EDit: TRIGGER MAN--The Reluctant Hit Man or The Impulsive Hit Man: >>DEK: Ken Murdock's Life Inside

the Dysfunctional Musitano Mob >>By James R Dubro >> >>On a late November evening in 1985, Salvatore Alaimo was puttering in his garage next to the Florence Street home he shared with his wife and five children. Suddenly a bright yellow AMC Pacer with three people in it drove by. There was a snarl of gunfire as one of the passengers unloaded a spray of machine gun bullets into the garage, a ganglandx clich* come to life. Alaimo, a 53-year-old Stelco janitor, took a round to the skull and died. Police investigating the murder later learned from neighbours that the man had been cautious in the recent weeks, as if worried about his security. He was not known to have been involved in crime, however, and police theorized that he had been threatened. They investigated blackmail and extortion as possible motives, but were unable to solve the murder. It remained unsolved until 13 years later, when the murderer would step from the shadows. >>The killer's name was Ken Murdock, and his first murder would eventually be overshadowed by other bloody deeds. In a Hamilton courtroom in November 1998, Murdock confessed to two other murders he had committed. In 1997, allegedly on orders from the Musitanos, he had cold-bloodedly murdered two of the most powerful Mafia bosses in Ontario: Johnny Papalia in Hamilton and Carmen Barillaro in Niagara Falls. Murdock told those assembled that he was still haunted by the memory of Alaimo's murder. "I now wish I could take it back and do it over differently," he admits today. "I cannot redo what I did in the past, but I now feel that I wasn't being myself when I did the shooting." This would be a more compelling argument had he not said that he would have done the murder for nothing since it was "for the family." It would have made more sense if he had not killed again two more timesfor the M usitanos a dozen years later, this time for Pat and Angelo whosucceeded to the l eadership of the family after Domenic died of a heartattack in 1995. part two Musitano (of four parts) The gunman, it turned out, had been ordered to kill Alaimo by soldiers of Don Do minic Musitano. All the killer says that he knew about thereason for the hit was "that Domenic Musitano wanted Alaimo dead," and that it had something to do with money. If the motivation was skeletal, the tools were equally bare-bones. For the drive-by shooting, the hit man had been armed with a World War II-era English Sten gun provided by Musitano's soldiers. Two of those soldiers rode with him for the killing - one acting as driver, the other as look-out. The gun jammed as the killer pulled the trigger; he had to smack it against the car's door to un-jam it, getting off just five bullets before the car sped away. He had no idea whether he had succeeded in shooting let alone in killing Alaimo until morning, when the slaying was splashed across the front page of the Spectator. The killer's reaction was the briefest of flinches, just two words: "Oh, shit." He was that distant from the brutal reality of an act that claimed the life of an innocent man - an act done, he says, "without thinking for a moment." It was his first murder. He was just 22 years old. Though he was to have been paid $10,000 for the hit, in the end the killer received a fraction of what was promised: $3,000. Even so, he couldn't have been happier. He had made his bones and he was now a member of the Musitano crime family. For this "blind ambition" - to be a member of the Musitanos - he says that he would have done the murder for nothing. >>Yet according to the hit man, this dark history could have been written much differently. In a recent interview, Murdock told me that he wouldn't have killed Alaimo - or anyone else - if Canada had a death

penalty. "Without a thought I would not have done any of the killings," he reveals. "Capital punishment would have deterred me." Sobering words to hear from an admitted serial murderer, and for me, a staunch opponent of capital punishment, they raised an unsettling question: Could capital punishment actually be a deterrent? If so, it could reshape the world of contract killers. Certainly mob bosses and other gangsters in Canada see very little downside in ordering hits. >>Murdock, imposing at over six foot one and a muscular 250 pounds, says that he is remorseful about killing Alaimo. Murdock says, "I don't feel good about killing people. I fucked up and I feel like shit." Though the 43-year-old now holds to a pumping iron regimen, he wasn't always so disciplined. The period following the 1997 murders of the two mobsters led Murdock deep into an extended cocaine binge. He didn't eat or sleep for long periods of time; when he did sleep, he had nightmares. He was a complete mess. So it was that, a year after his killing of Papalia and Barillaro, he was