Vagos, Mongols, and Outlaws: My Infiltration of America's Deadliest Biker Gangs

by Charles Falco

  As Rhino exited, I shuffled to the witness stand. He had testified under duress, pursuant to a plea bargain for lesser charges and a reduced sentence. He had no loyalty or sense of “brotherhood” for his fellow Vagos. He had a sense of self-preservation. They all did. The whole idea that Vagos would defend each other, even die for each other, was bullshit. Code, club, colors was all illusion and delusion. The seduction of being someone else was an addiction.

  Strangely, Rhino’s twin brother, who had never been a Vago during Rhino’s involvement, decided to prospect for the club after Rhino went to prison. But that wasn’t the strange part. The truly bizarre footnote was that they allowed Rhino’s brother to join at all, considering that Rhino became a snitch and at one time the Vagos had put a hit out on him. The revolving door swung again, and in the end no one really cared about a person’s past. They were all opportunists. They fulfilled the Now. Loyalty was fleeting.

  For them. But I had no question what my purpose served. Twist stared at me from the defense table, his gaze cold and penetrating and inhuman. A chill coursed through me as I recalled the night I had planned to kill him.

  As I raised my right hand to be sworn, the prosecutor moved in for the jugular: “You used to be a drug dealer, didn’t you?”

  Yes. A million years ago, I used to be a criminal.

  PART II

  Operation Black Diamond: Black to Black

  Which is better—to have laws and agree, or to hunt and kill?

  —WILLIAM GOLDING, LORD OF THE FLIES

  19

  First It Rains …

  Life in the Witness Security Program progressed at a moderate pace, safe but dull. I settled into routines, found work as a mechanic and earned a decent wage, but I couldn’t imagine the rest of my life. With no past, no apparent future, and only a mundane present, I simply existed like a broken appliance left to mend someday on a warehouse shelf. But more than that, I couldn’t bear to live my life perpetually hidden. I needed purpose. Monet married me in the program. She contracted to disappear with me, to protect me. But I didn’t want her sacrifice. She deserved to be safe and free. And the only way I knew to accomplish both was to return to my life undercover, but this time, as a well-paid informant.

  Canada offered its informants—they called them “police agents”—$1 million to infiltrate the Hells Angels. But the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had no paid positions available, so they referred me to their law enforcement agency, the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP). The Hells Angels operated largely as a cartel in Canada; the club had subsumed seven other biker gangs and represented the “highest concentration of Hells Angels in the world.” The OPP needed my help to infiltrate the club in Ontario, so they flew me to Buffalo, New York, to discuss the particulars. In a dimly lit café with wind howling around me, I proposed a four-month contract for their consideration: $10,000 a month until I got inside the Hells Angels.

  But the recession took its toll on the OPP as well, and the department had no funds to finance an infiltration. Unwilling to let the opportunity drop, I proposed getting inside a Hells Angels support club in the United States, preferably one with a chapter in Virginia Beach. The Hells Angels barely had a presence in Virginia, but they wanted one and they were actively recruiting the Merciless Souls. I figured if I prospected for the Merciless Souls and subsequently patched into the Hells Angels, I could transfer to Canada.

  Meanwhile, I commuted forty miles each way to work and began to notice a Mongol presence in my area. The one-percenter bikers roared past me wearing bottom rockers that boasted BALTIMORE. Predominantly a West Coast gang headquartered in Southern California, the Mongols only sporadically dotted some East Coast cities. And they had formed a fledgling chapter in Virginia Beach. I decided that while I waited for the OPP opportunity to materialize, I could work the gang part time.

  * * *

  Koz put me in touch with Gringo, an agent out of the ATF’s Richmond field office located ninety miles from my home. He said he was “working something big” but disclosed no details.

  The following week I arranged to meet Gringo ten miles from Richmond at a pizza restaurant. He arrived on his motorcycle, dressed in full Mongol cuts, wearing a Baltimore side rocker. His “prospect,” special agent JD, also wore a Mongol prospect patch.

  “You’re the Mongols?” I laughed.

