Game of Crimes
155: Part 2 - Steve Metelsky - Sinaloa Cartel, Hell’s Angels, and Asian Gangs in Canada
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They were dealing with El Chapo and importing massive amounts of kilos of cocaine into Canada, and that file was taken down. And this is kind of where Succvir Dio comes into play, Succvir Dio at that time was part of the Wolf Pack, but he was in British Columbia on the other side of the country on the west coast. And I have to give credit, when you talk about frontline policing, they call it frontline because the due diligence of the officers that are out on the street, you know, stopping cars with probable cause or reasonable probable grounds for an offense or whatnot. And there was an officer working in Oakville, Ontario. It's about half an hour outside of Toronto. It's right on one of the Great Lakes. It's a very sort of well-to-do town with some lot of money. I'll just say it. It's a very, very nice town. And he sees this Range Rover going speeding down the street. So he pulls it over. It's in the middle of the night. And in Canada, we have the acronym CPEC. It's Canadian police information computer and I believe in the United States, it's NCIC. So it's the same sort of thing. So as soon as the officer runs this guy and he was driving a Range Rover, it comes up Succvir Dio and all the bells and whistles go off like member of organized crime group. And it was all put on the system from the British Columbia RCMP. And here's the interesting sort of how sometimes it can be hard to keep track of these guys. The organized crime task force in British Columbia and the RCMP had no idea Dio had quietly relocated all the way across Canada to Oakville, Ontario, and he was living in a multimillion dollar mansion. And one of those things on the system that came up at that time, not only with his connectivity to cocaine and the underworld, was he was a marked man for for death, that if anybody comes in a contact with them, I'm not sure what they call it United States, but in Canada, we have a moral and legal ethical obligation, regardless of who it is. If there's viable information, credible information that somebody wants to kill them, you know, we have to notify them. And in the world of intelligence, I've done a ton of those, we would do them carefully. So sometimes it was from an informant. So we had to be careful how we crafted, how we got that information because we didn't want to expose that person. But here's this young uniform officer, you know, probably made the traffic stop of his life because he pulls over Dio and he was the, this was the very beginning of how this project developed was that traffic stop. And it was kind of like disguised living in Oakville. So immediately, not only does he sort of give him a pseudo duty to warrant at the roadside, he does the right thing, he contacts drugs, the drug unit, because he was flagged for cocaine importation and everything. And when the, and this isn't Halton, so just outside of Toronto, and when they contacted their counterparts in the RCMP in British Columbia, this is what they literally said to the investigator on the phone. Dio is in your neck of the woods, you're in a lot of trouble, because here's the, here's the flip side to this, the double edged sword murph is he was suspected and I have to say suspected in quotes of committing homicides. When you're in that life, it's a by the gun out by the gun and violence is, is, is part of that process and lifestyle. And so you have a risk to public safety element, because now he's living in this middle to upper class, upper class community. And if people are coming to whack him, like it's a risk to public safety at the same time, he's, he's, he's a major member of the Wolf Pac Alliance, who's moved out to Ontario. And the reason we all figured he moved out there was because Project Inc, all those big players in Ontario that were arrested and sent to jail for murder. That's a whole other, whole other story. I always liken it to the analogy of a great white shark in organized crime or transnational crime. You know, great white shark attacks somebody in their environment in the ocean. They, they typically lose a lot of their front teeth and biologically a great white shark adapts. As soon as that attack happens, the back row of teeth move in and they take the place of the front teeth. And I always use that as analogy in the world of, of drugs and transnational crime, if somebody gets whacked or somebody goes to jail, there's always somebody else that's going to fill that void and move up to take their place. And that's kind of the part deal played by moving out to Ontario to now be the Wolf Pac member, sort of representing British Columbia on the other side of the country now in Ontario near Toronto. So that was a, that was literally the catalyst to this. It wasn't a long file, but there was a lot of things that happened with it. So it was immediate surveillance on so clear deal right after that incident occurred. Yeah. And we're not talking about just a street level dealer here, or we're talking about a very upper echelon member of this organization. Right. Absolutely. Like the information when, when you and I were speaking about levels of info and confirming it, it was confirmed reliable. Like he not only was a member of that gang or organization, but he did have direct tentacles to El Chapo, Joaquin Guzman's, Sinaloa Cartel. So right out of the gate, you're dealing with this guy is a bona fide player in that world. And these guys don't mess around. And all of these criminal organizations for our listeners, if we say it's a drug trafficking organization, that's not the only crime they commit. They're, they're what we call poly criminal organizations, meaning wherever they can make money, although those Mexican cartels, they're all poly criminal, you know, if they can make money through human trafficking, through counterfeit medications, through counterfeit clothing, I mean, whatever it might be, they're all in it to make money. They, you know, they think that makes them more powerful and it really builds their ego. That's, that's one of the things that we target in law enforcement is that greed and that ego factor. This organization, so do they're moving cocaine, coming up out of Mexico. Any idea what kind of weights their move and say on a weekly or monthly or annual basis? The project before that Inc, which is connected with, with deal, they were bringing about a thousand kilograms of cocaine a month or every couple of weeks. So that's, that's some pretty good weight. And again, that's, it's funny how you say the war on drugs, you know, and I'm not slagging. I'm just, I'm speaking like the reality. And I applaud the investigators that, you know, when you see the press conference and there's the, the bricks of cocaine and fentanyl and some guns, that's awesome because it is saving lives. Those guns are off the street, 100%. But when you look at the reality of that world and you would know better than anybody else, Murph, it's like if you look at that iceberg and the majority of that iceberg is under the ocean, it's the tip that's showing that