happy to iniate a deal that traded his freedom for peace of mind and a kind of atonement for his many brutal crimes. "I said I'd do the time," he says. "I'll pay the price. Give me 12, life, I'm happy. I don't shy away from what I've done. It was wrong, but I ain't going to run from it. I'm going to do my time." >> >>Murdock is now in the eighth year of a life sentence. The term was originally to have been 12 years to life; he had agreed to an extra year before the possibility of parole, as his lawyer had proposed during plea-bargaining negotiations. Some lawyers agree that had Murdock bargained longer he probably could have had his sentence cut down to eight years. Murdock, however, wanted to serve the extra time as partially payment for his horrendous crimes. "Twelve years in jail," he says, "isn't enough for three murders." >>That's not just lip service. Murdock doesn't want special treatment or privileges. He has steadfastly refused to change his name, put himself in isolation and avoid the general prison population, live in hiding after prison or join any witness protection program. (The latter was offered as part of the plea bargain deal he made in exchange for his admission of the murders and testifying against Pat and Angelo Musitano, who he says ordered the two killings. Without Murdock's confession and deal, the police and the Crown had no evidence to charge either Murdock or the Musitanos for the mob hits.) "I believe my lawyer put something in about an identity change and all that other shit," Murdock claimed with bravado in June1999. "I didn't want it there. I don't want to change my name for fucking nobody. Enough is enough. I screwed up and I recognize that. Let me do my time and then let me spend some time with my family and then I'm dead." For all that, Murdock isn't worried about the possibility of retaliation. Reports of an imminent hit on Murdock may have expedited due process (he was charged, tried and convicted on the same day), but even when he was testifying in court or appearing in sensitive places, he refused to don a bulletproof vest. His perspective is at once deadly realistic and lightheartedly dismissive:. "If I got shot," he says simply, "someone would be doing me a favour." >>Ron Lalone, a veteran Peel Regional policeman who retired after two decades of service, believes that Murdock whom he has known since the Fall 1997 (when he was part of the management at the Hamilton strip club Hanrahan's) is not without redeeming qualities. "Ken Murdock is basically a very honest, loyal person who tries to do the right thing," Lalone insists. "He has trod a very difficult path to try to redeem himself for the very serious crimes that he had committed. However, Ken Murdock is a man of honour in my opinion - and I know a lot of people will find that very funny, ridiculous or ironic." Indeed, an honest "man of honour" is not how Hamiltonians would characterize Murdock. For 20 years, he was mostly a hardened criminal and a cold-blooded murderer - he

lived, loved, fought, robbed, got coked up and killed in the darkest parts of Steeltown's underworld. For three quarters of those amoral years he was also a member of the inner circle of the Musitano crime family. Not surprisingly, their verdict is harshest of all. Tony Musitano, now self-declared officially "retired" from the crime family, has said Murdock " is like a whore" for testifying against his nephews Pat and Angelo Musitano. For his part, Murdock denies having any regrets about testifying against the two Musitanos. "Cutting my ties to the Musitanos," he says, "was the best thing I have done in my life." >>A man of contradictions, Murdock now realizes that his life as a professional criminal and Mafia hit man was a big mistake and claims to feel profound remorse about his former life. " I beat up on myself a lot," he admits. "I feel bad on the inside for what I've done, but I'm now taking responsibility for what I did. I am paying for it with my 13 years to life." Murdock says, "getting life makes me feel better about myself. I am so happy to find the strength to say that enough is enough, happy that I found the strength to break through." Even so, Murdock admits to being lonely and often isolates himself, though he continues to live in the general population rather than under protective custody. "No one can hurt me more than I hurt myself," he says, adopting in a psychological language possibly gleaned from his time with a prison psychologist and a college level course in psychology (he has also studied philosophy in prison). Using his newly learned psychobabble to explain his feelings, Murdock now says "There is a big void now that half my life has been taken away... and it takes time to fill that void - to expand." >> >>Murdock says that his long road back from self loathing and despair began on June 23, 1999. On that day he looked away from cross-examining