‘Junction bully’ wanted by police

A man who joined his father in terrorizing a west Toronto neighbourhood is wanted once again by police for threatening residents.
Police want Ralph Scala, 39, to surrender to face charges stemming from remarks he made to newspaper reporters outside his 65-year-old father Felice Scala’s bail hearing last month.
“I’ve got four months to go,” Scala said, implying he plans to return to the family’s Quebec Ave. neighbourhood when his probation ends.
“A lot of people are going to be selling their homes,” the Star reported him saying.
The remarks drew complaints from five neighbours, Det.-Const. Todd Hall said Friday.
In 2009, Ralph Scala pleaded guilty to 49 charges, including mischief and criminal harassment in a three-year campaign of tire slashing, window smashing and threats against area residents and businesses.
Three months later, his father pleaded guilty to one charge of breaching a peace bond for aggressively speaking to a neighbour.
They were dubbed the “Junction bullies” and barred from their Dundas and Keele Sts. neighbourhood for three years.
Now Ralph Scala’s recent remarks have netted him 78 new charges: failing to comply with probation, mischief and uttering threats against 26 locals.
As of Friday, Scala had not surrendered, though Hall said he had spoken to him twice by phone and urged him to do so. Scala told the officer he wanted to wait until his dad is released from custody before turning himself in.
Gordon Goldman, lawyer for both men, said Ralph Scala doesn’t want both him and his father to be in custody simultaneously for the sake of their ailing mother who still lives alone in their Quebec Ave. home.
Meanwhile, a bail review for Felice Scala, in custody on six charges of breaching probation, is set to continue Wednesday. It was postponed Friday for lack of an Italian interpreter.
He is accused of six breaches of probation terms allowing him to visit his bedridden wife in their home six mornings a week. At all other times he is barred from the area.
Instead of going straight into his house, as required, he is accused of hanging around in front and back. Neighbours started videotaping him and complained to police.
“The charges should not have been laid in the first place,” Goldman said, adding his client did no more than linger a few minutes on his front porch or look around the back of his property.
“He’s not loitering on the street or in front of the neighbours’ houses,” Goldman said.
Goldman accused police of having a vendetta against the elder Scala, something Hall denied, saying officers were responding to complaints.