A man injured in a murderous attack at the Sicilian Sidewalk Café in Little Italy was an innocent bystander caught by a stray bullet, police say.
The man was sitting close to murder victim John Raposo, 35, on the packed patio at 3:32 p.m. on Monday at the popular ice cream shop at College St. and Montrose Ave. He was shot in the stomach with at least one bullet.
“He was just a patron of the café,” Toronto police Const. Victor Kwong said Wednesday.
The bystander was admitted to hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Police haven’t released his name.
A police officer who specializes in GTA organized crime said Raposo escaped an attack five years ago, which left one of his close friends dead.
Someone inside the café likely tipped off the hitman that Raposo was at the café watching the Italy-Ireland soccer game, the organized crime officer said.
The gunman fired about five times, catching Raposo at least once in the head.
“It was a thought-out, planned hit,” the officer said, adding that if Raposo was afraid of death, he didn’t show it.
The officer noted Raposo was close friends with mobster Eddie (Hurricane) Melo, who was shot to death in an underworld hit in April 2001 in a plaza near Hurontario St. and the QEW.
When Melo worried someone might plant a bomb under his car, Raposo volunteered to start it for him, the officer said.
“People would say that Raposo was crazier than Eddie,” the officer said.
Melo, a former professional boxer, was considered by police to be an enforcer for Montreal mobster Frank (Santos) Cotroni.
After leaving pro boxing, Melo made money through extortion and gambling machines as well as through mining stock promotion.
Raposo was considered to be fearless, even though he was not a tall man and wasn’t trained as a fighter.
“He was not a boxer,” the police officer said. “He was not a martial artist and he was not a big man. But he wouldn’t back down.”
Raposo’s wife is expecting their second child. As his family planned his funeral on Wednesday, police asked area residents to check their properties for any items that may have been discarded by the killer.
If any items are located, police ask that they not be touched and that the finder call police immediately.
Flanked by family members and local shop owners, and reading from a prepared statement, Sicilian Sidewalk Café CEO Maria Galipo offered condolences to the victims’ families.
“We are deeply saddened that an event like this could have happened in such a safe and family-oriented community.”
The incident inflicted on an unsuspecting family business and its patrons “is not a reflection of our neighborhood,” she said.
Galipo said the ice cream shop will reopen in the next day or so.
“We have not moved in 50 years and we intend to remain a vital part of the neighborhood,” she said.
“Ours is a family business: all of us put our heart and soul into running our café. And it’s like a family for the 40 people we employ here during peak summer season.”
Galipo went on to say that if an isolated act of violence keeps people away from the café, the violence wins.
“But I know we’re better than that. . . . Summer time is here. The patios are open. Euro 2012 is on. . . . It’s been difficult these past few days but we have to get back to some sense of normal.”
Nicknamed “Johnny Maserati” for his love of luxury cars, Raposo was scheduled to appear in court on an assault charge in two weeks.
He was also scheduled to go on trial in December on charges of dangerous operation of a vehicle.
When he was in his late teens, Raposo was friendly with a member of the Loners Motorcycle Club known as “Joe the Meatman,” but he never joined the club.
The hitman is described by police as a 6-foot white man with shoulder-length blond hair and a medium build. He wore a white hard hat, an orange safety vest with fluorescent green “X” on the front and back. His face was covered with a white filter mask.
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