you, you know, you took, you, you nipped off that criminal and this group, what's underneath is what got over the border that we never knew about or, you know, with drones or remote controlled subs. It's very hard to determine, but we can say when you're dealing with, especially Mexican cartels, they're moving a ton of weight and that's what these guys, these were the guys on the ground in Canada, these groups that were, were linked with El Chapo. It's, we, we being back when I was still in the job, especially in DEA, we would occasionally discuss that. Much are we seizing the, especially private citizens when you would meet them and they'd say, are you really having an impact or you're really taking cocaine off the streets because it seems like the price keeps going down. And if you look at the simple laws of economics supply versus demand, when supply is high, the price goes down. When supply is low, but demand is there, then the price goes down because there's not as much product. You know, quite honestly, I don't know what the percentage is estimate. I would probably be shocked if, if, if we were seizing, we being the law enforcement professionals out there are seizing 10%. I may be completely off, but you know what, the prices are still coming down and our audiences when we speak publicly, ask people, can you go out on almost any street corner in anywhere USA and buy cocaine and the truth is you can't, it's, it's, and it's certainly not taking anything away from our law enforcement professionals because believe, you know, better than I do, these people are dedicating their life and risking their lives to do the very best they can. And I promise you, when it comes to DEA, I can't speak for the other law enforcement agencies. But here in the United States, when we're talking about DEA, your taxpayers are getting your money's worth. I promise you, these guys are out there kicking butt and taking names. And it's not a, it's not a, you know, eight hour a day, 40 hour a week job, it's, it becomes a lifestyle. We've talked about that quite a bit here. Absolutely. Sorry to get off on the tangent there. No, it's okay. It's such a, it's such a hard thing to put a percent or an amount on, because it's, it's the unknown. But the one biggest hurdle any law enforcement agency has, federal, state, provincial, regardless of Canada, United States, we're all doing the same job is when you look at, and you notice like Escobar, like they're back in the late 70s, early 80s, they're pulling in millions, billions a year. El Chapo's organization, the same thing in that money, to further their criminal activities. And now with the onslaught of technology, it's crazy how they can bring contraband into the United States and Canada. El Chapo was literally, they were flying remote controlled airplanes with remote controlled parachutes with GPS's into British Columbia and Canada, dropping cocaine. And then he had the Mexican cartel associates who were, you know, living in Canada. They would use the devices to go locate the cocaine. How do you, how do you stop things like that? Like it's, they're using the proceeds of their crimes. And it's, that's why you need big money. You need big human resources. You need to invest, you need a lot of different things, Murph, to, to even put a dent in some of these organizations. That's just the truth. Absolutely. It's, you know, and that's, that's nothing we talk about is that they have unlimited resources. You know, we're a governor here in the United States, we're a governor by a congressional budget. Our agency gets a certain amount of money per year to operate and that includes salaries and facilities and everything that goes along with it to include operational funds for working cases, paying informants, that kind of thing. Well, and then we got these things called laws and constitutions that govern our actions. And, you know, you look at the, let's just say, synthetic drugs, whether it's fentanyl, whether it's methamphetamine, whatever it might be, pills, synthetic being manmade. If the way the United States, and I'm pretty sure it's the same in Canada, when they outlaw one of these, they outlaw the molecular structure of that drug. And so these chemists, these scientists are smart enough to change that molecular structure by one, about molecule, I don't know what it is. But now it doesn't fit inside that particular law. So now it's not illegal because they made that little change. And we are so slow, our Congress is so slow, our legislators to implement those changes, to bring this on board. There's just got to be a better way. It's, it's, gosh, I don't know, and, you know, I mean, this could lead into a discussion about supply versus demand, because if we'd get rid of demand, then supply would dry up, but that's a whole another episode. Let's get back to Mr. Dale here, what's he, he's, so he's now in Toronto that makes everybody very comfortable. Yeah. And to, to give, to give a perspective, he's got a multimillion dollar house in Oakville. He has, and this is surveillance information that reveals this pretty quickly. He has, I believe it was either high-end condo or penthouse condo right in downtown Toronto overlooking where our sports teams play in the heart of the city. And he called himself a trucking executive, he was linked with a trucking company in Mississauga. That's a suburb just outside of Toronto as well. And with this group, it was a legit company, trucking company, but the thing is they use legitimate companies. There's a nefarious side to that. So when business hours are done, or, or not, you know, some of these trucks have the hidden compartments and whatnot. So quickly surveillance, CSAM, and for liability reasons, Murph, I did this in the story. I named certain individuals in this case, but I, I have to sort of just use vague identifiers. But these two brothers were quickly seen meeting with Dio and all the behavioral indicators of drug trafficking, you know, the side-by-side cars, gym bag going to the next trunk, suitcase going to the other trunk, vice versa. And there was a lot of movement, very, I mean, very quickly, the Intel was, was showing like these guys are busy and they were moving suitcases and bags up to Dio's Toronto penthouse and back and forth. They followed them to a hardware store. They were buying vacuum sealers, large plastic bags. These are all the paraphernalia and the gear that, you know, you're using to package it and getting ready to distribute it. So they really, and a lot of times in these cases, the body language, even without sometimes hearing what they're saying, you can tell the hierarchical chain of who's, who's the big fish, who are kind of the gophers and the investigators quickly identified these two brothers as not only extremely close to Dio, but the essentially the, the gophers. What they had was, I think it was day two, they literally had these two brothers bringing a large bag out to a car, they were followed, they met a guy who was driving a rental car from Quebec. It's a province, just borders actually New York State and beside Ontario. And this member, unknown guy takes this bag. He drives right to Union