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Oakville Beaver | Thursday, January 19, insidehalton.com © I OPINION -ALLEGED GANGSTER'S PARADISE: THE UNDERCOVER RUSE oonnN METELSKY Columi EDITOR'S NOTE: The Following is Part 3ina four- part series on suspected gangster and murder vic- 0. in ‘El Chapo' an was violent and rose to power through ex- treme violence. That was a feature of the Mexican Si- naloa cartel," said Antonio Nicaso, Queen's University professor, organized crime expert and author of more than 40 books on the sub- “ Chapo and his orga- nization were the main supplier of cocaine and shipped huge quantities of it into Canada," added Ni- caso. The joint Halton and RCMP investigation — dubbed Project Canuck — ‘cepted two million. dollars i incash destined for El Chapo. Project Canuck went in- to high gear. Surreptitious cameras were covertly in- stalled in several locations, phone lines were tapped and the surveillance of Sukhvir Deo continued. Always Here HALTON CRIME, CONFIDENTIAL, Be tteee Deo and his crew never spoke on the "tapped lines” about any nefarious activ- ities. They ans in codeor in other langu: Investigators v were con- fident all their private con- versations were occurring on phones equipped with “pretty good privacy” —an encrypted app known as PGP. Constant references of "go to the thing" led po- lice to believe all the tar- gets were switching over to untapped phones equipped with PGP. The PNR - - dial num ber recorde! ‘ech nique enabling police i re- cord numbers from target- ed phones during an inves- igation — reaped some intelligence that caught the attention of the DEA ‘Drug Enforcement Ad- ministration) and Home- land Security. Deo frequently commu- nicated with a contact in Los Angeles he referred to by the nickname we “the broker" — who travelled frequently bimeen ‘Toron- to and Los eles. Police believed the "broker" was the conduit between Deo 1 Koln [=)/ om Co) UL v Patient Counselling v Complete Diabetic Care ¥ Vaccinations ¥ Cholesterol, AIC, AFib and DNA Screening and the cartel who bro- kKered money and cocaine shipments into Canada. s also seen meet- ‘os The DNRs confirmed they were also communicating over the phone. The sur- veillance team observed a lot of activity, which in- cluded Deo moving large duffel bags and suitcases around the Greater Toron- to Area. "Dean Costanza was in- volved in drug deals and drug investigations,” John Mans, a retired detec- tive sergeant, formerly in charge of Halton's intelli- gence unit. As reported earlier by the Toronto Star, a project from Niagara region dubbed Project Ink — in- volved a gang with connec- tivity to Mexico's Sinaloa cartel and the importation of cocaine into Canada in 2012. Canadian court docu- ments from that project re- vealed Nick Ne e gang's leader, had issued a murder contract on Dean Costanza. Nero was later convicted of cocaine im- portation and first-deg! murder — for a different homicide. Police believe Deo's re- location to Ontario in 2013, after Nero's incarceration, was no coincidence. Deo came to Oakville to fill the void left by the damage Project Ink inflicted SHOPPERS DRUG MART DE RANGO PHARMACY INC. 2501 Third Line 905-465-3000 NOW OPEN 24 HRS EVERY DAY 478 Dundas Street West 905-257-9737 Sr en www.shoppersdrugmart.ca Halton police photo SUKHVIR DEO 2 ladim, a former Halton drug and intelli- gence sergeant whoretired in 2022, confirmed the un- derworld connectivity of transnational organized crime is multilayered and Deo was in the centre of it all. “Dean Costanza and Joe Catroppa used to live gether in Halton," said Me fa- dim. Police confirmed they ean. cand Catroppa) is ties to the Musiene, ‘crime family in lamilton — namely mob- ster brothers Pat and An- elo. All four men, Costanza, Catroppa and the Musita- no brothers, have since been murdered — all shot to death. Two of the homi- Right ¢ Pr cides are unsolved mur- ders in the region of Hal- n. Costanza was gunned down in his car as he sat in his Oakville driveway on Dec. 3, 2017. Pat Musitano was shot ina Burlington parking lot on July 10, 2020. Angelo was murdered in Waterdown on May 2, 2017, and Catroppa was shot in Mexico on Sept. 27, 2020. However, in 2013, during the height of Project Ca- nuck, the connection es- tablished between Deo and Costanza was extremely significant. Yet, with ten- sions running high be- tween Halton and RCMP investigators, the team hit a roadblock as the lack of any tangible evidence “ ‘on, er operation. Investigators knew it would be a daunt- ing task infiltrating Deo's crew. “From my experience, I can't imagine infiltrati an international cartel," said Nadim, a former Hal- ton undercover operator, trained at the o highest le level by CISO— i telligence Senvice of Ont rio. "It's not impossible, but would be very chal- lenging.” Recognizing those diffi- culties, the project team fo- cused on the two brothers and ites" Catch a Great Deal! Toronto area. Intelligence investigators created a fic- titious marketing compa- ny with a fully backstop- ped cover story that in- cluded a functioning web- page and phone lines that would be answered by un- dercover operators if any- one called. The ruse involved acon- test. Two undercover oper- ators, posing as employees for the marketing compa- ny, handed out flyers door- to-door asking potential contestants to fill outa sur- vey that would automati- ally enter them in the con- test towina {elevision and gaming syst © two "associates" won othe contest. They had taken the bait from the co- vert hook. Days later when em- ployees of the marketing company installed the TV, no one suspected they were intelligence techni- cians until the hidden mi- crophones picked up a phone conversation one of the Brothers later had with family member about H the contest. "You idiots, that's the cops," the voice on the oth- er line said. The "wire had been mmpromised” and police had to act quickly. Part 4: Hitmen and mur- derous carnage Stephen Metelsky is an author, professor and retired HRPS detective. Twitter @StephenMeiel sky. Have a story idea? Reach him at HaltonCri- meConfiden- tial@gmail.com. Browse Price. @autocatch... Province, popular Cities or by the right price!