`He was crying, sweating´: A boxer´s daughter stares down his killer
(The Star Food)

Jessica Melo didn’t wear any makeup and wore her hair pulled back tightly from her face.She wanted Charles Gagne, the underworld hitman who murdered her father, to see the family resemblance — the rounded cheeks, buttonish nose, and sharp, often sad, eyes.“I never stared at somebody so long and so hard as I did that day,� she said, recalling she made a point to not look away that August day in Muskoka, at Beaver Creek minimum-security prison. Gagne, 45, murdered Eddie “Hurricane� Melo, a middleweight boxing champ and feared underworld figure, on April 6, 2001.Jessica was 19. According to court records, Gagne pumped five shots into her father and his best friend, Joao (Johnny) Pavao, in a parking lot outside the Amici Café in Cliffway Plaza, near Hurontario St. and the QEW, for the promise of $75,000 and underworld status.Read more: Father’s Day is ‘brutal’ for family of murdered boxer as killer gets day passesHitman who killed boxer Eddie Melo gets one-day pass from prisonTo find peace, she met her father’s murderer. Now this Vancouver woman’s story is helping put victims at the centre of criminal justice — on their termsGagne was on a day pass for an armed robbery conviction when he killed Eddie and Pavao. He drove down to the GTA from a halfway house near Ottawa, shot them dead outside the café, then drove back in time for curfew. The Crown first charged him with two counts of first-degree murder, but he cut a deal and pleaded guilty to second. The first-degree charge would have given him a life sentence.Instead, he was eligible for parole after 12 years.Melo said she needed to talk to Gagne to help her understand how that was possible.No one was ever convicted for ordering the hit on her father, who was linked by police to the late Santos (Frank) Cotroni, a Montreal mob boss.Melo said she also needed Gagne to explain his plea deal. She said she has unsuccessfully tried for answe ...