Read Online Biker Trials, The by Paul Cherry - Free Book Online
Authors: Paul Cherry
Tags: TRU003000
Ads: Link
control over Montrealâs drug market.
âWe are talking about a war. We must not forget that,â Vincent said on October 21, 2002, at one of the so-called megatrials that were the result of Operation Springtime 2001. One year after catching five Nomads with guns, hit money and photos of their enemies and after looking the other way, the Crown attorney could now prosecute almost all of them for orchestrating a massive, murderous conflict.
2
Mom
âThe ideology of expanding and totally controlling the traffic of drugs in Montreal came from Maurice Boucherâ
â Stéphane Sirois, ex-member of the Rockers, who wore a wire for the police as they probed the Hells Angels.
At the center of the conflict that became the war between the Hells Angels and the Alliance, a collection of drug traffickers in gangs like the Pelletier Clan and the Rock Machine, was a man called Mom.
Maurice âMomâ Boucher could not tolerate competition, so he relentlessly plotted to eliminate it. He expected full loyalty from his drug dealers, and he asked them to adhere to the same structure and rules expected of him as a member of the Hells Angels when he created his own gang in 1992, calling them the Rockers. And when he felt other members of the Hells Angelsâ Montreal chapter were not bloodthirsty enough for his war, he created his own chapter in 1995.
But years before the biker war ever started, the police already knew Boucher was a major player in Canadaâs drug trafficking scene. During an RCMP operation dubbed Project Jaggy, an investigation that began in September 1992, Boucher was drawing attention that indicated to the police how closely the Hells Angels were associated to other forms of organized crime. Project Jaggy began as an investigation into a conspiracy to bring 3.2 tons of cocaine into Canada from Jamaica. The police were tipped off thatmembers of the Hells Angelsâ Quebec City chapter were meeting with people from eastern Canada to plot smuggling routes.
All Aboard!
André Imbeault, a founding member of the Quebec City chapter, and Richard Hudon, convinced a man named Fennie Bungay to accept $1.5 million for his work in preparing a boat that would be used to smuggle drugs. The Hells Angels also gave Bungay $240,000 to buy them a boat. As they continued to monitor this partnership, the RCMP noticed other Hells Angels were coming on board as well, including Daniel Beaulieu and Marius Perron.
Bungay bought a boat called the
Arctic Trader
and spent $75,000 trying to make it seaworthy between April and May of 1993. But at the end of June, Perron had to give Hudon the bad news that the
Arctic Trader
couldnât be used. To offset their losses, the Hells Angels called in a specialist from Edmundston, New Brunswick, to strip their investment of anything worth money. Within a month, the Hells Angels apparently recovered from the setback because the new boat, called the
Fortune Endeavor,left
Marystown, Nova Scotia. As the police would learn, the illegal venture was crawling with Hells Angels. They would be charged eventually in connection with Project Jaggy, but Boucher was not one of them. However, his name kept popping up in surveillance reports as RCMP investigators followed the key players.
Raynald Desjardins and the Montreal Mafia
One of the first instances of police surveillance came on May 25, 1993, when Imbeault held a meeting with a man named Raynald Desjardins, who, the police would later learn, was financing the smuggling operation. Accompanying Desjardins that day was Boucher, sporting his Hells Angelsâ colors. That Boucher was with Desjardins was a noteworthy fact to investigators. Desjardins was well known to the police as being the right-hand man of VitoRizzuto, the reputed godfather of the Mafia in Montreal. What Desjardins brought to the Hells Angels was access to the Montreal Mafiaâs financial support and his personal experience in drug smuggling, which dated back at
âWe are talking about a war. We must not forget that,â Vincent said on October 21, 2002, at one of the so-called megatrials that were the result of Operation Springtime 2001. One year after catching five Nomads with guns, hit money and photos of their enemies and after looking the other way, the Crown attorney could now prosecute almost all of them for orchestrating a massive, murderous conflict.
2
Mom
âThe ideology of expanding and totally controlling the traffic of drugs in Montreal came from Maurice Boucherâ
â Stéphane Sirois, ex-member of the Rockers, who wore a wire for the police as they probed the Hells Angels.
At the center of the conflict that became the war between the Hells Angels and the Alliance, a collection of drug traffickers in gangs like the Pelletier Clan and the Rock Machine, was a man called Mom.
Maurice âMomâ Boucher could not tolerate competition, so he relentlessly plotted to eliminate it. He expected full loyalty from his drug dealers, and he asked them to adhere to the same structure and rules expected of him as a member of the Hells Angels when he created his own gang in 1992, calling them the Rockers. And when he felt other members of the Hells Angelsâ Montreal chapter were not bloodthirsty enough for his war, he created his own chapter in 1995.
But years before the biker war ever started, the police already knew Boucher was a major player in Canadaâs drug trafficking scene. During an RCMP operation dubbed Project Jaggy, an investigation that began in September 1992, Boucher was drawing attention that indicated to the police how closely the Hells Angels were associated to other forms of organized crime. Project Jaggy began as an investigation into a conspiracy to bring 3.2 tons of cocaine into Canada from Jamaica. The police were tipped off thatmembers of the Hells Angelsâ Quebec City chapter were meeting with people from eastern Canada to plot smuggling routes.
All Aboard!
André Imbeault, a founding member of the Quebec City chapter, and Richard Hudon, convinced a man named Fennie Bungay to accept $1.5 million for his work in preparing a boat that would be used to smuggle drugs. The Hells Angels also gave Bungay $240,000 to buy them a boat. As they continued to monitor this partnership, the RCMP noticed other Hells Angels were coming on board as well, including Daniel Beaulieu and Marius Perron.
Bungay bought a boat called the
Arctic Trader
and spent $75,000 trying to make it seaworthy between April and May of 1993. But at the end of June, Perron had to give Hudon the bad news that the
Arctic Trader
couldnât be used. To offset their losses, the Hells Angels called in a specialist from Edmundston, New Brunswick, to strip their investment of anything worth money. Within a month, the Hells Angels apparently recovered from the setback because the new boat, called the
Fortune Endeavor,left
Marystown, Nova Scotia. As the police would learn, the illegal venture was crawling with Hells Angels. They would be charged eventually in connection with Project Jaggy, but Boucher was not one of them. However, his name kept popping up in surveillance reports as RCMP investigators followed the key players.
Raynald Desjardins and the Montreal Mafia
One of the first instances of police surveillance came on May 25, 1993, when Imbeault held a meeting with a man named Raynald Desjardins, who, the police would later learn, was financing the smuggling operation. Accompanying Desjardins that day was Boucher, sporting his Hells Angelsâ colors. That Boucher was with Desjardins was a noteworthy fact to investigators. Desjardins was well known to the police as being the right-hand man of VitoRizzuto, the reputed godfather of the Mafia in Montreal. What Desjardins brought to the Hells Angels was access to the Montreal Mafiaâs financial support and his personal experience in drug smuggling, which dated back at
Similar Books
