Pubdate: Fri, 27 Feb 2004
Source: Globe and Mail (Canada)
Page: A6
Copyright: 2004, The Globe and Mail Company
Contact:  http://www.globeandmail.ca/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/168
Author: Tu Thanh Ha
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?188 (Outlaw Bikers)

POLICE CHARGE 63 IN FOLLOW-UP BIKER RAID

Hells Angels Who Filled Vacuum After Arrest Of Nomads Were Target Of Sweep

MONTREAL -- Three years ago this spring, authorities cracked down on the 
Hells Angels in Montreal, arresting about 120 people in the largest one-day 
police operation in Canadian history and slapping them with murder and 
drug-trafficking charges.

Police knew the bikers weren't going to give up easily. They began watching 
to see who would pick up the slack in illegal narcotics sales. Yesterday, 
in another crackdown, 63 people were charged.

In a series of raids in the Montreal area, 400 federal, provincial and 
municipal police officers arrested suspects and searched homes, offices, 
cheque-cashing outlets and the Agence Fantaisie Sensation 2000, a strippers 
booking agency in a seedy-looking part of east-end Montreal.

It was the most sweeping police operation since Springtime 2001, which 
ended the activities of the Hells Angels' elite Nomads chapter just as it 
was about to clinch a near monopoly over Montreal's lucrative illicit drug 
market.

This time, in a 30-month investigation, the police focused on Angels 
chapters around Montreal, which have stepped in to replace the Nomads, 
authorities said.

The operation dismantled four cells that sold cocaine, marijuana, hashish 
and ecstasy, police said.

It came a day after police arrested a member of the Angels' Sherbrooke 
chapter, Jacques Emond, and charged him with leading a Montreal 
loan-sharking ring, in another sign that bikers from out of town are 
filling in for the Nomads.

Police said Mr. Emond and five others operated from a north-end pawnshop 
that did $3-million in business a year, lending money at an annual interest 
rate of up to 300 per cent.

Those charged yesterday included 12 members of the South chapter and three 
members of the Montreal chapter (which is actually based in neighbouring 
Sorel).

Also charged yesterday was Normand Belanger, 54, who had been arrested in 
the Springtime 2001 operation but had been temporarily released for 
humanitarian reasons after the court was told he was near death from 
various chronic illnesses. Of the 63 suspects named yesterday, 10 Hells 
Angels were missing, leaving police to wonder if their targets had got wind 
of the impending crackdown.

Retired biker investigator Guy Ouellette said the latest crackdown will 
cause the Angels chapters in Sherbrooke and Trois-Rivieres to fill the vacuum.

The arrests in effect wiped out the 17-member South chapter. The remaining 
five who weren't indicted yesterday are either already behind bars or on 
probation.

The South chapter is the sixth and most recent in Quebec. In its clubhouse 
in St-Basile-le-Grand, south of Montreal, a police raid in 1998 uncovered a 
photo of Jose Theodore socializing with bikers, embarrassing the Canadians' 
star goaltender.

The national clearinghouse for police data, Criminal Intelligence Service 
Canada, says the South chapter was created in 1997 with bikers who had 
clean criminal records in the previous five years, in an attempt to avoid 
prosecution under new gangsterism laws.

Police yesterday also targeted puppet biker gangs that do the grunt work 
for the more senior Hells Angels, filing charges against four members of 
the Evil Ones and one of the Rockers North chapter.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom