Do we need American Biker Gangs in Canada?

[#juan]

Biker gangs' feuds leave bloody trail
Turf wars between rivals have killed club members and innocent bystanders

HAYLEY MICK AND TU THANH HA

TORONTO AND MONTREAL -- In the aftermath of the discovery of eight bodies in rural Ontario this weekend, police sources have pointed to outlaw biker gangs, a criminal element with a bloody history in Canada.

During the 1990s, about 160 people died during the decade-long turf war in Quebec between the Hells Angels and a smaller biker club called the Rock Machine.

The Hells Angels wanted absolute control over the distribution of illegal drugs in the Montreal area. From 1994 to 2001, the Rock Machine fought furiously to keep its share of the market, and scores died as hostilities spread through Quebec.

When the turf war peaked during the mid-1990s, it was being won by the Hells Angels, who had greater resources and systematically killed off their rivals one by one.

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There can no longer be any doubt that Motorcycle gangs like the Hell's Angels, and the Banditos are a major criminal element that should be stamped out. Why the various law inforcement agencies in Canada and the U.S. haven't eradicated these scum long ago is beyond me.

 

[#juan]

Bandidos flaunt brutal pedigree

JULIAN SHER

Special to The Globe and Mail

Their slogan is unabashedly in-your-face: "We are the people your parents warned you about," screams the banner on the official website of Bandidos Canada, and they mean it.

In biker wars that have stretched from Quebec to Winnipeg and throughout Europe, the rivalry between the Bandidos and the Hells Angels has been long-standing -- and bloody.

Unlike the Hells Angels, who have tried to finesse their public image with toy runs and other charity stunts, the Texas-based Bandidos have never shied away from flaunting their brutal pedigree. "Cut one, we all bleed," the Bandidos warn -- and the blood has never stopped flowing, often from internal strife as much as external battles.

In Europe, the Bandidos went to war against the Hells Angels -- literally, with anti-tank rockets, hand grenades and plastic explosives -- in a five-year drug-turf war that left 11 people dead before the gangs agreed to an uneasy truce in 1997.

The Bandidos moved into Canada in 2000, when they took over the Rock Machine, who were engaged in a vicious turf battle with Maurice (Mom) Boucher's Hells Angels in Quebec that left more than 160 people dead. The Hells Angels won that war, and then moved on to try to crush the Bandidos in Ontario with a combination of bullets, bribes and bluster.

A civil war erupted among the Bandidos when the Hells Angels recruited Paul (Sasquatch) Porter, a prominent Rock Machine leader who had survived three murder attempts.

He was luckier than four of the other 11 founding members of the Bandidos' allies in Quebec: they were assassinated via gunshots or car bombs -- one so devastating that the police could identify the victim only by means of a small piece of skin with a tattoo on it.

Mr. Porter decided his life would be better -- and no doubt longer -- if he switched allegiances. He persuaded several members of the Bandidos to jump to the Hells Angels, the first sign of serious internal tensions within the Canadian organization.

Bandidos members who refused to bend -- like Alain Brunette, who left Quebec to help build the Bandidos' Kingston chapter -- had to be broken.

The Quebec Angels sent Daniel Lamer, one of their enforcers from a puppet club, to assassinate Mr. Brunette. But in March of 2002, Mr. Lamer's car was pulled over for speeding on Highway 401. The ensuing gun battle left one OPP officer wounded and Mr. Lamer dead, saving the life of his target.

What the Hells Angels began, the police finished. In June of 2002, about 300 police officers swooped down on homes and clubhouses of the Bandidos in Toronto, Kingston, Montreal and Quebec City, arresting Mr. Brunette and 25 other gang members. The Bandidos were effectively wiped out as a serious force in both Quebec and Ontario.

The Bandidos' small Toronto chapter has tried to make inroads in Alberta and Manitoba, but with little success against the Hells Angels behemoth.

The ineffectiveness of the Canadian arm of the Bandidos could not have sat well with the Texas-based gang, which has always prided itself on its violence and guts. The Canadian Bandidos were considered enough of an embarrassment that their U.S. sponsors tried in the last few months to disown them.

"Because their numbers were so low in Canada, the U.S. Bandidos had tried to separate themselves from Canada," said a police officer with the Criminal Intelligence Service of the Texas Department of Public Safety whose name cannot be revealed because he works undercover against the gang in their home state.

"When you get to the point when you're not even breaking even -- on drugs, like any other trade -- you decide to close the business," he said.

