DEAD MOBSTER'S CREW ARRESTED, POLICE ALLEGE

'Multicultural': 32 Suspects Rounded up from Ontario, N.B. and N.Y.

If Gaetano Panepinto, a discount coffin seller and Mafia strongman, had not
been shot dead two years ago when he drove his Cadillac into an ambush in a
well-to-do Toronto neighbourhood, he would have likely been charged
yesterday in a sweep police say mopped up the remnants of his criminal
organization.

As it was, police arrested 32 people from Ontario, New Brunswick and New
York State, who are accused of forming a major criminal organization
involved in drugs, credit card fraud, stolen goods and violence.

Among them is Juan Ramon Fernandez, the new boss of the group, police allege.

Mr. Fernandez, 45, had been banned for life from Canada. He has twice been
deported under armed escort to his native Spain, has a list of convictions
- -- including one stemming from a gangland slaying -- and is well known to
organized crime investigators in Montreal for his connections to top Mafia
figures.

Yet, police investigators said, he still managed to re-emerge in
Mississauga, under the alias of Joe Bravo, filling the void left by Mr.
Panepinto's murder.

Before Mr. Panepinto died, however, he attracted the attention of more than
his killers.

It was September, 2000, when a pair of experienced detectives with the York
Regional Police noticed the hulking Mob enforcer muscling his way to
prominence in the underworld north of Toronto. (The detectives did not want
to be named.)

"Panepinto was making every effort to establish himself as an organized
crime figure" said RCMP Chief Superintendent Ben Soave, who heads a special
anti-organized crime unit but was not involved in this case.

Mr. Panepinto was an obvious target for police.

Looking a bit like Arnold Schwarzenegger, he was a suspect in a myriad of
crimes and yet still spoke brazenly about his business, the Canadian
operations of Casket Royale, a U.S. firm offering discount caskets, urns
and funeral cards from storefront shops in competition with the more
expensive offerings from funeral homes.

His caskets ran from $295 for decorated pressboard to a bronze luxury model
for $4,900; he offered children's coffins for free and a denim-covered
model with cowboy decorations.

On Oct. 3, one month after the detectives opened their file, Mr. Panepinto
was followed from his home and ambushed, police believe. He was shot
repeatedly from a van that pulled up beside him. Who killed him remains a
mystery.

That sent the York police probe spinning in a new direction -- and also
offered up the code name for their operation -- Project R.I.P.

"There was a bit of a hiccup there in the investigation and it took us down
another road," said Detective Inspector Paul Sorel, officer in charge of
York's investigative services.

While Toronto police investigated the murder, York police shifted their
efforts to the rest of Mr. Panepinto's crew.

They had plenty to work with, police said.

They tracked marijuana, hidden in a spare tire in the back of a vehicle,
being smuggled from Canada into the United States.

There was a large pill press in St. Agathe, Que., that churned out
colourful tablets of Ecstasy, the popular nightclub and rave drug, by the
bushel.

There were at least 10 litres of gamma hydroxybutyrate, a liquid drug known
simply as GHB, that is sometimes used as a date-rape drug; anabolic
steroids, in liquid injection form and pills in blister packs; magic
mushrooms, an organic hallucinogen; and painkillers stolen from a pharmacy.

There were also sophisticated economic crimes, police allege.

Counterfeit credit cards were being created using a machine that steals the
data contained in a credit card's magnetic strip. Replicas were then made,
using a special embossing machine that spat out more than 100 credit cards,
which were used to buy furniture, electronic goods and alcohol, police allege.

Investigators also found a new man they believed was moving to claim the
leadership role of the organization, a man who came to the area from
Montreal and was later identified as Mr. Fernandez, police said.

Then came another significant development.

Officers learned of a huge cocaine shipment making its way to Canada under
the supervision of Mr. Fernandez, police allege. It was supposedly a load
of at least 100 kilograms, said Det.-Supt. Sorel.

At the same time, however, police say they uncovered a plot by Mr.
Fernandez to kill a rival drug baron.

That left officers with a dilemma: To prevent the murder of a crime figure
they had to spoil their probe of the drug shipment.

In May, Mr. Fernandez was arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit
murder.

"We arrested him, we had to. We had to intercede, but because we had to
arrest him we lost track of that big shipment of cocaine," said Det.-Supt.
Sorel. He does not know if the drugs ever landed.

There were other signs that violence surrounded the organization, police said.

In June, sticks of dynamite were found in the basement of a Vaughan home
when officers showed up with a search warrant, looking for evidence in
their credit card investigation.

Police evacuated the buildings around the home, removed the explosives and
arrested the couple who lived there.

And in other searches related to the case, police seized two Uzi submachine
guns with silencers, three pistols, a rifle and a replica hand grenade.

Mr. Fernandez has been associated with the Rizzuto Mafia organization in
Montreal for years, sources tell the National Post.

He came to Canada as a teenager but never took out citizenship, which left
him vulnerable to deportation when convicted of a criminal offence.

On March 6, 1987, Mr. Fernandez was barred from residing in Canada because
of his criminal past and taken under escort back to Spain. He returned
under a false name shortly afterwards.

He again faced criminal charges and again was deported, this time on April
3, 2001. And when these charges are dealt with, he will again face deportation.

The list of men and women arrested show how organized crime is evolving in
Canada, said Antonio Nicaso, an organized crime observer and co-author of
Bloodlines, a book chronicling Mafia activity in Canada.

"This is another operation that confirms the new criminal agreements that
are forged in the underworld.

"This is an organization that combined people from many backgrounds --
motorcycle gangs, Greek criminals, American couriers, Vietnamese, Romanian,
Italian.

"This shows the multicultural aspects of the underworld. This is the new
face of organized crime -- criminal partnerships that, 20 years ago, were
unthinkable."