attorney Dean Paquette in a preliminary hearing of Pat and Angelo Musitano for ordering the Papalia and Barillaro hits, and addressed the defendants directly. "This is the hardest thing for me to do right here [testifying against them]," he admitted. "It's tearing me apart inside, because I do love these guys..." Pat Musitano looked up incredulously. Murdock then addressed young Angelo (then just 21), once a close friend whom he had known and protected since Ang was just seven. "Do you understand?" he asked poignantly. "Even though you don't believe it, I know you are hurt. I'm fucking hurt." At this point, Mr. Justice Culver strongly suggested that Murdock address the court or Paquette rather than the defendants. >>Even today, Murdock remains emotional about that pivotal moment. "I was exasperated at what was being said [in the cross-examination]," he explains. "This was coming from my heart... I was hurt... I had made a promise to protect them [Pat and Angelo] but I did something for them that I did not feel good about... I was struggling with these conflicting feelings." That anguish over his testimony against the two Musitanos is one of the central conflicts Murdock has had to cope with since testifying against his former "family" members. These were close friends who at one point gave him a beautiful and expensive gold signet ring with his initials on it, a mark of the great respect in which he was held by the entire Musitano crime family. These were dear friends whom he had promised to protect, and for whom he had murdered. >>Nothing of his former life seems to have prepared him for that wrenching conflict. Asked how he lived with himself when he was an enforcer and hit man, Murdock said that when you are living the criminal life "you just don't think about it. You get by anyway you can." His coping mechanisms might include lots of women, cocaine and money. He enjoyed a feeling of power, but now realizes that it was an illusory glory. Even while he was at the top of his game, others were working to "screw" him out of jealousy or rivalry - allies included. While in the

mob family, Murdock says he was "always getting screwed one way or the other" by the Musitanos and claims he "doesn't give a shit about Pat and Ang Musitano anymore." (He has since lost the gold signet and could care less about its loss.) Murdock maintains that unlike old Dominic, Pat Musitano "is not a leader" but rather someone in love with the idea of the mafia but without the smarts to run a family in an organized fashion: "Pat wanted to kill Remo Commisso [a longtime Toronto mob boss], Johnny K-9 [John Croitoru, a wrestler and the former Satan's Choice president later charged with the 1998 double murder of Ancaster lawyer Lynn Gilbank and her husband Fred], the Luppinos [an old Hamilton mob family], hosts of people. Pat was going a bit crazy with this Godfather nonsense - he was going to have everyone killed... They overreached themselves big time." Murdock characterizes the family under Pat as "dysfunctional". Conversely, Murdock describes Domenic as a "very loyal, honourable man" who knew how to run a mafia family. >>Lalone, who is now working on a feature film treatment of Murdock's life, has a similarly charitable estimation of the hit man. He remembers Murdock as a customer who was "polite and well-behaved," though his dark celebrity would ripple through a room. "His entrance would cause a bit of a stir," lalone admits. "Some people would kind of stop their conversations and look over to see where he was going and to whom he was talking to, Ken definitely had a presence about him. It was obvious that he carried a lot of weight and people would be intimidated by him. This is even though he was not known to have murdered people. But he had a big reputation as a tough guy, and he was certainly known to be connected." Lalone also says that Murdock is "a real gentleman and a stand-up guy." >How do you start to account for that stark contrast? How can such a stand-up ge ntleman also be a violent criminal and a brutal murderer? part threeWhen I talked to Murdock at length in February and March, he seemed at times soft-spoken and sensitive, a dramatic departure from the hard-boiled enforcer all too used to the brutal laws of the underworld. Murdock appeared to me as a thoughtful man, if a man of paradoxes. He was also full of well-intentioned cliches; one he echoes several times was the mantra, "A promise made is a promise kept." But he was referring to promises to both protect and help people and promises to seriously hurt and even to eliminate people. After hours of talking with him, I don't know that I came any closer to accounting for his redemptive about-face. All the same, there was something straightforward and direct that I came to like about this clearly conflicted and quintessential outsider. It might be that he is, for better and for