Biker Trials, The

by Paul Cherry

  In 1993, however, while he was serving his sentence, Michaud wanted nothing to do with the Hells Angels and was expelled from the gang. He was apparently a changed man. In 2001,he used section 745.6 of the Criminal Code, the judicial review provision, better known as Canada’s “faint hope clause,” to convince a jury that he deserved a break on his sentence and was given a chance at parole after having served 20 years. He described his role in the slaughter, saying he had merely pointed a firearm at one of the victims and told him not to move, just before the five Hells Angels were shot dead.

  Michaud was released on day parole in May 2003 and impressed parole officials with his rehabilitation. He spent two years in a halfway house, being gradually reintegrated into free society and becoming a family man. He admitted to the National Parole Board that he had been morally blind to what the Hells Angels were doing when he was a member and that he joined them out of an immature need to belong to something, no matter how criminal. He was released on full parole in June 2005.

  Among the five Hells Angels murdered in the Sherbrooke chapter’s clubhouse in 1985 was Michel (Willie) Mayrand, a former member of the Marauders, a gang based in the Eastern Townships mining town of Asbestos. The Marauders was another of the smaller gangs the Hells Angels used to select its members from during their early years in Quebec. Mayrand’s brother Richard joined the Hells Angels’ Montreal chapter a year before his brother was murdered. After the slaughter, Richard Mayrand chose the gang over sibling loyalties and decided to stay with the Hells Angels. He even did time for refusing to talk at a coroner’s inquest about what happened in Sherbrooke. He would later take on an important role in the Nomads chapter and be a key player in the Hells Angels’ expansion into Ontario. He would also be among the people arrested in Operation Springtime 2001.

  The Hells Angels’ ability to purge five of their own members in such a violent way in 1985 brought them notoriety in Quebec and would influence future developments. The gang’s Montreal chapter was left scattered after the purge as many of its members were rounded up as suspects or went into hiding. The chapter needed new blood, younger members who were willing to join an organization with a reputation for killing its own.

  Boucher was made a member of the Montreal chapter in 1987, joining Walter (Nurget) Stadnick, who had earned his patch in 1982. Both men would play important roles in the gang’s future, not only in Quebec but in the rest of Canada as well.

  Stadnick had been a member of the Wild Ones, a gang based in Hamilton, before joining the Hells Angels. Like Boucher and most other members of the Nomads chapter, Stadnick grew up in a working-class neighborhood, but in his case it was in Ontario. Between 1971 and 1988, he had been convicted at least four times for crimes committed in Hamilton and Toronto. The longest sentence he had served was six months for a weapons offence. He eventually became the Hells Angels’ national president, despite the fact he does not fit the profile of a typical biker gang member. He stands only 5 foot 4 inches tall and is thin. When appearing in court he is soft-spoken, polite and quick to smile. But he is also a survivor.

  On September 8,1984, the first anniversary of Yves Buteau’s death, Stadnick and a group of about 20 other bikers were riding their motorcycles in a close formation along Highway 143 in Saint-Pie-de-Guire, a small town outside of Drummondville. Buteau was from Drummondville and had been buried in a cemetery there. Riding with Stadnick that day were other important members of the Hells Angels from both the Montreal chapter and what would become the Sherbrooke chapter. They were on their way to the cemetery to pay their respects. Denis Houle, a future member of the Nomads chapter was among the group, riding his red 1984 Harley. Michel (Sky) Langlois, who had just replaced Buteau as president of the Montreal chapter, was there too. Ronald Lauchlin MacDonald, the future president of the Halifax chapter, was also along for the ride.

  At the same time, a 57-year-old priest driving his car down Rural Road 13 was heading to an event planned as part of the pope’s visit to Quebec that year. The priest was apparently late. His car went through a stop sign and barreled into the Hells Angels and their motorcycles. The close formation the bikers were riding in caused a chain reaction as the priest’s car plowed through them. Thirteen motorcycles were involved in the accident and four of them caught fire. A Hells Angels’ prospect named Daniel Mathieu died shortly afterward in a Sherbrooke hospital. Stadnick was burned badly in the accident and ended up losing several fingers. He also suffered severe burns to his face that were still visible 20 years later.