Station, which is our major train station in Toronto, buys a one way ticket to Montreal, Quebec. And one of the surveillance members goes in on foot. And his fallen, he buys a ticket as well. And I thought this was really cool. Sometimes you come up, investigators have to come up with, you don't have the luxury of time on your side. And he's making phone calls, he's got eyes on this unknown guy who's now has this suitcase in his possession on the train. So they called ahead, made some calls and an agency further up outside of Toronto. They created this, like it was a canine terrorist scenario or a drug sniffing scenario with the dog. So it was a ruse, but it worked well. And they stopped the train and they instructed everybody in the train to take possession of their belongings, whether it be a suitcase backpack. And every piece of luggage was claimed, except that suitcase would go figure, right? That's not my Coke. There was 15 keys of stamped pure cocaine in there. And at that point, it's people on the higher pay grade have to make these decisions because sometimes, you know, the investor can't make them do arrest this guy. You have all the reasonable, probable grounds, probable cause. So calls were made in Canada with these big drug files. We have what's called the PPSC, it's the public prosecution of Canada. And they are our lawyers, our crown attorneys who you work in tandem to make some of these they make the decisions. And it was, if you pick this guy off now, you're not getting the higher hanging fruit on the tree. This is just a low and 15 keys is a lot, but it's the opportunity to move up the chain because we know this group is connected to not just Mexico, but El Chapo. So the green light was there. But at that point, the PPSC said, you're just a small municipal agency. You need to work with, we need to bring the RCMP on board. And it comes back to your point, Murph. You need federal money. You need federal resources and you need more investigators on the ground. So that's typically how works in Canada, you have these joint forces operations with even a few municipal services, but you don't have the budget, the luxury of time, a lot of these are quick fixes. So this morphed into a project called Project Kanak. So the RCMP were quickly on board and it just really, the next level of surveillance was back on these two brothers and they were seen meeting with a rabbi. And again, he was driving a rental car with Quebec license plates. And he received a couple large duffel bags in the trunk of that car. So long and short, the RCMP actually lost this rabbi during surveillance. And this is talk about a needle and a haystack. They reach out to the OPP who are the provincial. They kind of do the highway patrol. It's kind of one of their mandates. Our highways are actually really busy in the greater Toronto area. So they put out the all points bulletin to the OPP, this make and model, this color, this is the plate. And really, when you talk about the highway, anybody can get off. It's like finding a needle in the haystack. So, sure is, sure is, they find the car and they have the reasonable grounds to stop it. And in the bags was 2 million in cash. And the rabbi who actually they determined he's referred to as a hawala, which is a term where he was no doubt the money man and they were dealing with this hawala as he was really like the money transporter. So he was driving straight to much rather money. He was actually wearing a catheter in the car and he refused to get out and I'll tell your listeners the reason why. He could not leave the proximity of that package in the trunk with a two mill. May imagine just stopping at Burger King and drinking somebody steals your car and you lose two million. You're a dead man walking like that money was going right till choppo. And that was verified later in the file. That was two million. And that was probably half a day's proceeds with these type of groups. But pretty significant. It's just a lot of cast of characters that sometimes enter these files. Let me interrupt you. Let me ask you a little bit about this guy that was acting as a hawala and I don't have a lot of experience with him. I would have done a lot of research on him and talked to a lot of people that have dealt with him and traditionally a hawala is where, and if I get this wrong, correct me. And so somebody in Canada has a contact typically in the Middle East, like Lebanon, whatever country might be over there. And you can, if you wanted to move money to the Middle East from, let's say, the United States, you could go to a hawala. This takes place hundreds and probably thousands of times a day. And what happens is the person that says in New York City, you give them the two million dollars. Well, they know somebody over there and once they do a verification that, yeah, I've got the cash. It's legitimate. It's not counterfeit. You're free to go ahead and do that transaction. Then somebody in the Middle East will pony up their two million dollars to give to the recipient and they issue code words that have to be identified and matched and all that. But there, of course, they take a percentage, but it's a way of moving money without actually moving money. Does that sound accurate? 100%. The whole law is they operate outside the confines of legitimate banking and you really remove in essence a lot of times the paper trail, the digital footprint of trying to wash and clean that money. On a real quick side note, like in the province of Ontario, you know, we have part of me legalized casinos where they're run by the government and they're used all the time runners in, whether it's the mafia or bikers to clean money, you go in with 10,000 cash put in some money into a machine, you gamble maybe 300. And when you press the receipt, that receipt now for 9,700 is completely washed that money because it cannot be traced backwards to where that money originated from. So when you have 100 or 200 guys going to all the casinos in the greater Toronto area and beyond, putting in money and then cashing out with that slip, that money now is official government slip, 9,700 times 200 people doing that every day or that's a very simple way to wash money. So these Hawales are a way of getting money overseas by because they're very cognizant of leaving that paper trail. And it's about washing and cleaning that money so it can get to where it needs to go. Yeah, it's about accountability so that they can prove, hey, I didn't steal any money. We think the laws are tough, not within the criminal organizations, that could be your life. Absolutely. Yeah. And that's why he was wearing a catheter, like even if $5 was missing, it's really like the principle of it. Like you might as well lose the whole $2 million if you're going to lose even $20 because if that float of $2 million short, the paranoia is there already, but then when they have something concrete, like, okay, if this guy stole 20 bucks, what else has he stole on? So you really, it's, they attach themselves to these, these items because they can't afford to lose them. Hey, I'll try not to interrupt you anymore. Oh, no, absolutely not. So it was just really