worse, a product of his environment. "He was certainly created by the town and the people he encountered along the way," Lalone opines. "Murdock was a man of his surroundings and life style and circumstances and he has trod a very difficult path to try to redeem him for the very serious crimes that he had committed." >>There's a simple reason for those contradictions, of course. Murdock himself says that he had three separate, somewhat compartmentalized lives and identities: one as a real family man (a son, a brother, a husband, lover and father), one as a Musitano hit man and family member, and a third as a friend to many people, legitimate and criminals. In all three of these identities Murdock was loyal, protective, considerate and often single-mindedly consistent. For a long time luckily these three lives fortunately didn't intersect very often. In all of his killings for the Musitanos, Murdock was almost completely robotic and impulsively motivated by loyalty to the 'family'. Hearing him recount his early years, you begin to get a sense of where that kind of loyalty comes from.

>Ken Murdock was born in the Beach Strip area of Hamilton near Lake Ontario in 1 962.His father disappeared from the scene very early. "I had no dad," he says with blunt poignancy. "I had no role model." He lived with his mother and her various boyfriends. His mother's longtime partner was well-known local rounder and a career criminal Big John Akister, who moved in with the family when Ken was six. He now says that Akister, who died in 1995, had a "major influence" on his life. >>One defining episode from those years took place when Murdock was just six. Ken remembers it as one of the most terrifying, traumatic moments of his youth. "I was in the bedroom and there was argument between two close fem ale relative and Big John Akister and [another man].They had been mouthing off a bout something. There was a gunshot. The television was shattered. Then there wa s another gunshot and my relative was covered in what I thought was blood. I wa s in my bedroom but could see it all from a crack in the door. She was all red. I was very scared... I slipped out of house and crawled under the vehicle of the Love Brothers [local wrestlers] and fell asleep. I didn't learn until the next day that a ketchup bottle in my relative s hand had been shattered by the shot, but she had not been hurt." >>Domestic drama aside, the other major change in Ken's life was the move when he was 15 from the middle-class Beach Strip, bordered by Lake Ontario and a seasonal amusement park, to the tough, gritty inner-city world of the North End. There, the teenaged Ken, large but short on street smarts or fighting skills, was a target of bullies, constantly assaulted by groups of boys. The frustration built to a blind rage. One day he grabbed a large ceremonial sword and chased some of the boys, nearly decapitating one of them with it. Akister was incensed and quickly educated the boy on the consequences of using a sword. Murdock, then 16, decided to learn the martial arts and other fighting techniques. A year later, he was proficient at karate and boxing and soon became respected in the neighborhood for his fighting prowess. People left him alone, and soon it was Ken who became the one to be feared. He was getting into fights a lot and enjoyed his new power. The period also marked the beginning of his involvement in the criminal underworld. By 18, he had done his first prison stint, for assault. >>From 18 to 22, when not in jail Ken primarily worked at a marina, though he briefly managed to get a great job at Dofasco as a line clerk and steel quality control officer, gaining invaluable experience in welding. Murdock boasted to me that his boss there described him as "a definite asset to the company." At about the same time, though, Murdock beat his brother-in-law senseless. The brother-in-law had walked in on Murdock's naked wife and just stood there looking at her for far too long. The assault landed Murdock in jail and cost him his legitimate job. >>Murdock eventually ended up in Collins Bay Prison near Kingston with his stepfather, who was also doing time there. Through Akister and others, he met many other criminals: Toronto mafia boss Rocco Zito (who played his Spanish guitar in the cell opposite him and frequently came to his Murdock s own cell for coffee since he had an expresso maker), Hamilton street gangster Luce Pietrorazio, and - fatefully - Domenic and Tony Musitano. Murdock immediately hit it off with Domenic, the old mafia don doing hard time for a series of arsons and extortions and for ordering the killing of young Toronto mafia hotshot Domenic Racco. By the time he left Collins Bay in 1985, Ken was so close to the Musitanos that he assured them that he would help "look after" and "take care" of Domenic's boys, seven-year-old Angelo (Ang), Domenic Jr, and Pat (then 16).