"If you're not bringing anything into the pot, you're a liability instead of an asset."

And that leaves the rich assets of the drug trade in Canada in the monopolistic hands of the Hells Angels.

"The dominant biker organization in Canada is the Hells Angels," says Sergeant Eric Dupre, national co-ordinator for outlaw motorcycle gangs at the RCMP's Criminal Intelligence Service. "The Hells Angels rule and the Bandidos are an insignificant player at this time."

Even more insignificant after the weekend's bloodbath.

 

[Jay]

There can no longer be any doubt that Motorcycle gangs like the Hell's Angels, and the Banditos are a major criminal element that should be stamped out. Why the various law inforcement agencies in Canada and the U.S. haven't eradicated these scum long ago is beyond me.

If the law agencies are going to follow the law there is only so much they can do.

 

[#juan]

Banditos website

http://www.bandidosmc.ca/home.html

 

[darkbeaver]

RE: Do we need American B

Biker gangs are corporations, of course thier just obvious about it, if they wern't selling drugs and hookers they'd be selling prescription drugs and legal porn. These dirt bags are just as hard to prosecute as the white collar dirt bags, and who screws the public more.

 

[the caracal kid]

RE: Do we need American B

indeed dark,

There is much more to the biker gangs than the colour wearing thugs. They run as much legit business as illegal. You would be surprised where the suits of the HA's have investments.

 

[Colpy]

Re: RE: Do we need American B

Biker gangs are corporations, of course thier just obvious about it, if they wern't selling drugs and hookers they'd be selling prescription drugs and legal porn. These dirt bags are just as hard to prosecute as the white collar dirt bags, and who screws the public more.

You are correct in this DB. Although I didn't see a number of bodies after Bell took over Aliant.....just different methods, and big corporations don't need hitmen.....they have lawyers.

Personally, I wouldn't give a damn about biker wars, as long as they only kill each other. Unfortunately, as the kid killed in Montreal some years ago proved, innocents get in the way. We simply can't have bombings and shootings in our streets.

Perhaps one of the eight was undeserving of his fate.........but I doubt it. With 5 under arrest......that's 13 down.

Unfortunately, this seems to leave the field to the Angels.

 

[Said1]

There's a club house not two blocks from my house and you never hear a peep out of them. Not that you'd go close enough to listen, but aside from bikes they're quiet.

These same buttholes own a chip wagon at a prime location, a corner store, partners with one of the fruit and veg vendors at the Parkdale market and a few of them hire people to destribute flyers around the city. Of course, they're up to other stuff, but it's usually the wannabes that are running drugs and looking after hookers.

They even send out Christmas cards, if you believe that!

 

[darkbeaver]

Re: RE: Do we need American B

indeed dark,

There is much more to the biker gangs than the colour wearing thugs. They run as much legit business as illegal. You would be surprised where the suits of the HA's have investments.

No I wouldn't be surprised, I have first hand experiance with dirt bags, thier costumns don't confuse me at all, big money ain't got no soul. They have more money in the legit stuff than in the fronts, greed knows no borders and respects no institution, the same is true of organized religion, there you will find many of the worst examples of dirt bags. The church has ever been the harbour of perverts and thieves. Last summer I ran into, (if you can believe this) a gang of christian bikers, a more confused lot of posers and losers would be hard to invent.
Hey, I digress as usual, bikers bad.

 

[Finder]

Well there's two things you have to consider here. The right to affiliation, and the fact that the biker gangs are only the foot solduers of larger orginized crime. We can not just remove the top of the mule and forget about the roots. If we clip the top it will only grow back, sometimes worse then it was before. It will take committment and a lot of resources and creative thinking to get rid of this problem, also not just in law enforcement but socially as well.

 

[LittleRunningGag]

RE: Do we need American B

Outlaw bikes with motors. <--- Creative thinking

:lol:

 

[annabattler]

A couple of recent court cases,in Ontario, have decided that the biker gangs are criminal organizations,and membership in them can also be regarded as criminal.

 

[fuzzylogix]

What makes a group of bikers a gang? Lots of people are hobby bikers- we have them around our area in southern ontario a lot- whole families at times going out for a spin together. so what defines it as a gang- if they all wear the same outfit, or if they call themselves a gang?

I hate bikers on the highway- I have nearly smushed them so many times . I especially hate when they ride side by side, both bikers ending up riding on the white line, hanging into the next lane.