Monica Proietti
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Monica Proietti (February 25, 1940 – September 19, 1967) was a Montreal bank robber and folk hero better known as "Machine Gun Molly".
Monica came from a poor Montreal family, many of whom were involved in crime in some way; her grandmother served time in jail for receiving stolen goods, and reportedly ran a school for crime for the neighbourhood children. In 1956, at the age of 17, Monica married Anthony Smith, a Scottish gangster (he was 33). The couple had two children. Smith was deported from Canada in 1962. She then became romantically involved with Viateur Tessier, but he was jailed in 1966 for armed robbery.
The members of her crew included Gérald Lelievre and his brother Robert, who made headlines in 1984 when he and three others were killed when a bomb was detonated in a downtown Montreal apartment building. The victims had been suspected in the murder of West End Gang kingpin Frank Peter “Dunie” Ryan.
Monica and her accomplices held up more than 20 banks, stealing over an estimated $100,000. On September 19, 1967 Monica died in a shoot-out with Montreal police following a high-speed chase through the north-end of the city. Reportedly, this was to have been her last bank robbery, intended to fund a new life in Florida.
A 2004 Quebec film Monica la Mitraille (Machine Gun Molly in English) was based on her life. The film was adapted from the book Souvenirs de Monica by Georges-Hebert Germain.
[edit] Bibliography
- Georges-Hebert Germain. Souvenirs de Monica, 1997.
- Alan Hustak. "Machine Gun Molly: twenty-five years before Thelma and Louise, Montreal had its own real-life female gangster." Montreal Gazette, September 1, 1991.
- Betty Nygaard King. "Hell Hath No Fury: Famous Women in Crime." Borealis Press, Ottawa, 2001
