Residents of a suburban cul-de-sac in east London, Ont., say they were shocked when heavily-armed police officers in tactical gear descended on their quiet street and later laid drug manufacturing and smuggling charges against a father and son who had lived on the street for years.
The police raid happened May 29 on Fundy Avenue with an “intense and sudden” police presence before dawn that ended with police seizing home-made guns, firearms parts, a 3D printer and an assortment of drugs.
“It happened very early in the morning,” neighbour Alex Raemisch said. “We saw the lights, sirens and lots of activity.”
The small circle of houses is a tight-knit community, according to another neighbour Rachel Chew. There’s a communal basketball net for the kids on the street, and the neighbours have garage sales and barbecues together, she added.
“This place is a beautiful spot in the evenings and on weekends,” she said.
The surprise raid included tactical officers and police dogs swarming the small bungalow at around 5 a.m., neighbours said.
Benito Schiavone, 33, and his father, Modesto Dino Schiavone, 57, are now facing charges related to smuggling and manufacturing prohibited weapons and devices. They will also be charged with drug possession when they appear in court, officials said.
When CBC News knocked on the accused men’s door, the older Schiavone answered but declined to speak. He returned home the same day he and his son were arrested, according to neighbours.
The two men were rarely seen by neighbours, and the home belonged to another family member, Chew said, adding she was angry that illegal activity could have been happening next door.
“You don’t know what that might bring,” she said. “This is our little hub … and I think that that’s just kind of an insult to what we’re trying to build together.”
The Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) worked with the London police to investigate the two men and conduct the raid. The two men were initially flagged in October 2024 when packages containing a silencer and a 50-round magazine were intercepted at a mail processing facility in Mississauga, Ont., officials said.
While the raid came as a shock to the neighbours, similar searches happen about six times a year in suburban homes, said Abid Morgan, the director of the CBSA’s Ontario firearm smuggling enforcement team.
“It’s just your average neighbourhood where we see a lot of this type of firearms manufacturing taking place, especially utilizing 3D printers,” he explained. “From time to time, narcotics are seized as well.”
Starting in 2019, CBSA began to see 3D-printed weapons appear regularly, Morgan said, adding that as the printing technology advances and is able to make increasingly capable weapons, it’s becoming fairly commonplace.
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While the exact number of firearms seized during the Fundy Avenue raid is unknown, it was on the “upper end of average,” Morgan said. The items seized included:
The accused are scheduled to appear in London court in before the end of July, facing eight counts each of unauthorized possession of a prohibited firearm, four counts each of smuggling prohibited devices, four counts each of unauthorized importation of a prohibited device and two counts each of manufacturing a prohibited firearm.
