Irish Mob muscles into graffiti removal… ah Montreal

by titocurtis

Photo by Jacob Earl

Apparently Montreal’s Irish mob has been making a killing in the graffiti removal racket (see what I did there?).

According to a report by La Presse, members of the infamous West-End Gang took over one of the largest graffiti removal firms in town about three years ago. The former owners of the firm, called AV-NET, owed a substantial sum to John MacKenzie—a man with alleged ties to Montreal’s Irish mob.To square up their debt, the AV-NET owners handed Mackenzie their graffiti removal business as well as O’Neil’s Irish Pub in St-Eustache  the Sûreté du Québec told La Presse.

MacKenzie’s rap sheet isn’t particularly long but the report says he’s been suspected of loan-sharking for some time.

No good Montreal mob story would just end there though. La Presse also reports that AV-NET has been awarded $1.7 million in municipal contracts since 2009.

What a great way to kick off Thursday, I love this city.

If you can read French, you should probably just check out the original story in La Presse by Vincent Larouche (a pretty righteous dude).

While we’re on the subject… D’Arcy O’Connor, who taught a bunch of us journalism and hard living down at Dawson College, wrote a fantastic biography of the West-End Gang.