Philip “Phil” Cassidy (29 June 1953-) was an American arms dealer, gun enthusiast, and criminal who was known for his drunken and temperamental behavior. Cassidy took part in a 1986 bank robbery in Miami, Florida, and he would become a major seller of military-grade weapons in both Miami and New York City.
Biography[]
Phil Cassidy was born in 1953 in the American South, and he came from a rural family that one may pejoratively call "rednecks". Cassidy was a drunkard and temperamental, and he eventually found a love for weapons, especially guns. He invented stories that he was a veteran of the US Army who had seen action in the Vietnam War, but he was actually rejected from the army several times due to his erratic ways. Cassidy instead decided to sell weapons from his trailer in a junkyard in Miami, Florida during the 1980s, and he sold arms to the criminals of Miami. In 1986, he was hired by Tommy Vercetti as one of the gunmen in the robbery of a corrupt bank in Little Havana, and he earned $100,000 as a result of the heist. After the heist, Cassidy had Vercetti's help in liquidating his rival dealers, but Cassidy would lose his left arm in the explosion of his trailer when he drunkenly detonated the homemade alcoholic beverage/explosive boomshine while he stood near it. Cassidy would move to New York City by 1998, and he opened a gun store that was frequented by the Yakuza. In 2001, Cassidy and criminal Claude Speed both fought off many Colombian cartel members that sought to muscle in on his business, and Cassidy resumed selling military-grade equipment.