  Over several slices of pizza, Gringo explained the agents’ odyssey: He and JD had started a Mongol “community impact investigation” in Baltimore six months prior with a goal of curbing drugs, but after encountering administrative roadblocks, they transferred their case to the ATF field office in Richmond and joined the Virginia Beach chapter of the Mongols. But they had yet to switch their rockers.

  “You commute from Richmond?” I asked.

  “Technically our chapter has three official Mongols, but the president is an enlisted soldier. He’s currently out to sea. So is the other one. I’m the acting president.” Gringo grinned.

  “How did you…”

  “We applied.” Gringo explained the extensive process involved in becoming an accepted full-patch Mongol. The club demanded a birth certificate, relatives’ names and addresses, employment and criminal history for the last ten years, even tax returns. Preparing an undercover identity involved an elaborate operation. Gringo and JD had to create fake records—including school, credit, and work history—that corroborated their fictitious lives. I quickly realized the difference between our respective roles: Gringo and JD had the administrative support of the ATF to doctor records. I had no one. Gringo had already been “approved” by the Mongols to become a full-patched member thanks to the help of a confidential informant. JD, however, still waited for his paperwork to clear.

  My heart sank as I listened to the requirements. Like hell would I complete an application for Mongol admission or expose my past or my family to that kind of scrutiny. And I couldn’t exactly borrow another agent’s identity without attracting suspicion from the ATF. Never mind that I was technically still in the program.

  But I was in luck. Apparently on the East Coast, the Mongols required official credentials only if a prospect wanted to become a full-patched member. I could be a part-time Mongol prospect and avoid a background investigation altogether. Distance helped. Gringo convinced the two official Mongols in the Virginia Beach chapter that the reason they hadn’t seen me yet was that I lived damn near eighty miles away.

  * * *

  At first my dip back into undercover life was unremarkable. I was too part time to really participate much in the bar scene. And I hadn’t committed to the Mongols since I still hoped the OPP opportunity would materialize. But one chilly September afternoon in 2008, Gringo asked me to attend an “event” at the Virginia Motorsports Park in Dinwiddie—a possible “war” brewed between the Pagans and the Hells Angels’ support club, the Merciless Souls. The Pagans, who had long claimed Richmond as their territory, planned to intimidate the fledgling gang. They requested members of the Outlaws Motorcycle Club and us Mongols to assist in their cause. The three clubs tolerated each other’s presence mostly out of guarded caution. They shared a common enemy—the Hells Angels—and a joint goal—to impede the club’s territorial growth. None of them could survive a Hells Angels sweep. The Pagans respected the Outlaws because they feared them. By designating certain regions of the East Coast Outlaws territory, the Pagans maintained their own stronghold on larger parts of Virginia. The few Mongols who occupied the East Coast had no support from their West Coast chapters, and politically the club functioned much like an independent party trying desperately to capture the majority vote by advancing a minority platform.

  Gringo, JD, and two Mongol hang-arounds obliged. I followed Gringo in my clunky Honda Civic as he sped through traffic toward the racetrack. Doubt swirled in my head. What was I doing? I was part time for a reason. Inside the park, an army of Outlaws and Pagans squared off a few yards from the Merciless Souls. They formed a blur of colors, like misfit cowboys, prepared to re
enact their own version of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Police scattered in the bleachers, some blending with civilians, others guarding the entrances and exits.

  Snuff, president of the Manassas chapter of the Outlaws, shifted next to me, the skull and crossed pistons on his cuts flapping in the breeze. His trademark black leather beret kept his ponytail in place. His mostly gray beard extended to his belly. A former competitive power lifter in prison, he now used a cane. His patches telegraphed his commitment to the Outlaws, his willingness to exact revenge, even murder: SNITCHES ARE A DYING BREED, AHAMD (All Hells Angels Must Die), ADIOS (Angels Die in Outlaw States), GFOD (God Forgives, Outlaws Don’t). He sneered menacingly at members of the Merciless Souls, his eyes narrowing to slits.

  The Merciless Souls grew increasingly agitated at the Pagans’ and Outlaws’ presence. They stood in defensive posture, arms crossed, mad dogging us, inviting a confrontation. Each side waited for a signal to fire, and I had no doubt Snuff would charge headlong into the crowd randomly shooting. And the agents and I, woefully outnumbered, would be caught in his bullet spray. Tension rippled over us. Deputies milled around us, and I wondered if any would interfere.

  After an hour of staring at one another, the Merciless Souls finally dispersed.

  * * *

  The big standoff almost compelled me to grow out my short-cropped hair and prospect for the Merciless Souls. The Hells Angels had no chapters yet in Virginia, and I was fairly confident the club would absorb the Merciless Souls and anoint them as the first Virginia Hells Angels chapter. After three months of working undercover as a part-time Mongol, I decided to defect.

  “Nothing’s happening,” I complained. “There aren’t enough Mongols here to make an impact.”

  Koz suggested I watch the evening news. That night on TV, an anchorwoman with serious eyes and a wide smile reported on Operation Black Rain, a “massive undercover investigation” that “resulted in the arrest of thirty-eight members of the Mongols Motorcycle Club, including the club’s president, Ruben “Doc” Cavazos. Federal authorities also served over 160 search warrants in California, Ohio, Colorado, Nevada, Washington, and Oregon. A total of 110 arrest warrants…” As her voice filled my living room, Koz debriefed me.

  “While you worked the Vagos, I worked undercover in the Mongols.”

  “You were part of Black Rain?” His revelation stunned me. Of course I had no idea, and his ability to move effortlessly in and out of the investigation was a testament to his skill. I wanted to be that good, that incognito.

  The fallout from that investigation had huge implications for our Mongol infiltration. Not only did Black Rain devastate the Mongol leadership on the West Coast, but a federal court also banned use of the Mongols’ logo (a ruling that was later overturned); gang members could no longer wear their colors. Unable to flaunt their identity, Mongols had to revise their club code. Full-patched members now blended with prospects. Their whole rank-and-file hierarchy disintegrated. Lars, the Mongols’ national president, rotted in federal custody. During the raids, government agents seized the Mongols’ paperwork, including pending applications from prospective members, partially completed background investigations, “research” on possible informants, and the club’s bylaws and constitution. We no longer had to prove or explain our status to the Mongols. Members had no means of checking our credentials. And Lars was no help. If we said we were Mongols, we were.

  Even our chapter president, who briefly returned from his sea post, accepted our status without further inquiry. The new laws emasculated him; we suddenly all looked alike, dressed now in T-shirts, soft colors with the Mongols logo embroidered on the pocket. Real tough guys. Black Rain’s crippling effect on the Mongols organization made us reevaluate our purpose. We had less need to conduct another full-scale federal investigation into the same biker club. Few Mongols inhabited Virginia Beach, and most of the other clubs in the area either liked or tolerated the Mongols’ presence.

  We debated whether to infiltrate the Pagans, but Gringo worried about exposure. He and Koz had previously investigated the Warlocks, the Pagans’ chief rival. There was always a chance some Pagans might recognize them. But the Pagans shared an alliance with the Outlaws; if we infiltrated the Outlaws, at least the Pagans would treat us well.

  I was conflicted. I wanted to work the Hells Angels and relocate to Canada. But that option still hadn’t materialized and I was open to other possibilities.

  Meanwhile, as Mongols we continued to frequent bars in Richmond, mixing with Pagans and Outlaws, until one night changed everything. The catalyst came shortly before Thanksgiving in 2008, when the agents witnessed what Snuff would later describe as an “unfortunate” incident involving a black male patron and members of his Manassas chapter. In the Hard Times Cafe, a Depression-era parlor tucked into a street corner in Fredericksburg, two Outlaws, Alibi and Jason (Snuff’s brother), decided to “have some fun” with a customer.

  “Got a light?” Jason dangled a cigarette between his lips: A black man obliged. But when his match flared in the murky darkness, Jason, without provocation, put his fist through the man’s face. Since he “wasn’t going to get laid” that night, he figured he “might as well hit a nigger.” The force of Jason’s punch propelled the man to his knees. Alibi, a stubby Outlaw who resembled a tree trunk, struck the dazed and bloody man again, this time fracturing his eye socket.