interesting at that point, the RCMP come aboard and there was a lot of, of surveillance. And this is when our intelligence agency came into offer the additional support, obviously you have to get warrants authorized by a judge to, you know, break in authorized, legally authorized to break into businesses to install cameras. And that's, that's basically what was happening. And I will say this, I worked with the RCMP, some of the best investigators and colleagues I worked with. But when you get a big federal agency working with smaller agencies, there, there's a couple things. They're going to be honest, a big federal agency, sometimes the left hand is not sure what the right hand's doing. And when, when you're, when they're bringing in the big guns, there's some big egos, sometimes that go along and you get a little, a little bit, it's like two rams, you know, bucking in the middle of a field and then you get the, the brass who are like, you know, hurry up and wait, you know, we need to wrap this up. I will say something, you know, when, when you're dealing with the set, you have to make the investment, this, these are, these are the big groups, but there was sort of a lot of that going on behind the scenes and a little bit of this, but the one difficult thing with these groups, and this was happening in ink is the technology. And they were using something called PGP, which is pretty good privacy. It's, it's, I believe in a correct me from wrong, it's like an app that's encrypted. The military has used it and then they're using burner phones. So in Canada, we have like warrants to do like DNR's dial number recorders. You can clone phones so you can see what that person is doing in real time. You can access their texts, but when they're thrown a phone away every day, it, it makes it very, very difficult. And then they were speaking in Poojabi, they would say things like go to the other, go to the other, I'll talk to you, I'll talk to you there. So there was some, and this is the thing. These criminals don't have rules and regulations to follow, whereas on the other side of the legal fence, we do. And it was also established very early on, Dio was dealing with a guy who was, he was Canadian, but he was situated in Los Angeles, California. And he on the lines on the wiretap lines, he would only refer to him as the broker. They all had nicknames too. And he actually, that DA and whatnot were brought into this file on Homeland Security because of the connection to the United States and Mexico. And every group needs somebody at the back end. And that was Dio's guy, because Dio's up in Toronto, Mexico was up very far away. This guy was his conduit to El Chapo, who was brokering the deals. And to give your listeners, most of the cocaine was going in transport trucks and it was coming all the way up the West Coast, into the United States, into Canada, in the British Columbia. And from British Columbia, it was coming all the way across, like literally all the way across Canada to Dio's trucking company and being distributed. Another route that's very popular is up in the Midwest. The other route was coming right across the United States through Chicago. And then up. And part of the reason Canada thrives not only are sort of lackadaisical laws, but it's really our proximity to the United States. Corruption is huge in any organized criminal group. So if you have corrupt contacts at things like the airport, our West Coast and East Coast, just like in America, if you have corrupt contacts there or using shipping containers or bypassing border patrols with the technology of drones and submarines, back to what we're talking about earlier, you just don't know how much stuff is coming up. But those were the two main sort of routes that were coming in. And we were brought in to come up with a strategy from like the intelligence side. It's very hard. It's not impossible, but it's very difficult to just get an undercover into a group like this. And it was kind of like a bit of a pressure cooker. So when you talk about like Joe Pastone sat out of our for a year and a half, just ingratiating himself with with the mob locals, like we didn't have the luxury of time. So we came back to looking at these two brothers and just based on, you know, that go for mentality, the body language of you knew they were they were running around on the wires. They were deals like, go get me this, go get me that, get me a coffee. They weren't saying that, but I mean, it's kind of like that. So we came up with an idea. Let's just do an undercover play. We created a fictitious entertainment promotional company and you have to backstop. It took some time, but we brought in some tech people and created a website. So everything was 100% backstop and the two brothers lived just outside of Toronto. They lived together. So we, you know, any undercover operation, you have to script it. It's like casting a movie. We got two email undercovers, very experienced. We had the T-shirts made and they went around handing out flyers to everybody in that neighborhood, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of doors about a TV contest. And if you filled out this quick survey, your ballot went in and a week later, we were going to draw for the TV and we had a 70 inch TV and a gaming unit. And you know, it was all rigged. Right? Oh, yeah. I remember reading about this. This is cool. Sometimes you got to, you got to figure some sort of outside the box. And I, my partner at the time, I have to give credit where credits do was, was very instrumental in that also. And so the brothers went and we call it in that line of work, they, that was the hook. They took the hook, hook, line and sinker and yeah, they won the TV, holy cow, we won. So I remember, and this is where it's like, you can't make this stuff up. So I was the undercover handler, meaning I'm supervising the op and the two guys from the promotional company delivering the TV are Intel techs, they got the coveralls and so the wire is already in the TV, the microphone. So I'm about two miles away listening, you can hear the rustling and whatnot. And part of them winning was they, these guys are coming in to install it right on the wall. And so I can hear the, it's live for sound. And at that time, Dio had flown back to BC and the wire picked up and it was, this is where some of these guys, they have that eyes, they're heads on a swivel, but they have this spidey sense intuition. And so you hear the two brothers on the phone with Dio, he's across the country, like, hey, we won this 70 inch TV and this gave exist up and without missing a beat. I will give, I will give credit where credit's due. Do you help missing a beat, says you bloody idiots. That's the cops. And it's the worst thing you can hear on the wire. Oh yeah. Because it's like, oh great, this, it, it sure enough. So I'm not making a set like Dio would hire private jets, flies, friends, the United States to see the Super Bowl. He was making so much money. So he gets on his private jet ASAP, flies back to Toronto. He goes to, I think it was best by one of the big electronic shops. He buys the identical TV, identical. And it's the worst