[15] Tong was a local legend in Toronto as an incorruptible policeman who had walked the beat since 1929 and who stood out on the account of his fedora and trench coat which made him seem like a character out of a Hollywood film.
[25] Elkind was an unsuccessful boxer, but he obtained a job as a busboy at the Copacabana nightclub where the most famous musical and comedy acts in America such as Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, Sammy Davis Jr. and Harry Belafonte played.
[43] Elkind started working as a bouncer in the Arabian Village bar on College Street alongside the boxer Howard "Baldy" Chard, which served as an illegal gambling house for Johnny Papalia.
[53] In the early 1960s, Elkind had a respectable image as the owner of The Coach Room store and a senior Teamsters official, a married man with two daughters who gave generously to charity and to Zionist groups.
[61] In December 1969, Elkind in a plea bargain with the Crown pledged guilty to the fraud and money laundering charges related to the failure of Atlantic Acceptance, and was sentenced to one year in prison.
[63] While serving his sentence, he became friends with Harold Ballard, the owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team who had been convicted of fraud and income tax evasion.
[1] The journalist Adrien Humphreys wrote: "Marvin helped cops corral cartel members in Mexico, Libyan terrorists, drug traffickers in New York, mobsters in Detroit, coup plotters in Ghana, stock swindlers in Amsterdam, corrupt politicians, outlaw bikers, killers, sexual predators and a full inventory of criminals in cities across Canada.
"[1] One officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), Andy Rayne, who worked with Elkind on several cases in the 1980s and early 1990s, said of him: "Marvin wasn't a hardened criminal.
[89] In his first case for the police, Elkind exposed a scam by real estate salesmen, Herbert Asselstine and George Buric, to cash phoney certified cheques from a bank in St.
[93] Joining Gill and Elkind was Andy Rayne of the RCMP, a British immigrant who had a dark, swarthy look which allowed him to play other people of other ethnic backgrounds such as Italians, Greeks and Arabs.
[94] Elkind introduced Rayne to Anna as Andy Lenew, who told her that he was willing to spend a million dollars to import VCR tapes of child pornography into Canada.
[101] The five-month FBI–RCMP joint investigation, known as Operation Blizzard, concluded in July 1983 when a shipment of depraved content being shipped from New York to Toronto was intercepted in Buffalo and the smugglers were arrested.
[96][102] The case ended with the convictions of Hodas and two associates, Richard John Spadafora and Sheila Baumel, on charges of smuggling obscene material for shipping 1,200 VHS tapes worth $50,000 U.S. dollars of child pornography to Toronto.
[108] Elkind learned that Papalia planned via dishonest means to buy up via fraud much of downtown Hamilton in order to build a 100-room hotel that would cover 82,000 square feet.
[109] In 1984, Elkind's status as a Teamsters official led him to be approached by Hector Massey, a political science professor at York University and a prominent organizer for the Liberal Party in Toronto's Jamaican-Canadian community.
[122] In June and July 1986, Elkind's status as a Teamster official allowed him to be involved in a drug-smuggling ring bringing cocaine from the Detroit into Toronto, where Robinson joined him using his Colonel Gibson alter ego.
[131] Elkind told the three Mafisoi that he not only represented Corrigan, who was willing to steal from the Teamsters pension plan to make a loan to Scarfo, but also Irving Kott, a disreputable Montreal financer.
[132] After his release from prison in 1983, Kott went on to make $400 million U.S. dollars via a boiler room operation in Amsterdam, selling shares in a bogus company which claimed to have invented a machine that could suck gold particles out of water.
[141] Resnick told Moon during an alcohol-soaked interview besides a pool in a hotel in St. Kitts about the International Bank operation that was printed in the story: "We'll meet again in Hong Kong, maybe Macao, Rio de Janeiro or even Australia, in the same circumstances.
[142] On 14 September 1987, Elkind met a Toronto businessman, Nicholas Andreko, at the Wheat Sheaf Tavern who told him he was going to finance a coup to topple Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings, the president of Ghana, and was looking to meet some arms dealers.
[144] On 5 November 1987, at a posh hotel in Toronto, Elkind introduced Andreko to "Colonel Gibson" and "Gino", who presented themselves as shady arms dealers who were willing to sell him a stockpile of AK-47 assault rifles plus ammunition.
[148] On 28 February 1988, Elkind met another conspirator, Dr. Edward Mahama, who represented the leader of the plot, a former finance minister in Rawlings's government who was living in exile after a failed coup attempt in 1981.
[151] As Ghana was a fellow member of the Commonwealth, the coup plot, which was based partly in Toronto, was especially concerning to Joe Clark, the External Affairs Minister, who was briefed by Robinson personally on the case.
[167] Elkind's arrest for making death threats, extortion, and loan sharking was reported in the Toronto newspapers, which served to protect him against charges of being an informer for several years afterward.
[170] The next day, Elkind and Rayne received a phone call from FBI Special Agent Rich Mazzari to tell them that their act had worked too well, and the Detroit police were convinced that the Canadian duo were the ones who bombed the disco.
[180] Elkind was forced to testify at the trial, which ended with Grossman being convicted as well as his wife divorcing him after an audio tape of him boasting about receiving fellatio from a prostitute was played in court.
[190] Bored with his life in witness protection, on 7 June 1993, Elkind broke away from his FBI bodyguards to travel to Las Vegas to watch the boxing match between George Foreman vs. Tommy Morrison.
[174] Elkind was a controversial figure at his synagogue, where many felt he had damaged the reputation of the Jewish community of Toronto by his criminal activities and by exposing Tully's plot to kill Fisher.
[198] In 2009, Elkind was called out of a retirement for his last undercover mission when he was employed in Mexico City by the FBI and the Policía Federal to contact one of the cousins of the Pasquale family he had grown up with.
[200] In 2011, Elkind said of his criminal career: "The Mob life is living with a lot of bad guys, and you’re not sure sometimes who are your friends and who aren’t...If there was a way I could turn the clock back 68 years...I would do it completely different.