123 ARRESTED IN HUGE HELLS ANGELS RAID

Full-Patch-Member-Turned-Informant Aided In Quebec Bust

(CNS) The tough shell of secrecy that protected the Hells Angels in
Quebec for years finally cracked during an investigation that has
produced the arrests of almost the gang's entire membership in Quebec.

Canwest News Service has learned the key to the investigation that
generated the arrests of 123 people Wednesday in Operation SharQc
involved a full-patch member of the gang who turned informant, an
extremely rare occurrence in Quebec.

According to two sources familiar with the investigation, Sylvain
Boulanger, a former sergeant-at-arms in the gang's Sherbrooke
chapter, supplied investigators with information about an important
vote the gang's membership across the province held in July 1994.

Hells Angels across Quebec essentially voted in favour of engaging in
the bloody turf war, with rival gangs such as the Rock Machine and
Dark Circle, that ran from 1994 to 2002 and involved the deaths of
more than 160 people, including several innocent victims.

At least two other informants, Martin Roy and another man, both
former underlings in the gang's vast drug trafficking network, gave
evidence in support of the investigation. The fact that Roy was an
informant was already revealed in Operation South, an investigation
that produced the arrests of several Hells Angels in Montreal a few years ago.

In past investigations, the Regional Integrated Squads who
investigate biker gangs could only rely on underlings such as Roy for
inside information. Having an actual full-patch member supply
information about the gang's operation has not been witnessed in
decades. A few Hells Angels ditched their loyalty to the gang after
the 1985 Lennoxville Purge, when the gang killed five of its own
members at a bunker near Sherbrooke, Que. But since then, getting a
Hells Angel to ditch his colours and turn his back against a gang
that demands fierce loyalty appeared to be impossible in Quebec.

Wednesday's roundup represented an unprecedented strike against one
of the biggest criminal organizations in the province with 111
full-patch Hells Angels arrested or sought on arrest warrants.

Members from all five of the gang's chapters in Quebec are
represented among the charges filed in Operation SharQc. The Justice
Department placed the gang's five bunkers, or clubhouses, across the
province under seizure orders.

Retired gang members were also among those arrested, as were several
people described by police as associates of the Hells Angels.

Everyone who appeared in court will remain in custody until they have
a bail hearing. The next date in the case is set for April 22.

In all, 156 people are named in a 26-page indictment and 115 appeared
before a judge. Another eight were already behind bars and many of
the remaining 33 people not arrested by late Wednesday afternoon are
believed to be in France and Dominican Republic, where the Hells
Angels in Quebec recently established a chapter.

More than 100 people named in the indictment face first-degree murder
charges, allegedly linking them to 22 homicides carried out during
the Hells Angels war with the Alliance, an umbrella group that
included the Rock Machine and Dark Circle. The Alliance was united in
its opposition to the Hells Angels' monopolistic attitude toward drug
trafficking in cities such as Montreal and Quebec City. The war was
initiated by members of the Hells Angels' now defunct Nomads chapter,
led by Maurice (Mom) Boucher.

Crown prosecutor Madeleine Giauque said Wednesday that Operation
SharQc is an extension of Operation Springtime 2001. She said a small
group of people reflected on what they learned from Operation
Springtime 2001 and came up with ideas on how the scope of a similar
investigation could be broadened.

Giauque would not comment on how the investigation was conducted. But
when asked if the murder charges represented a group of people who
allegedly were in agreement with the gang war she replied: "One can
draw that conclusion from reading the charges."