thing. Now everybody's scrambling for warrants and takedowns because you literally hear Dio taking the part, both TVs to find where the difference is with the parts between them and sure is shaped. He finds the wire. But at that point, it was, we had a couple of good days with that, but not everything is a bed of roses and you got to deal with the adversity of these things. So everything was, you know, most, most criminals won't go to that length to those links to, I mean, they might say, yeah, that's, you know, that's a set up by the cops, you idiots. But I was, I was, when I read that part of the article, I was shocked that, that he personally and his level in the organization would go by that television and then sit there and take the other one off the wall and compare the innards of the TV to we found something different. That's, you ain't to give these guys credit for anything, but that's, that's pretty good on his part. Yeah. I have to admit to, I agree with you, Murphy, at that point that the takedowns had to be put into place and it was interesting. Some of the neighbors where Dio lived in his mansion in Oakville, like he had gym bags. This is kind of like you and I is very similar to having, you know, if you have some loose cash in your car that you might use for a coffee or whatnot, he'd have $200,000 or something like that sitting in a gym bag and another bag of cash in the trunk that he had basically forgotten about. He had a couple aftershave bags and they had solid bricks of gold. This is just, they had enough time to get rid of some of the evidence. So long and short, they found something interesting in his condo in, in Toronto, in the penthouse condo hidden in a hidden compartment. It was a large ziplock bag with a picture of a guy from Windsor, Ontario, which is just a cross from Detroit, Michigan. There was a handgun with a silencer and on the back of the guy's photo, we're all his details. His name, what he drove, what his address was and investigators quickly said, yeah, this is a kill kit. He's going to hand this off to somebody. And we found out later that he was another drug guy who was kind of impeding possibly on his turf or there might have been a previous beef, but that probably definitely saved that guy's life because a duty to warn was issued to him right away. So good sleep should come naturally and with a new natural hybrid mattress, it can. A collaboration between Lisa and West Elm, the natural hybrid is expertly crafted from natural latex, natural wool and certified safe foams to elevate your sleep sanctuary and support a greener tomorrow. Breatable organic cotton and moisture-wicking joma wool consistently provide cool and comfortable slumber. 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If you need extra cash, go to getcast.com that's getcast.com, getcast.com. They're all charged with cocaine, obviously this could have gone so much bigger and unfortunately you have to deal with things ending prematurely, kind of like my hairline. What do I have to talk about that? No, I don't want to go all the way back to there, Murph, what I do that, I don't know. But this is in 2013, so just over 10 years ago and they're all awaiting disposition. And this is where this file that I originally spoke to you in Morgan comes back into play. You can't make this stuff up, it was crazy. So three years later in 2016, I'm working on the RCMP's biggest mafia project to date with that police agent from the banana crime family. And we're having a huge deal because on one of the wiretaps with one of the made men in the mafia in just outside of Toronto, one of these criminal associates is talking about the South Asian guy who owes him half a million dollars, he doesn't name them by name. But he describes every single vehicle that he drives, they're all high-end cars, Rolls Royce, you name it. And then the mob guy is, it's like two guys talking about who won the hockey or baseball game last night, just nonchalantly, it picks up on the wires like, well, you know what we could do, we could rent a white panel van, we'll get masks, we'll, they're basically talking about kidnapping them. And so now we have the transcript of this at the meeting and I'm not an ego guy at all, but because I had dealt with Dio as part of that file a few years earlier, we're trying to identify who they're talking about because it's like, they're, they're going to kidnap probably torture and kill this guy. So I said, he has described suit for a deal to a tea, a tea. And so now we have to hurry up and scramble and find Dio and notify him. Well, at that point, he was in hiding because keep in mind, he was a dead man walking the information from British Columbia RCMP in that world. And they were hooked with so many people in different organizations, you never, the long list of motives and suspects are endless in these cases sometimes when they're unsolved. So even though we weren't able to find him physically, I was able to find out as Lauren, I was actually the one now working this mafia project who gave him a duty to Warren. Well that was in, I would say March of 2016 and in May, I had to write the date down. So I remember May 23, 2016 in the NBA, the Toronto Raptors, who had a good team then, they were playing the Cleveland Cavaliers in the playoffs and the game was in Toronto. And this is where Dio's penthouse was like, looked over the, it was called the Air Canada center at the time. Can't make this stuff up, Murph. Dio, Dio was sitting, uh, courtside floor seats at that game with a bunch of his cronies. He was heckling LeBron James so incessantly, so obnoxiously that it not only got LeBron James attention, like it was throwing LeBron off his, LeBron was actually giving him like crap, giving him crap. The ref's like, this guy's got to go. So the NBA ref points to Dio and he actually gets escorted out of the Air Canada center. And because it was like, we only have one NBA team in Canada, right? The Raptors. Right. Dio made national sports news in Canada, not because he was a gangster, Murph, but because he has, he has a, he disrupted probably arguably the best NBA player, especially at that time during a very high profile playoff game, televised in the US, Canada, and it disrupted the game. So he made the news all across Canada. And I, I didn't see that part. I was watching the game. I'm not making this up because I'm working with the RCMP now, a colleague of mine who was the primary investigator says, put the sports news on at 10 o'clock tonight. You're not going to believe what happened. And then I couldn't believe my eyes. I'm like, for a guy who's supposed to be in hiding because he's fearful of his life here, he's made national news because he's heckled LeBron James and he gets kicked out of the arena. He's just, he's just being an ass. He was just being like, so as much as I gave credit to him for the TV scenario, like he really kind of half that all goes away with when you're in hide, here's, here's the thing. You can be in hiding. He could have sat in the cheap seats with a hat, sunglasses, beer and a box of popcorn, shut your yap or watch the game. No one would have known who the hell he