Joe Morselli

Who was Joe Morselli?

Giuseppe Morselli was a Quebec businessman who owned a successful cafeteria enterprise and was a major fundraiser for the Liberal Party of Canada in Quebec. He was implicated as being one of the key players in the sponsorship scandal. He was accused of running a parallel fundraising network within the Liberal Party in which he received envelopes of cash from advertising firms such as GroupAction.

In his testimony to the Gomery Commission, Daniel Dezainde, the former director-general of the Party in Quebec, called him "the real boss of fundraising".

In 1989 he was the target of a car bomb in Montreal.

Morselli was known to have close ties with Chief Quebec Liberal Party organizer, Alfonso Gagliano, and was appointed by him in 2000 to the position of vice-president of the Liberal Party's Finance Committee.

Allegedly during 2001 he met with Jean Brault for lunch at Restaurant Frank in Montreal where money was exchanged for favours in hiring Party members and redirecting funds.

On May 26, 2005 he testified at the Gomery Commission. He died of an apparent heart attack in Florida in March 2006.