Online gambling assassination attempt update

Further information has emerged on the attempted assassination in a Toronto suburb last week of online gambling businessman Mark Peretz.

Local media reports are that Peretz, who lies seriously in injured in hospital after the shooting, was accompanied in his car at the time by associate Paris Christoforou, who was also wounded, although not seriously.

Our readers may recall that Christoforou is a former Hells Angel enforcer who was jailed along with Peretz for their attempted murder by shooting in 2004 of alleged mafia chief Michele Modica.

In the botched assassination a young mother and innocent bystander, Louise Russo, was struck and paralysed by a stray bullet.

It was alleged that the attack on Modica was motivated by his failure to pay an online gambling debt owed to Peretz, who operated a Costa Rica-based betting website.

The police have confirmed that they are investigating whether the Peretz-Christoforou attack is connected with another shooting outside a Toronto suburban restaurant earlier this month in which an unnamed 35-year-old man was seriously injured.

It is thought that there may be a connection between these incidents and the acrimonious break up of a business partnership involving a member of the London, Ont., Hells Angels charter in which proceeds from an online gambling enterprise were apparently skimmed off and invested in property deals without the knowledge or agreement of other business partners.

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