  In 1996, while Boucher was busy with the war in Montreal, Stadnick spent time traveling across Canada making and maintaining important contacts for the gang as it prepared to spread westward. Stéphane Sirois, a member of the Rockers, traveled that year with Stadnick to Winnipeg where the Hells Angels planned to set up a Rockers chapter whose members would sell drugs supplied from Montreal. Stadnick had no way of knowing Sirois would later leave the Hells Angels’ organization on bad terms and agree to work for the police. Stadnick told Sirois that he already had drug dealers working for him in Manitoba so that setting up a puppet club in Winnipeg only made sense. It’s hard to know how good business was in Manitoba, but four years earlier, a bag the police suspected was Stadnick’s was seized at a Winnipeg airport. Inside it, they found $80,000. Stadnick was charged with possession of the proceeds of crime, but his criminal case ended with the Crown dropping the charges, possibly due to a lack of evidence. Sirois was also with Stadnick as they prepared to travel to Saskatchewan to visit members of the Rebels, a gang celebrating their anniversary. Stadnick talked of how his dream was to see the Hells Angels become the only biker gang in Canada. Two years later, the Rebels were made prospect members in the Hells Angels.

  On July 21, 2000, another part of Stadnick’s dream was fulfilled. The police in Winnipeg had been monitoring a clubhouse that belonged to a gang called Los Bravos. They were aware of what was about to happen. Every member of the gang was present that day and could be seen wearing their Los Bravos colors outside the clubhouse before they all walked inside. Stadnick arrived at the clubhouse carrying a large white bag that appeared to be full. Minutes after he walked in, the police could hear a loud cheer emerge from within. As they filed out of the clubhouse, the gangsters were sporting new patches on their backs revealing that they had become prospects in the Hells Angels.

  The following day, the Winnipeg police spotted Stadnick in a local strip bar, partying with members of the Satan’s Choice, a gang from Ontario, the next province on the Hells Angels’ wish list. Although they resided in Ontario, Stadnick and fellow Hells Angel Donald (Pup) Stockford were frequently in Montreal during the biker gang war. The police initially assumed that they and David (Wolf) Carroll, the only other anglophone in the Nomads chapter, ultimately planned to set up their own chapter in Ontario.

  Despite being ten years apart in age, Stadnick and Stockford appeared to be good friends according to underlings who would later turn informant. They were rarely seen apart when in Quebec. Sirois later testified that Stadnick and Stockford often slept at the Rockers’ fortified bunker in Montreal on Gilford Street as a security measure during the biker war. The Ontario pair faithfully attended the Hells Angels’ monthly meetings in Montreal even though they did not speak French. After they were arrested in Operation Springtime 2001, the Ontario pair asked for a separate trial in English. They asked that 500,000 documents the Crown had as evidence against the Hells Angels be translated into English, a process estimated to cost $23 million. Their request was turned down by a judge who said they would have to be content with a summary of the evidence in English.

  The request was a further sign that, despite being longtime members of the Hells Angels in Quebec, neither Stadnick nor Stockford had made a serious effort to learn French. Wiretap evidence gathered during Project Rush revealed that the francophone members of the group had to switch to English when talking on the phone to Stadnick or Stockford. One informant, who would testify at their trial, said the pair re
quired a translater, a Hells Angels’ prospect, when he explained to them how to cut down the PCP he had supplied to them. Although they lived outside the boundaries of the biker war, Stadnick and Stockford were on high alert. In 1995, Kane told the RCMP that both men had complained of strange visits from people claiming to deliver pizzas they had not ordered. Kane also said Stadnick talked of nearly being abducted in Hamilton while he was out riding his Harley-Davidson. Kane said Stadnick believed members of the Outlaws, a long-established Ontario gang, were behind the incident. He told Kane that a pickup truck pulled up beside him at a red light and someone tried to grab him. He managed to fight off the would-be abductor and sped off on his motorcycle. At the time, Stadnick was under investigation for what appeared to be preparations for a drug pipeline between Thunder Bay, Ontario, and Winnipeg, Manitoba.

