Giovanni Cazzetta

Giovanni "Johnny" Cazzetta (born 1957) is a Canadian outlaw biker and gangster who, along with his brother Salvatore Cazzetta, was a co-founder of the Rock Machine Motorcycle Club in Montreal.

He was the club's second in command, and also had considerable connections with Quebec's Mafia figures.

Cazzetta was born in Montreal, Quebec, in 1957.

He and his brother Salvatore grew up in the city's Saint-Henri neighborhood, which was known as a territory of the Dubois brothers.

Giovanni acknowledged during his trial that he had spent his younger years "basically raising himself", and that he had made a conscious decision to take up a life of organized crime for monetary gain.

At some point in the 1970s, he joined the SS Motorcycle Club with his brother.

Salvatore and Maurice "Mom" Boucher were leaders of the SS, which had been labeled a anti-immigration group and which was under consideration for an invitation to join the Hells Angels.

In 1977, he and Salvatore were charged with robbery and breaking and entering.

They had broken into a local bar and attempted to steal money from the cigarette machines, although they found only $300.

The police arrived and while hiding in the bar's basement, Salvatore attempted to attack an officer.

For this he received a two year sentence.

The Rock Machine flourished under the leadership of the Cazzetta brothers, and throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, the club began to use their contacts in the West End Gang to purchase large and import amounts of narcotics through the Port of Montreal.

Both the Rock Machine and the Hell Angels remained on peaceful terms for years.

There were multiple factors to this; Salvatore Cazzetta and Boucher were "longtime friends" and possessed a great amount of respect for one another.

The Cazzetta brothers also had business dealings and ties with Italian-Canadian Mafia groups in Quebec, particularly the Sicilian Rizzuto family.

As the Mafia imported large amounts of narcotics through the port of Montreal, the Rock Machine acted as one of their distributors, supplying drugs to street-level operations to be sold.

Cazzetta was particularly involved with the Mafia, being friends with several high profile Mafia members.

These operations gained the club considerable notoriety and influence in Quebec's criminal underground.

According to Parker, the Hells Angels would not instigate any issues against the Rock Machine out of concern that the powerful Rizzuto family would directly intervene on the Rock Machine's behalf.

It was said that the Cazzetta brothers were related to a member of the Rizzuto family.

When the SS was disbanded in 1984, Giovanni and Salvatore Cazzetta, Paul "Sasquatch" Porter and others chose not to join the Hells Angels.

Following the Hells Angels' internal Lennoxville massacre of 1985, which occurred when five senior members were ambushed and killed due to elements within the club's Montreal chapter suspecting they were embezzling club profits, the Cazzetta brothers and Boucher went their separate ways.

According to true crime author RJ Parker, the massacre was met with distrust within other elements of Quebec's underworld.

According to Parker, the Cazzetta brothers were closely related to a senior member of the Rizzuto crime family, and thus adopted the position that underworld members should not kill other members of their own club.

Boucher joined the Hells Angels.

In 1986, the Cazzetta brothers and other former members of the SS formed the Rock Machine motorcycle gang.

That same year Boucher, was released from prison.

The Cazzetta brothers offered Boucher membership in the Rock Machine, but he declined the offer.

The Rock Machine established its first chapter in the city of Montreal and began taking over turf formerly controlled by the Montreal chapter of the Hells Angels, which had been weakened by the Lennoxville massacre.

Cazzetta held the position of second-in-command, with only his brother Salvatore holding more influence.

The Cazzetta brothers recruited some of the best talent available, and by the early 1990s, the Rock Machine had over 100 members or prospective members between its Montreal and Quebec City chapters.

The Rock Machine also formed alliances with the Rizzuto family, the West End Gang, and the Dubois Gang.

In April 1992, Cazzetta was arrested by police and charged with trafficking narcotics.

Police had found him to be in position of three kilograms of cocaine (valued at $2.25 million, modern equivalent of $4,893,052).

In the spring of 1993, he pleaded guilty to four charges and was sentenced to four years in prison.

The Rock Machine's cocaine smuggling and distribution resulted in increased police scrutiny, and 1994, Salvatore Cazzetta was arrested with eleven tons of cocaine.

The Cazzetta brothers' detention triggered Boucher to attack the Rock Machine to instigate the Quebec Biker War.

The conflict lasted eight years, and many innocent bystanders were hurt or killed.

While Salvatore Cazzetta was in prison during the entirety of the war, Giovanni Cazzetta would be temporarily released.

Cazzetta was released from prison in early 1997 and continued as a senior member of the Rock Machine.