was, but here he is courtside, no disguise, clearly identifiable. And then he's making a huge scene, like, he, you know what, he probably could have set courtside with a hat on, like you said, maybe some glasses just to disguise himself a little bit and nobody would ever notice, but he just couldn't control himself. And that's, that goes back to the thing we talked about earlier, the ego and the pride thing that they think they're more important than anybody else. And so, and so this isn't good cause you haven't gotten to what this leads to yet. This is not good. On May 23, 2016, Murph, literally two weeks later, do at that time was driving a Range Rover. Young Street in Toronto is, is, is actually one of the longest streets in the world, if not the longest street and it cuts right through the heart of Toronto, it's a very busy street. So two weeks after that game, do's Range Rover pulls out from the underground parking of a high end condo. And this is 12 o'clock PM lunchtime and at that time, during the week in Toronto, it's, it's like a mini New York. Toronto is actually a very busy city bustling pedestrians, cars, you name it, buildings everywhere with windows and witnesses who hit men dressed in construction outfits, literally Greek deals Range Rover when it comes to the top of the underground garage. And I think, don't quote me, but over 10 shots were fired from, from both of these hit men. He was electronically tracked and there's no doubt in my mind that he put himself on the map for that hit from the spectacle at the Toronto Raptors game against Cleveland and Lebron James that whole incident. And you know, we've seen a few different high profile assassinations in the underworld in Toronto and other parts of Canada. And that seems to be kind of the modus operandi, like they, they are professionals. It's an unsolved case, Murph in Toronto and these you could, I've seen the video. I don't want to give it because there is some sensitive information, but based on the calmness, coolness of how these guys operated, one hit man was on Dio's driver's side. The other hit man was on the passenger side. They are firing into the car with precision. They're easily, easily could have been friendly fire, but you could tell that these guys were the hired guns, the professionals, and it was a very structured hit. And they left, fled the scene in kind of the modus operandi in Canada. I can't speak for the United States, but in Toronto, whether it's mafia hits, hits like this with cartel connections, Honda Civics always seem to be, not always, but in most cases, the getaway car, they're usually stolen. And the reason is that this car in this case would deal, the two guys gone and it was a black Ford or Honda Civic. And the reason they prefer these is because there's so many of them on the road. You don't want to drive something flashy. As soon as they get into traffic, they're, they're blending in with all the other Hondas and all those cars on the road. So we really kind of seen a trend also with hit men dressing as construction workers, so they can operate in plain sight. And that's exactly what happened. Yeah, they just, they're blunt. You're exactly right. I mean, these guys, the professionals, they do their homework. That's why the professionals, right? And that's why this is still an unsolved case. When I was doing some research on this, I found where Dio was hit 14 times. So that, you know, that's going to leave a mark. And here's the other thing, the fact that this is still sorry, the other thing that's kind of surprising, I mean, when you are dealing with professionals, they do their best not to leave any clues for law enforcement to follow up on. But I was looking at the cold case homicide rates in Toronto and the overall clearance rate since 1921 until today averages nearly 80%. I mean, that's a huge clearance rate than the fact. So this murder happened on June 7th, 2016, and it's still unsolved today. And the fact that they use, they put a GPS tracking device on his car. So they knew exactly where he was at all times. Well, you know, he found the bug in the TV, but he didn't find that one on his car. No, and that's, that's, that's another new trend. I'm sure that's everywhere in the world, but a lot of high profile hits in the last eight years in, in Canada, you know, when when somebody we call them a stick on poxy, just literally can buy them at a spy shop and, you know, gone are the days where a hit team has to take risk taking a burn, meaning, you know, like the, the bad guy knowing they're being followed. They just follow up, whether it's on their phone, a tablet or a laptop, they can see in real time where that car is going or where that car has been. Right. So the, the element of surprise is, is tenfold now. And you know, really that's, that's these, these criminals using the technology at, at their disposal. But one thing I want to put out for your listeners too, like, I always say this, I don't condone no one, none of us condone violence, but in that life, they go into that life. You know, that old expression in by the gun out by the gun, a lot of these guys don't see 30 years old deal, wasn't even 30, you either go to jail, you put on a government jersey, become an informant or a police agent or a witness, or you get killed. And I will say this too, like, I'm not being a hypocrite. I love watching all these crime shows, whether they're based on real, like Narcos is awesome and other, other crime shows. But having spent so much time in my career in, in those hotel rooms in no car with a high level informant, obviously with a partner, you know, you take these heartened criminals away from the gang mentality. And when you develop the trust and rapport, because you are protecting their life, they are giving you information knowing they'll get killed if it gets exposed. So the pressure on us as investigators to buy the book is so, so crucial. But once you gain their trust and rapport, I've not just won many. These guys have had so many of them say, I don't sleep at night. I am constantly fearing I can get a bullet in the back of the head. And whether they're like a guy like deal, living in a multi million dollar mansion, he's got Range Rover, Rolls Royces, Bentley's, none of that matters. The paranoia and fear is 100% we're all human. We all have those emotions. I don't care how tough you are. No one can stop a bullet and knowing that there's people out there that any given time want to put a bullet in you. I cannot imagine living in that state of heightened fear and paranoia. So it's real. So when you see on TV, they make it sometimes this glorious life, they might have all the material things, but on a physiological emotional level, I don't care how tough you think you are. These guys are fearful. Even if they never express it, there's no doubt in my mind they're, they got a pit in their gut wondering is today the day, someone's coming after me. I can't imagine this is maybe my greedy side. I can't imagine having $200,000 in a bag laying around that I forgot about or having gold bars. I mean, how rich do you have to be that that happens? If I lose a $5 bill, I'm upset. Isn't it good when