  As early as December of 1994, with the war only five months old, Kane was able to tell RCMP officer Verdon that it looked like Boucher was giving the orders behind the attacks on the Rock Machine, a gang partially composed of men Boucher had been friends with before. As well, the Hells Angels had put out an ultimatum to street-level drug dealers in Montreal’s east end. They had to buy their drugs exclusively from the Hells Angels, or else.

  Long before the war began, the Rock Machine was formed by Salvatore and Giovanni Cazzetta, brothers who had gained influence in Montreal’s drug trafficking circles. That influence quickly made them targets for the police. But as the Cazzetta brothers would point out later, they were behind bars for almost the duration of the war.

  Despite using the same hierarchy system as the Hells Angels, the Rock Machine was actually not a biker gang until it officially constituted itself as one in June 1999, as its members prepared to join with the Bandidos. But when the war started, the Rock Machine was just a part of a group of criminal organizations called the Alliance whose members refused to back down before the Hells Angels. Its members were issued rings with an A surrounded by a circle of diamonds. Because it resembled the Hells Angels in many ways, the Rock Machine was the most visible part of the Alliance. Like the Hells Angels, members of the Rock Machine wore leather jackets with patches on their backs proclaiming their identity. Dealers sympathetic to their side were given Rock Machine paraphernalia like T-shirts and baseball caps.

  A newly minted member of the Hells Angels shows off his new colors after leaving the Hells Angels’ bunker in Sorel, Quebec.The photo was taken by police monitoring a party where dozens of members of smaller biker gangs were “patched over” to become Hells Angels on December 29, 2000.

  The Rock Machine also adopted a hierarchy system similar to that which the Hells Angels had used internationally for years. This system served as a form of probationary period meant to weed out undesirables, especially potential informants. In this hierarchy, the official entry-level position is that of a “hang-around” and the probationary period normally lasts eight months. The second level is that of a “prospect,” where the potential member is allowed to wear a bottom rocker, or the lowest-ranking emblem, on the back of his leather jacket identifying which chapter he is from. The “prospect” level generally lasts a year. Only those who graduate to being a full-fledged, or “full-patch,” member can wear the Hells Angels’ legally registered logo, a winged skull, nicknamed “the Death Head.” Another introductory level is that of “friend.” It is sometimes used by the Hells Angels to label people who work for the gang but have no intention of joining them.

  In fact, the Hells Angels used underling gangs to carry out their dirty work during the gang war. One of those groups, the Rockers, used a similar hierarchical system, but in their case, a “prospect” was called a “striker.”

  Another gang to join the Alliance was the Dark Circle, a group partially composed of successful drug traffickers who had managed to invest millions of their drug money in real estate and other legitimate businesses before the biker war started. The Dark Circle was supposed to be like silent partners in the Alliance, financing murders, arson and extortion. At the beginning of the war, the Dark Circle had roughly 18 members who, according to former members, decided by July 1994 that they were willing to wage war with the Hells Angels. Their plan was to hit the gang hard without making it obvious the Dark Circle was involved. Members would not wear leather jackets with patches on their backs. Instead, each member was issued a ring bearing the leg of an eagle and a diamond. The Dark Circle had no president, as other gangs did, but was run by an executive committee whose four members were considered to be intelligent, influential men in Quebec’s underworld. Members of the Dark Circle actually had good relations with the Hells Angels’ chapter in Sherbrooke prior to joining the Alliance, but they grew unwilling to tolerate Boucher and his ambitions to dominate Montreal’s drug trade. Among the four was Michel Duclos, a former teacher, described as a cultivated and intelligent man, who had owned a bar for six years before the war started. He would later claim he joined the Dark Circle in the interests of protecting his business from the Hells Angels. While serving a sentence for attempted murder, Duclos apparently decided to quit his gang; he stopped associating with Alliance members as well while behind bars.

  Another member of the Dark Circle’s executive committee was Salvatore Brunnetti, a man who would eventually defect to the Hells Angels after waging war with them for years. He was arrested in Operation Springtime 2001, despite being a member of the group for only a matter of months. The two other members of the committee survived the biker war, despite contracts on their lives for helping to finance plots to murder various Hells Angels. One of these men would tell the National Parole Board he had no interest in being released from his federal penitentiary because he feared for his life on the outside. The other broke the unwritten rule of the underworld and cooperated with the police in 1998 to help arrest two Hells Angels’ associates who were planning to kill him.

