PaperTrail Blog
Jump to full article: Center for Public Integrity, 2009-06-05
Author: William Marsden
Intro: The Center's International Consortium of Investigative Journalists has taken heat lately for exposing the large-scale tobacco smuggling out of U.S. and Canadian Indian reservations. The Mohawk News Network called us "untruthful" for linking the Indian trade to "bikers and other gangs," and concluded that "the Center serves Big Tobacco." One angry blogger branded our stories "a precursor to genocide."
Now comes word that Canadian police in Quebec this week have cracked down on what they are calling a major Hells Angels contraband tobacco and drug trafficking ring inside the Kahnawake Mohawk reserve near Montreal. About 60 police officers raided the bunker-like compound of Rice Mohawk Industries in an investigation code-named "Project Machine" and rounded up 46 people. Among those arrested were owner Peter Rice and his two sons Burton Rice and Peter Francis Rice. Also arrested was Salvatore Cazzetta, the reputed leader of the Montreal chapter of the Hells Angels.
Police say the Hells Angels used the Rice compound as a base for trafficking in contraband tobacco and crack cocaine. The men are charged with participating in a criminal organization that defrauded the Quebec and Canadian governments of millions of dollars in tobacco taxes. Cazzetta is also charged with drug trafficking.
In "Canada's Boom in Smuggled Cigarettes," ICIJ took readers inside a billion-dollar black market and revealed the close ties between Indian tobacco sellers and organized crime.
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