It was on 14th March 2001 Salvatore was murdered leaving a strip club.
A single sniper bullet pierced his skull and he was instantly killed. His bodyguards franticly searched the entire area but the mystery killed had eluded them.
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Salvatore was buried in a private Family ceremony near his mansion in St Marks.
Both the Forelli and Leon families were in chaos. Joey Leone was forced to give up work in his garage and assume power of the family. Joey was certain it was the Triads that had murdered his father, Ran Fa Li had to pay for this. Joey gave this job to Tony Cipriati who had detested the Triads from the start. Tony arranged for his men to observe the movements of Ran Fa Li, he was guarded at all times.
Tony got word that Ra Fa Li was meeting in Staunton with a fellow Triad leader from San Fierro (who was rumoured to be in Liberty City to buy a bankrupt Yakuza-run casino). Tony's men went into action.
The meeting place was the same hotel Marco and Antonio had met all those years ago to discuss the Sindacco problem. The hotel was heavily guarded with Triads, but this didn't stop Tony. Ran Fa Li was first to arrive and then followed by the other Triad Leader, who was accompanied by a mystery black man.
Tony had planned this hit like a police raid; it was going to be messy, he wanted to send a clear message. At Tony's signal a barrage of Leone soldiers raided the hotel. Heavy gunfire was heard and within minutes the Leone soldiers ran out of the building and fled in their cars.
The police arrived and discovered the bloody bodies of 25 Triads and 6 Leone soldiers. Among the bodies was that of Ran Fa Li, shot in the head 5 times. Eye witnesses report that they saw a smartly dressed black man and an oriental blind man escape into a car waiting around the back of the hotel.
This originally seen like a huge victory for the Leones, until one of their sources in the Yakuza informed them who really killed the Don; it was the maniac that blew up the Columbian tanker.
Joey sent a hit squat to Staunton Island to track him down but when the entire team were slaughtered he cut his losses and didn't pursue him further. He had the Triads to worry about.
Meanwhile Giorgio Forelli, who was suspected dead along with his brother, was found alive, washed up on the shores of Staunton Island. Giorgio made a recovery within weeks and took his place back in charge of the Forellis.
The war with the Triads and Forellis, along with the unsolved bombing catastrophe in Staunton had weakened the Leones and neither family was in any state to wage war. A "ceasefire" was implemented in 2002.
City life began to return to normal however in late 2004 there were rumours on the streets of a new European crime wave about to hit Liberty soon. The families were getting nervous and despite all their efforts couldn't find out who it was.