Frank Cotroni

His oldest brother, Vincenzo, was 20 years older, born in 1911 in Mammola, Calabria, Italy, and immigrated to Montreal in 1924 with his two sisters, Marguerita and Palmina, and his brother Giuseppe; his other brother, Michel, was later born in Montreal like Frank.

Within Montreal, Cotroni was known to French-Canadians as Le Gros ("the Big Guy") and to Italo-Canadians as Il Cice (an Italian phrase for the soft center of a hard nut).

Cotroni was fluently trilingual, speaking Italian, French and English.

Unlike his older brother Vic who always spoke his French with a strong Italian accent, Frank spoke joual (Quebec French) like a native speaker.

Cotroni was described as being more comfortable speaking French than Italian.

Likewise, Frank married into a French-Canadian family and regarded himself as a Quebecois.

Cotroni grew up in a house at the junction of Ontario and St. Timotheé streets in Le Plateau-Mont-Royal (now in Montreal), a poor neighbourhood that more affluent Italian immigrants avoided because of its high crime rate.

His father, Nicodemo, was a carpenter whose average weekly income was $35.

His older brother, Vincenzo, had become involved in organized crime in the late 1920s, and in the 1930s was involved in "baseball bat elections" where he served as "muscle" for the Quebec Liberal Party and the Union Nationale, beating up supporters of rival parties and stuffing ballot boxes.

As a result of Vincenzo's work in "baseball bat elections", the Cotroni family enjoyed the protection of Quebec politicians for decades afterward.

His family, including his brother Vincenzo, had immigrated to Montreal in 1924, from Mammola, Calabria, Italy.

His brother founded and headed the Cotroni crime family.

Cotroni's principle illicit businesses were drug trafficking and labor racketeering, while he also worked at various times as a restaurateur, boxing promoter, owner of strip clubs in both Montreal and Toronto, ceramic manufacturer, and owner of a vending machine company.

Cotroni was born in 1931, in Montreal.

Cotroni was born in Montreal in 1931.

In 1950, Cotroni was convicted of the possession of stolen goods, serving a short sentence on the account of his age.

Between 1953 and 1957, New York mobster Carmine Galante lived in Montreal, and during his time in Canada, Galante forged an alliance between the Bonanno family of New York and the Cotroni family of Montreal that cemented the Controi family as the dominant organized crime group in Montreal.

On 24 July 1956, he was arrested for taking part in a wild street brawl that left several men injured.

Cotroni was first arrested as an adult in September 1960 for the possession of a deadly weapon, being found carrying a handgun.

While on bail, in November 1960, Cotroni led 30 of his men into smashing up the Chez Parée Cabaret, for which he was fined $200.

On 4 November 1960, Cotroni and his men marched into the Chez Parée and smashed everything with baseball bats that caused $30,000 in damages.

Cotroni was heard to shout in French, "They will pay me, even if I have to wait until I die".

Cotroni and his men were arrested leaving the Chez Parée.

A group of students from McGill University were being held in the Montreal jail following allegations of drunken behavior and throwing a beer bottle at a police officer.

Cotroni and his men were placed into the same jail cell and the students were impressed with Cotroni's kindness as he gave his expensive fur coat to a student who had no coat.

The students were later shocked to learn that the same man who behaved in a kindly fashion to them was the same man who destroyed the Chez Parée earlier that night.

On 1 July 1966, he rented a house at 5146 Trans-Island Street, which was directly opposite a branch of the Decarie Boulevard City and District Savings Bank.

A group of men consisting of Paul Désormier Sr.; his three sons, Michel, Paul Jr. and Pierre; and Joe Horvath of the West End Gang started to dig a tunnel from the basement of the house that Cotroni rented to the vault of the bank across the street.

During the violent Mafia war with the Sicilian Rizzuto crime family in Montreal, Paolo Violi (who was acting capo for Vic Cotroni) and his brothers were murdered along with others through the mid-1970s to the early 1980s until the war ceased.

Cotroni had connections with the Bonanno crime family, and in 1975, was convicted in the United States of smuggling cocaine and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

In prison, Cotroni met fellow inmate French-Canadian Réal Simard, and Simard would become Frank's driver and eventual hitman upon their release in 1979.

The Calabrian faction continued to operate with Frank as acting boss for his ill brother after the early 1980s.

In the early 1980s, Cotroni ordered Simard to commit several murders.

In 1983, Simard and associate Richard Clément killed Mario Héroux, but unknowingly only severely wounded Robert Hétu, in their Toronto hotel room after they conspired to kill Clément.

Hétu testified against Simard and Simard was arrested and convicted, until he became an informant against Frank Cotroni and the family; this resulted in an eight-year sentence for manslaughter against Frank, his son Francesco, and two associates in 1987.

In 1989, Cotroni lost his court fight against extradition on narcotics charges in Connecticut that dated back to 1983, on the condition that he serve his time in Canada.

In 1997, he was again charged on narcotics violations, and released from prison in 2002 after serving four years of a seven-year sentence.

In the final two years of Frank's life, he released a cookbook, Cuisine des souvenirs et recettes (Kitchen of Memories and Recipes), published by a subsidiary of Quebecor Media.

Frank Cotroni (born Francesco Cotrone; ; 1931 – 17 August 2004) was an Italian-Canadian crime boss of the Cotroni crime family in Montreal, Quebec.

Cotroni died of brain cancer on 17 August 2004.