Mafia boss Pat Musitano, who struggled to push his Hamilton based mob family to greater underworld
power, was shot dead Friday after dodging death for years. The Mob Reporter here from the scene of
Musitano's gangland murder in Burlington, Canada. He dropped dead at the scene after a gunman opened
up on Pat, beside his black bulletproof GMC Yukon Denali. He was not alone in the parking lot, sources
tell me. Pat was with two trusted insiders: his cousin Pino Avignon, and a longtime mob associate
John Cleary. After Pat was gunned down, I am told, Avignon and Clary chased the gunman as he peeled
away, apparently hitting the getaway car with their own car. But the lone assassin escaped. Clary was
shot in the attack and is in hospital. The crime scene shows what was left behind. Pat's armored
SUV is parked beside a black Mercedes sedan. Police were examining both vehicles very carefully at the
edge of the parking lot. Partly out on the street is a Lincoln sedan. This, I'm told, was the vehicle
Clary was in. It seems to have hit the getaway vehicle as it left. Perhaps the gunman shot at
the Lincoln to stop the pursuit. Regardless of how it went down, it is hard to be shocked that Pat was
finally killed. He knew he had enemies. Everyone did. Just a year ago he was shot in an almost identical
circumstance. He was beside the same armored SUV visiting his lawyer's office in Mississauga. He
took four bullets that day — including one to his head. Remarkably, instead of paralysis or
brain damage, he was sitting up in a chair the next day complaining of the hospital's food. Musitano
symbolized the modern mob in Hamilton because of his archetype gangster appearance, his enormous
girth, his throaty voice, his gangster chic — and the mayhem that shadowed him. He was a decidedly
blue-collar mobster who loved cars, hockey, hanging out in bars and restaurants, wearing dark
sunglasses and dressed in suits — always custom-made because of his size. And sometimes a silk scarf
draped around his neck. Musitano was born into the Mafia as the eldest son of a Mafia boss and
he embraced his outlaw culture until his final day. He knew exactly what his father Dominic Musitano
was and what his family name and lineage meant. When his father died after a heart attack in 1995,
Pat Musitano took over the family business. He was more aggressive than his father. He pushed to
bring his mob family to greater underworld power. There were two Mafia figures who stood in his way:
"Johnny Pops" Papalia was shot dead in the parking lot of his vending machine business. Two months
later, Carmen Barillaro, Niagara's crime boss, was shot dead in his home. The triggerman for both hits
said Pat ordered the killings. Pat then hitched his wagon to the burgeoning power of the Rizzuto crime
family from Montreal, under the Sicilian mobster Vito Rizzuto. It may have seemed a safe bet but
Pat's timing was terrible. He didn't get a chance to enjoy the spoils. Pat was arrested for the
Papalia killing when Rizzuto took Ontario and by the time he was released from prison
Rizzuto was extradited to the United States for the notorious murder of the three Capo's of the
Bonanno family. The Rizzuto family was crippled and the Calabrian gangsters who felt betrayed by Pat
were taking power back. Everyone was waiting for Pat to meet gangland retribution. He dodged several
attempts but his luck ran out in the parking lot of a low-rent mall on a sweltering day in July
He lived his life like a gangster and he died like a gangster
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