>>Soon, Murdock was an unofficial member of the Musitano family. Now he had a real family with a strong father figure and boys to protect and help educate. He kept his promise to the Musitanos and formed a strong bond with the Musitano kids, especially Pat and Ang. For the first time, Murdock had something that approximated a family and in a funny way a career, albeit that of Musitano enforcer and killer. From 1985 to 1997, when not incarcerated, Murdock says he worked "on and off" for the Musitanos while continuing to work legitimately as a bouncer and later at a Hamilton auto body shop. He also continued his own street criminal career selling drugs, robbing a jewelry store, and doing freelance enforcement work. Sometimes he paid the price for flouting the law: he served four years in prison for a jewelry store robbery in November 1989 during which he physically assaulted the store's owner. After being nabbed for the crime in 1990, Murdock tried to use his inside information on the Alaimo hit to get the Hamilton police off his back. He misled the police, though, and gave them information only on his driver and lookout man. Neglecting to mention that he was the trigger man, he fingered one of his accomplices for the murder. The cops stupidly dropped the negotiations. H e went to prison after being convicted for the robbery in 1992 and stayed there until early 1997. That checkered resume speaks to the fact that Murdock was never a professional hit man in the sense that he learned a skilled trade. He had dubious mentors in the Musitanos (the two erratic hit teams they sent out in 1983 to kill Domenic Racco were comprised mainly of drunks and braggarts), and his hits were not very well-planned. They were lethal all the same. >> >>The first time Ken Murdock met Johnny "Pops" Papalia was just 20 minutes before he killed him. He knew the legendary stories of the well-known Mafioso. Murdock's stepdad had told of being in the can with the well-known gangster in the '70s. Akister described saving Papalia from serious harm in prison when the mafioso was given an apple with a hidden blade in it. Papalia was very thankful for Akister's timely intervention at the time, but according to the young Musitanos' lawyer John Rosen, Johnny later publicly snubbed Big John. Rosen argued that this was motive enough for Murdock to kill the mobster, but Murdock had no personal desire to harm let alone kill the aging, semi-retired don. >It was Pat Musitano who asked Murdock to kill "Pops" several weeks before the murder, allegedly because he owed Johnny a lot of money he couldn't repay and feared for his life. Murdock tried unsuccessfully to kill the 73-year-old Papalia in his apartment building a week before the actual murder, and again on Railway Street days before the hit, but both times he didn t think it was the right time. Finally, on the morning of May 31, 1997, at t he Musitano mob hang-out The Gathering Spot, an irritated Pat insisted that the hit man follow through. Musitano's sources told him that Papalia was at Railway Street, so why not act now? Impulsively, Murdock drove immediately home to get his .38, raced over to Railway Street, parked on the corner and bent the plates a bit on a truck borrowed from the auto body shop/towing service he was connected with. >>It was high noon when the killer strode boldly to the front door of Galaxy Vending. Inside he found two men and asked the first one who he recognized from photos as Papalia if he was Johnny. When he said yes, Murdock reached out and shook his hand, telling the don, "I'm Ken Murdock." He then asked the septungarian mafia boss if he would come outside to talk with him, as he knew Papalia used the outside front as an office, Papalia, who would have certainly heard of Murdock, went outside with him like a lamb to the slaughter. The don, whose father had been a mob boss in the 1910s and 1920s, was uncharacteristically trusting and