  “He has to have surgery.” Snuff took a pull on his beer, and his words chilled me more than the cool winter air funneling through his garage. He had canvassed the restaurant, worried about witnesses, assured that they knew the script: Alibi punched in self-defense. Snuff tossed his empty bottle against the wall and shot Gringo a hard stare. “I suggest you lie, too.”

  Jason snickered. “Hit any niggers lately?”

  Alibi, too, begged JD to “lie to his lawyer,” “testify falsely” at his pending trial. “That’s what a brother would do.”

  * * *

  In early January 2009, we decided to become brothers. At first I refused, still hopeful Canada would materialize. But then JD reminded me that Outlaws had chapters in Canada; I could infiltrate the club in the United States, transfer, and still work for the OPP.

  JD looked relieved. “Good. Because we already told them you were in.”

  20

  Outside In

  We are not marauding sociopaths … we have rules.

  —OUTLAW TO A REPORTER

  The American Outlaws Association (AOA) was officially established in 1965. A precursor group originated in Chicago in the 1930s and eventually spread throughout the East Coast, Canada, and Europe, with chapters formed in France, Norway, Belgium, Great Britain, Germany, Thailand, and Sweden. Recently, the AOA established chapters in Russia and Japan and boasts one of the largest motorcycle clubs in the world. The various chapters are grouped into color-coded regions. The Copper Region, which included North and South Carolina and Virginia, consisted of seven active chapters. Milwaukee Jack served as the Outlaws’ national boss. And like the Vagos, the AOA implemented a rank-and-file structure replete with a boss, vice president, enforcer, and secretary-treasurer. Prospective members first had to “hang around” the club for at least one year, demonstrate their commitment to the organization, and eventually obtain a club sponsor to prospect. That process could last at least six months or more.

  As Mongol full-patches, we planned to become a prospective chapter of the Outlaws composed of agents and informants. But the Mongols, angry that the Outlaws had seduced us, insisted that the leaders of both clubs meet to discuss the politics of defection. Not that recruitment required permission, but tolerance was appreciated. The Mongols and Outlaws, after all, still had to coexist in a small territory, and with a common enemy it made sense for them to play nice. According to the club’s strict rules, we needed five members and we had only thirty days to find a clubhouse. If we failed, we would be relegated to probationary status through the Northern Virginia chapter under Snuff’s leadership. That wa
sn’t going to happen.

  At first we attempted to recruit the Mongols’ Virginia Beach president (as well as the other member and the hang-arounds) to be our fourth member; with him mostly at sea he could fulfill a number without actually being a participant. But he refused. He was a devoted Mongol with no interest in defecting. He needed the identity, especially after losing his position with the Naval Special Warfare Development Group.

  Nevertheless, he had a prized “war trophy” he wanted to sell, a Russian-made automatic AK-47 that he “found” buried in warehouse debris on an abandoned Iraqi military base.

  “I could use the money,” he confided in Gringo and offered to toss in his bike for good measure.

  “I plan to report it stolen anyway,” he added, “and file a fraudulent insurance claim.”

  He sold Gringo his motorcycle for $1,200 and reported a theft with the Fairfax County police. But when the Mongols president learned that his insurance company had denied the claim, he offered Gringo two ballistic vests and another AK-47 in lieu of his immediate repayment. He should have known Gringo would never accept a bike with a lien.

  “I was low-hanging fruit” for the agent, the president confessed as he later pled guilty to selling illegal weapons to a federal agent.

  * * *

  The Norfolk field office, nearly eighty miles from Richmond, attempted to find us recruits. Naturally they wanted to avoid using another federal agent. The expense and the safety measures that had to be implemented each time the ATF dispatched one of their own into the field posed a bureaucratic nightmare. But they had a possible candidate, an informant and former drug dealer who had recently completed a prison sentence. He sounded promising. I arranged to meet him after work in a local bar.

  “Tell him you’re a federal agent,” Gringo suggested. “Explain that you’re infiltrating a biker club but don’t tell him which one.” The lie was a necessary precaution. If we decided not to use the informant, the less he knew about us and our operation the better.