Montreal Mafia murder trial: Secret recordings paint picture of murder scene

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The people who would have worked under Salvatore Scoppa when he ordered the deaths of two Montreal mob leaders felt no lost love when he was killed three years after the mob beatings.

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Dominico Scarfo, 49, is on trial before a jury at the Gouin courthouse where he is charged with the first degree murders of Lorenzo Giordano and Rocco Sollecito. Scarfo allegedly shot Giordano on March 1, 2016 in Laval and played a role in Sollecito’s death on May 27, 2016 also in Laval.

At the start of the trial, prosecutor Marie-Christine Godbout told the jury that the murders had been ordered by Scoppa, a leader of a Calabrian clan of the Montreal mafia who wanted to eliminate the leaders of a Sicilian clan.

The man who shot Sollecito eventually became an informant for the Sûreté du Québec in 2019 and was used to secretly record a series of conversations he had with Scarfo that summer. This included a conversation the pair had on August 6, 2019, while driving a vehicle to a town somewhere outside of Montreal.

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Three months earlier, Scoppa had been killed in a hotel in Laval.

During part of their conversation, Scarfo and the informant, whose name cannot be released, shared what they knew of Scoppa’s final moments.

“So you know how it happened then,” the informant asked Scarfo.

“He went for a smoke and that was it,” Scarfo replied with a chuckle.

“Do you know how it happened? Who is it, who who,” the informant asked.

Scarfo then said another person who was at the hotel told him that Scoppa sensed something was going to happen. He said the person told him Scoppa was suspicious of a truck that was “circling” the hotel.

“But Sal didn’t click when (someone) said let’s smoke outside? I’m surprised Sal didn’t click. He saw there was a suspicious truck,” the insider said.

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Scarfo also revealed that his source of information was a woman who saw Scoppa being shot and noticed the gunman’s blue eyes under a mask. Scarfo said the woman assumed the shooter would soon be arrested because he used a limited-edition Ford Explorer for the hit. The homicide remains unsolved.

At various points in the conversation and at an earlier one, the informant suggests that he and Scarfo were not paid as promised by Scoppa. He seemed to bring up the subject often in an attempt to get Scarfo to make incriminating statements.

This included a specific reference to Scarfo’s alleged role in Sollecito’s murder. According to the Crown’s theory of the case, Scarfo waited for Sollecito to leave his home that morning and positioned a vehicle in front of Sollecito’s BMW. When the two vehicles reached a designated point at an intersection on St-Elzéar Boulevard, Scarfo’s vehicle came to a dead stop, forcing Sollecito’s BMW to do the same. The shooter, who was waiting inside a bus shelter, shot Sollecito eight times through the passenger side window.

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Scarfo seemed to get the reference, as the informant said an accomplice in the murder, a runaway driver, felt that Scarfo should be paid less than he was promised.

“I’m pissed that Sal got beat up. I wanted me to punch him. You know? For everything the f-ker did,” the insider said.

“I never betrayed anyone except this guy. He fucked me,” Scarfo replied.

“Brother, he deserved it. You know why,” the informant asked.

“He deserved it,” Scarfo said, raising his voice.

“You know, don’t let your loyalty make you a fool,” the insider said.

“That’s exactly what’s happened to me my whole life,” Scarfo replied.

The trial will resume on Thursday.

pcherry@postmedia.com