even gave Murdock a cigarette. When Papalia then asked Murdock what he needed to talk about, Murdock spun an invention that Papalia could presumably relate to: Pat Musitano owed him a lot of money, which he refused to pay back. "How should I go after Pat?" he asked the Godfather, knowing that Papalia was really Pat's godfather. Papalia gave it some thought, then answered as they walked around in front the building that had been a mobster haunt for decades. "Whatever you do," he said, "I do not wish to be involved." >>This was the wrong answer. To Murdock, it suggested that Johnny wouldn't mind if Pat Musitano were killed and thus confirmed the story Pat had t old him. Murdock then terminated the conversation by shooting Papalia in the back of the head at close range. Papalia was instantly killed. Murdock calmly returned to his vehicle parked half a block away, dropped the truck back at the auto body shop and went home. Later that afternoon, his adrenaline still surging, Murdock stopped at the Gathering Spot where Pat rushed to meet him outside. Murdock told him that he had done the killing, and Musitano simply said that he had heard and thanked him, advising the hit man to get the hell out of there "because the place is crawling with cops." >>In the following weeks, Murdock continued discreetly meeting with the Musitanos. Angelo told him that there had been a major mob sit-down in Buffalo between senior members of the Papalia family and the Maggadino family, which for years had a major influence and control over mafia operations in Ontario. At one such meeting, allegedly between John's older brother Frank, Carmen Barillaro, and a Buffalo family boss, the talk turned to Pat Musitano. The group agreed that the evidence was that he had ordered the hit (Murdock had been seen by a Papalia associate at the time of the murder). Barillaro then stated angrily, " I'll take care of that fat piece of shit myself." Upon learning this, Pat quickly decided that he had to act first and demanded that Murdock and Angelo do the hit. On July 23,1997, the pair drove to Niagara Falls armed with a 9mm gun to kill Barillaro. Ang was so angry with Barillaro that he wanted to do the murder himself. Murdock, ever protective of the youngest Musitano, would not let him do it and ordered him to stay in the car as he approached the house. Murdock devised a strategy to knock on the door of his Corwin Avenue home and ask Barillaro if he wanted to sell his flashy red Corvette. Barillaro, who was on the phone with a friend, curtly told Murdock that he was not interested in selling the car and advised him to "get the fuck out of here." Murdock kept the door open with his foot and jumped inside. He then took out his 9mm gun and shot the gangster twice while telling the dying mafia thug, "This is a message from Pat." The news of Barillaro's sensational murder hit the papers the next day. Introspective and philosophical, the Ken Murdock of today is a far cry from the dangerously murderous thug of years past. He appears to have gleaned some wisdom from his hard-knocks rise and fall, and some perspective as well. Murdock has had a unique perch to analyze the scope and power of the Mafia in Hamilton. He says that while there are several mafia families operating, there are also many other what he calls "circles " of criminals co-existing with the traditional mafia including bikers, Asian gangs and many other street gangs. Hamilton has long been where the heart beats for the Mafia in Ontario. Murdock believes that the authorities should have wiped out the Mafia in the late 1920s through decisive action, but that instead they allowed it to grow and prosper over the next fifty years, But, "the Mafia today is dysfunctional," according to Murdock. In fact Murdock heartily laughed when I asked him about the mafia in Hamilton today. "It is not an organization," he insisted. "It should be called disorganized crime not organized crime.