  Also under the umbrella of the Alliance was the Pelletier Clan, a gang led by brothers who had controlled drug trafficking in large parts of eastern Montreal until the Hells Angels gave them an ultimatum — to start selling drugs for them. When the Pelletier Clan’s leader, Sylvain Pelletier, was killed in a bomb blast on October 28, 1994, most drug dealers in Montreal were left with no doubt that war had been declared in the streets, parks and bars where they sold drugs.

  By January 1995, the RCMP was paying Kane $1,000 each time he met with them to deliver information. His reports became more detailed, particularly about Boucher’s plans for the new Nomads chapter. Kane’s reports at that point indicated there was a rift in the Hells Angels since some members of the Montreal chapter were not fully on board with Boucher’s war with the Alliance. Kane learned that the Montreal chapter was closed to new members because some of its older members were not impressed with its most recent recruits. “Future members would have to prove themselves in a way that was very evident to be accepted,” Verdon wrote after talking with Kane early in 1995.

  On that same day, Kane said the new Nomads chapter would be ready to roll on June 24, 1995 — it turned out to be the day it was officially chartered. The term “Nomads” is used by the Hells Angels worldwide to identify special elite chapters whose members are not limited by territorial boundaries, as others are. Its membership was to be composed mostly of senior members of the Montreal chapter who were active in the war.

  “According to the information received, the ’Nomads’ will be more ’rock and roll’ and take territory all over Canada. The leadership will be maintained by Maurice (Mom) Boucher and the Rockers will be their affiliates,” Verdon wrote one day in what proved to be a very accurate description of what was to come. The note was followed by others that were equally accurate predictions:

  • “That (Mom) Boucher said that the next members to join the H.A. Nomads would not be garbagemen.”

  • “That the Nomads will pick their future prospects from the Rockers.”

  With only one exception, this was indeed how Boucher would recruit members for the Nomads as the b
iker war dragged on.

  René Charlebois and Normand Robitaille were among the first to become Hells Angels through this route. Charlebois and Robitaille began their careers in the Hells Angels’ vast network as members of the Rockers, the gang Boucher himself created in 1992. It was a collection of drug dealers and “muscle” who moved cocaine and hashish for the Hells Angels in eastern Montreal. Before he joined the Rockers in April 1997, Charlebois was, according to one informant, a penniless criminal delivering drugs and contraband cigarettes out of a submarine sandwich restaurant in eastern Montreal. Previous to that, Charlebois’ expertise appeared to be limited to credit card fraud. But he often got caught. Being in the Rockers, and later the Hells Angels, brought Charlebois status he had likely never dreamed of as an independent dealer, moving his product along with greasy sandwiches. While he was with the Rockers, he was estimated to be making $12,000 a month from drug trafficking. One informant also told the police that Charlebois and two other Rockers were able to finance a $1.7 million drug deal with a dealer in British Columbia. Charlebois boasted of making a $45,000 profit on the deal; but on his 1996 taxes he only claimed $18,000.

  Things appear to have got much better when he was made a Hells Angel in 2000. Charlebois was often seen driving a Cadillac Seville — which he rented through a numbered company. When his luxury home was raided during Operation Springtime 2001, the police found that the biker had acquired expensive tastes. They found bottles of expensive wines including a bottle of 1989 Château Haut-Brion, worth an estimated $1,325, and a 1990 Château Lafite. Charlebois also had more than $7,000 in cash lying around as well as five $1,000 gambling chips from the Casino de Montréal. While he was a Hells Angel, Charlebois had a bodyguard from the Rockers constantly by his side, even when he tended to his legitimate businesses, which included a car wash. Charlebois’ lavish wedding on August 5, 2000, caused controversy across Quebec after photos were published in the crime tabloid Allô Police. Singers Ginette Reno and Jean-Pierre Ferland had been hired to perform at the reception.