontario by the Health Professions Regulatory Advisory Council. Here is an excerpt, which I would consider very serious - but I know it happens because I have two personal experiences with obstruction of justice with the CPSO - the most recent was earlier this year in 2006.

In at least one case "there was prima facie evidence that CPSO officials may have committed the criminal offence of obstructing justice by repeatedly misleading the Executive Committee as to the true state of the evidence in this case". In the remaining cases Mr. Code found "evidence of abuse and misuse of power", "systemic unfairness and repeated abuse and misuse of power", and "a consistent pattern of unfairness

Updated September 2, 2005 - link to KPMG Report below

Since the subject of organized crime is circulating the blogosphere, I might as well add this little tidbit.

While taking a break from preparation of my C.E.D.A.W submission in 2002, I engaged in a hallway talk of wisdom my neighbour Mr. G seeing there wasn't a water cooler in the near vicinity. Mr. G knew I was busy researching in the library archives so he suggested during a deep discussion of the economics of war, to see if I could find an article in the Toronto Telegram about a student who published his thesis on the intention of the John Birch Society's plan to break up Canada.

Now this article apparently appeared in the Toronto Telegram in the early 70's, so that meant I had to look up months of microfiche over a period of two years. I didn't find that one but I did find an article in the June 5, 1970 publication on O.P.P Commissioner Eric Silk (born in Hamilton) and O.P.P Superintendent Wilson from London, Ontario.

It turned out that Commissioner Silk and Superintendent Wilson had links to George Duke, an associate of John Papalia crime family of the Hamilton Mafia. The article described how all four met at Duke's estate in Oakville for an 'open house' on lawn maintenance equipment.

Duke also attended the wedding of Wilson's daughter and flew up from Fort Lauderdale in order not to miss it.

Now the Paplia crime family of Hamilton had another associate named Paola Violi who married the daughter of Giacomo Luppino who was the most influential "N'drangheta members in Ontario" (see The Mafia of Montreal). Giancomo Luppino was a close friend to Cosa Nostra boss Stefano Magaddino, cousin to Joseph Bonanno.

In 1997, John 'Pops' Papalia, a made member of the Joseph Todaro Cosa Nostra family of Buffalo, was gunned down in front of his office in Hamilton, Ontario.

Paola Violi also had a Hell's Angels connection and of course, our own former Minister of Public Works Alphonso Gagliano is alleged to be a "made man" in the Bonanno crime family of New York although it is not proven.

Back to O.P.P Commissioner Silk. He retired from the O.P.P in or around 1973 and became the President of the Medico-Legal Society of Toronto. He died in 2004.

I have no other details regarding any further investigation in Commissioner Silk's ties to Mafia associates since then, although I attempted to see if I could get more information from the Hamilton detachment of the R.C.M.P., but they were not able to elaborate, only that the officer I spoke to remembered the events covered in the newspaper at the time.

C.S.I.S wasn't able to comment on any information and if they had any, it would be classified.

I don't know what exactly the Medico-Legal Society of Toronto does but apparently it has something to do with helping doctors write insurance claims for accidents as one example. In any case they deal with the Law Society of Upper Canada (LSUC) and the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO).

The reason I find this society intriguing because of the two largest and powerful organizations in Ontario are the self-governed and self-policing Law Society of Upper Canada and the College of Physicians and Surgeon's of Ontario.

This article on R.C.M.P Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli's press conference into organized crime infiltrating Parliament (see Hansard) seems to tie a few things together when it's compared to what is now happening in our government, especially when he was so open to suggest that "criminal groups are focusing on Parliament, the courts and other institutions with the aim of destabilizing the political system."

Now compare this article and the current events with my post of May10 and April 29.

The KPMG Final Report of the Review of the CPSO Complaints and Discipline Process commissioned by Elizabeth Witmer, the Minister of Health in July 2000 is posted here.

This report documents, amongst other concerns, that 71% of Ontarian's complaints about physicians are dismissed and 81% are dismissed without logical rationale.

What is most concerning is on page 33 the CPSO is using a standard of evidence higher than the civil standard. The Regulated Health Professions Act states the the College is to use the civil standard. KPMG reports that the CPSO justifies this higher standard in the case of Bernstein (Ontario Divisional Court 1977) but the judgement clearly defines the standard as civil.

There is a more concerning adjacent story that goes along with this report, which will be posted at a later date. I am also in the process of confirming the Commissioner Zaccardelli's 2000 news conference with RCMP and any subsequent reports that are publicly available.

This conference was confirmed by Commissioner Zaccardelli's office but there is no indication of it on the RCMP's website. I was referred to a criminal intelligence website but it did not clarify that organized crime was infiltrating parliaments, only in developing countries. I was told by the public relation's office that anything else would have to be requested through freedom of information.