you get your clothes out of laundry and you're, you're hanging up or folding your clothes and you find a wet $5 bill and it's like, oh man, I just hit the jackpot. Well, very recently I opened up my armrest in my car and I forgot I had put a 20 and they're just, you know, miscellaneous coffee money or something. And I was like, scores. Yeah, I felt like I wasn't on any laundry. That's a good day. Absolutely. It's a great day. Yeah. I tell you what, being in Canada, I think coffee costs about $20 a cup, doesn't it? It's pretty expensive up there. It's, you know, Starbucks has a layaway plan now, which I'm kidding about that. But they should because it's, I never order food. Don't get me wrong. I love we have two of our biggest coffee places are Tim Hortons, which is really expanded. Into the United States, especially in the upper New York, some of the States and Starbucks. I don't know where the food from Starbucks because it's like a 10, 10 almonds is like eight bucks or something like that. Yeah. No, I'm okay. It gets kind of ridiculous that Connor and I have been up to several different law enforcement events in Canada speak and it's amazing how expensive things are. We, I think the last one last, I was telling you earlier before we started recording that we were in Vancouver last year and they was the Vancouver police, their resiliency and law enforcement conference. And the organizers, one of the organizers, her and her husband, they had really taken care of us. And so the last night we were there, we took them out to dinner and it's a nice restaurant right on the bay there, the water, you can see everything. And we ended up all just getting burgers and you know, they had a couple of drinks and things like that and just four burgers and drinks and maybe an appetizer, there's like 200 bucks. Oh. It's just outrageous. It's awful. And it's funny. We were talking about your can of center. It's where our two big sports teams, the Raptors and hockey, the Maple Leafs play. If you grab a beer and a hot dog, it's north of 30 bucks. Wow. Wow. So it's, uh, you know, one of the best things they ever did was stop drinking alcohol because this saves me a lot of money. Good for you. Oh, it does. I don't know when this is going to air, but we have in Ontario, we have the LCBO. It's a liquor control board and they're on strike right now, but there's, there's, it's kind of like one of those newsworthy things on Ontario with some people. But we have wineries that they're selling beer and wine in, in the grocery stores now. So it's, it's this debate of do you privatize versus. So that's what's going on right now. That's the, the big hot ticket. Yeah. Yeah. I tell you what, man, it's, Steve, it's been a hoot having you back on the show. Thank you very much for bringing this to my attention because I read the articles and I saw where you quoted me in there and thank you for that recognition. You must have really been hard up for material to put up that in there, but it did take up a paragraph. So I really appreciate it. And we bring these cases in to show that the crime is not just limited to one area. But it's worldwide, you know, there are professionals in every country, we used to talk about the Columbia police and people always, they still ask us about corruption with the Columbia National police and the truth is we, I know it exists, but we didn't see it. You know, there were three minor events that we saw and they were very minor, very, very minor events, nothing that put our lives in jeopardy, the opportunity to bring out the show that, that crime does operate on a worldwide basis and that, that more importantly, that regardless of what country you're in, anywhere in the world, but especially the five eyes countries, which includes Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand and the UK, extremely professional law enforcement people that I've met and all those countries, you being one of those in Canada, we met a bunch of others up there and it just gives us an opportunity to highlight how in depth these criminal organizations are, how far they'll go with technology, but at the same token, how stupid they can be and it results in their murder just two weeks later. Absolutely. The one thing you can't fix is that I just want to say, I love what you did in your career and hobby as well and I love what you're doing with this podcast. It was awesome being on once, but to be on twice is a sincere honor and I can talk to you all day, you're the real deal, Murph, on and off the air, you're a great guy, so thank you for having me back on. I already told you I'm going to buy a bunch of books, so that's going to make me blush here and remember that wet $5 bill you talked about? I'm going to mail that down to you for- I think I should be mailed it to you. It'll be Canadian though, so it'll be worth about maybe $0.350. That just brought back a memory here. When we do speak at the Vincent Canada, part of the contract is that we get paid in US dollars. Yes, do that. Our dollar is like being on the other end of Mike Tyson in the corner of a ring, it's like, "Oh!" And I go a buffalo lot and you convert the money in it, it's like brace for the impact because 200 Canadian, you're going to get about 120 American currency, but we're used to it. We're just accustomed to it, so it is what it is, right? Absolutely, brother. Again, an honor to have you on here. Thank you for giving us your time and bringing these stories on, and if you will stand by for all our listeners, hang in there for the big brief. Like I said during the introduction, as nice as Canadians are, they still have their problems with crime, same as every other country in the world. When we talked about Canada and drugs in the past, we know we always get the same question. Is there cocaine in Canada? Of course there is. Right during the Pablo Escobar days, do you think he'd miss out on the potential gold mines just because Canadians are nice people? Canada's a wealthy country and he knew that, so yeah, the many in cartel moves huge loads of cocaine across the borders to our neighbors to the north. And when the Mexicans took over the transportation and distribution responsibilities of moving the coke, they absolutely wanted to maintain that network in Canada. You heard Steve talk about that just now. By the way, back to my days in DEA, our agents identified Atlanta and Chicago as two of the primary transshipment points in the United States for moving cocaine to other locations, including Canada. And we all know Chicago isn't that far from Ontario, right? And we all know that with cocaine comes the violence. If you've wondered if criminals are loyal to each other, you just heard the truth of how they'll turn on each other in a heartbeat to protect themselves and their territory. Now you got to love this guy. We just talked about Suic, Suic Verdeo talk about an ego. This idiot, he knew people were looking for him. How many times did the cops have to warn him once they got information that there were new threats out against the guy? You know, believe me, warning the criminal that a threat against his or her life has been identified, that can be a