It is very overrated and romanticized. Everything is done on the spur without much planning or thought. The Hell Angels and the triads are more together." Judging by how easy it was for him to kill Barillaro and Papalia, long considered by police to be the top godfather in Ontario, it seems that many mafiosi don't take precautions, foolhardy considering their line of work. Respect on the street is one thing, but it won't stop a bullet. It's a lesson slow to sink in. Many powerful bosses in the U.S. and Canada have been the victim of murder over the last century, and guns are certainly more plentiful than ever. >>When I asked Murdock about the growing gun problem in Canadian cities and the recent Federal Liberal promise to ban guns, he laughed. "There will always be lots of guns here," he insisted. "They're just so easy to get. Many of the ones we got arrived fresh in wraps from stores in Niagara Falls, New York. All types: .45s, .38s, you name it. We often brought them back right in trunks of our cars... Guns are very available in Hamilton and across Ontario because of the U.S. proximity and underworld trade." Talk turns to gang gun violence in Toronto and Murdock weighs in with a blunt assessment: "Criminals are shooting each other. Everyone thinks they're somebody with a gun, but it isn't right to kill innocent people." The irony of his words seems to escape him, but he speaks them with conviction. >>Despite years as a street tough, Murdock is surprisingly a big time law and order conservative, a startling incongruity for a man whose litany of criminal convictions date back to 1980 include assault, robbery, drug trafficking, use of dangerous weapons, extortion and murder. Yet he now strongly believes that the entire justice system needs to be "reorganized," and that parole should be revamped. "There have to be consequences for your actions," says the man whose bloodyRE criminal career on the streets of Hamilton spanned 20 years. "Sentences should be longer and criminals should have to serve their whole sentence.Any parole given should be earned not automatic. >>Domenic and Tony Musitano, who had ordered the hits on Racco, were lucky in that they didn't really serve any extra time in prison for the killing; Domenic served only two and a half years for all the convictions; Tony served less than five under our generous parole system. The Musitanos have led a charmed life, ducking long prison sentences despite being found guilty of very serious crimes (arson, extortion and conspiracy to murder). The younger Musitanos, Pat and Angelo, seem to be following this tradition as they only received 10 years in 2000 for admitting to ordering a hit and are expected to be out of prison in October, having served two-thirds of their sentences which is when mandatory parole kicks in under the current system. (Pat was recently transferred from the medium-security Warkworth Penitentiary to the minimum-security Beaver Creek facility, dirisively known as Club Fed.) Their cross-generational average maximum of six years for ordering contract killings is sobering stuff. Under the current system, Murdock himself should be out on parole by 2012, at which point he says he will return to the Hamilton area and live under his own name. He claims to be unafraid of reprisals from the Musitanos, whom he feels have more than enough of their own credibility problems on the street. In any case, Hamilton is Murdock's town. He was born and he will probably die in its tough, gritty streets. In the interim, Murdock wants to be relocated from his prison far away from Hamilton to a prison in Ontario so that he can be closer to his own family. >>But what will be the fate of the Musitanos when they emerge from prison as expected later this year? Will Pat and Angelo, like their uncle Tony, try to go legitimate? This is what Murdock now devoutly hopes for them. In spite of all the grief and pain the younger Musitanos have brought to Murdock's life he is trying to put his anger behind him.

Ever the loyal friend Murdock is now displaying magnanimity towards Pat and Angelo Musitano. "I hope they learn something from all of this. I hope they get out of it [the Mafia],"the former hit man says, before adding a vaguely ominous coda: "I also hope they don't get hurt." >> >>- - - - >> >>For the past three decades, James Dubro has been a well -known crime-writer on organized crime and policing, documentary filmmaker and author. He has published five best-selling books, including Mob Rule, King of the Mob: Rococo Perri and the Women who ran His Rackets, and Dragons of Crime and helped to produce, research and write many television documentaries including CBC's famed Connections television series, programs on organized crime for CityTV, [Newsworld?] "Rough Cuts" and "Witness". He co-authored the definition of organized crime for the "Canadian Encyclopedia." He is the past President of the Crime Writers of Canada (CWC) as well as the winner of the CWC's Derrick Murdoch lifetime achievement award, and a contributor to magazines as diverse as Canadian Business, Toronto Life, and Eighteenth Century Life. He recently published an in-depth introduction to a new edition of Morley Callaghan's acclaimed 1928 debut novel Strange Fugitive (Exile Editions). In the late '90s, Dubro was qualified as an "expert witness" on organized crime by an Ontario court. He is currently working as a special consultant for a History Channel television series entitled MobStories I I for 2007. He resides in Toronto.