difficult thing to do because it could jeopardize your entire investigation, but you still have the responsibility. And that's what professional law enforcement officers do. They take an oath to protect people from harm. And as much as you might not like it, that includes low lives as well. Do he had even moved to Ontario to hide out and get away from his so-called friends and colleagues, and he did a pretty good job of it for a while, didn't he? But then he got comfortable and he got complacent, probably thinking he was again once again invincible, which ultimately did his downfall. Dio decided to attend an NBA game with the Raptors when they were playing the Cleveland Cavaliers. And just attending the game with some friends, that just wasn't enough for Dio. He spent the extra money, which I'm guessing was probably thousands and thousands of dollars to get those court side seats. You know, the seats that can be seen every time the camera focuses on the teams. And who was the star of the Cavaliers at that time? Hmm, a relatively decent player named LeBron James, and given Dio's extensive background careers, a drug dealer criminal and thug, along with the fact that he was wealthy from his criminal activities, no legitimate activities, he decided he was going to help out the raptors by screaming and insulting the most well-known player on the floor of LeBron James. Now, as if that wasn't enough, Dio pushed it to the point that the referees and coach noticed him as well, and Dio was evicted from a game, escorted out by security. But that still wasn't enough. He had to show his ass so much during all of this that he was featured on the Canadian sports TV later that night in the following day. What a freaking idiot here. Now based on my long career in law enforcement, even I know that criminals, especially wealthy criminals, they liked to bet on sports. And they tend to watch professional sports on TV to see if they're going to win or they're going to lose, right? So do you think they might have seen this dunce on the game and confirmed he was located in Ontario? And what happened? Two weeks after his debut on television, Dio was murdered by what appears to be a professional hit team as he was leaving the coffee shop. These assassins, they had found Dio's car, they attached a GPS tracking device on it, and they knew where he was any time he went out from his residence. To this day, Dio's murder still remains open, and you know what, I'll be surprised if they ever saw it. The one way they might saw it is if one of the murders is captured and he decides to flip on the others and get a better deal for himself, although it's still murder. So it's not going to be all that good a deal. Well, all this seems to be common amongst so many criminals, doesn't it? They let their egos get in the way. They think they've got the world by the tail and no one would dare say anything or do anything to them. When I was in Columbia, I learned an expression they like to use down there. That expression is campaign. What does it mean? Loose translation? Big deal. Shit happens. Now, seriously, I don't condone violence of any kind. I've fought against violence for 38 years, but when a knucklehead goes and does something so brazen and foolish makes you think that, well, you know, maybe he asked for it. I salute Steve Matelsky and all the members of the law enforcement in Canada. God bless them, along with all the men and women in law enforcement around the world are military and all of our first responders. Steve has written a book titled Undercover, which I've read. I encourage you to get a copy and read it as well. And if you do, you may find a chapter in there that includes something about yours truly here and talks about the Pablo Escobar investigation. So if you're having trouble sleeping, you might want to read that at least that chapter. You can find it on Amazon and I've got it on the Game of Crime's website under a book list. If you go there, just look for episode 21. That's when Steve was on the first time and you'll find a link to his book. Steve's website is underworldstoriesstoris.com. You can also follow Steve on Instagram at underworldstories_com, C-O-M. On X at Stephen, S-T-E-P-H-E-N, underscore Mattelski, M-E-T-E-L-S-K-Y, 333. And on LinkedIn at Stephen G. Mattelski. Steve, brother, thank you again for coming back to the Game of Crime's podcast and sharing more adventures. Even though you're retired from law enforcement, you continue to do your part to teach and train others so that they can take up the sword and the responsibility of trying to protect the public and fighting against evil. It's an honor to have you on here anytime, brother, and I wouldn't be surprised to see you again in the future. Okay, very quickly, I'd appreciate you going to Apple or Spotify and hit those five stars and do that every week for me, please. It only takes a minute and that small act really helps to support the show. And on YouTube, do me a favor and click on that subscribe button, trying to build those subscribers up. Send me your comments and feedback on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or to our email address, which is Game of Crime's podcast at gmail.com. Our website is Game of Crime's podcast.com, where you'll find all of our episodes, book lists, merchandise, and more. On Facebook and Instagram, go to Game of Crime's podcast and on X, type in Game of Crime's. Also, on Facebook, go to Game of Crime's fans and join the best private group on the Facebook platform. The group is run by her favorite mafia queen, Sandy Salvato. She rules with an iron fist, but wears a velvet glove. So just go to Facebook and type in Game of Crime's fans. And if you're looking for even more content, check us out at patreon.com/gameofcrimes and sign up. I've got several monthly episodes that range from serious to pretty silly. So come over and have some fun. And do me a favor, tell your friends about Game of Crime's, either a person or on your social media platforms or however you stay in touch with others. The best advertising and marketing in the podcast world is word of mouth and your efforts are much more effective than mine. I truly appreciate you helping me to spread the word about the best weekly true crime podcast available. Seriously, thank you all once again for continuing to support the Game of Crime's. Remember, we can have different ideas and different opinions, but that doesn't mean we can't continue to be friends. Finally, thanks for joining me to play the biggest, baddest, most dangerous game of all, the Game of Crime's. I'll see y'all next time. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] Good sleep should come naturally, and with a new natural hybrid mattress, it can. A collaboration between Lisa and West Elm, the natural hybrid is expertly crafted from natural latex, natural wool, and certified safe foams to elevate your sleep sanctuary and support a greener tomorrow. Breathable organic cotton and moisture-wicking joma wool consistently provide cool and comfortable slumber. Every purchase helps fuel Lisa's work with shelters and those in need. Visit Lisa.com to learn more. That's L-E-E-S-A.com.