Raids carried out on a drug trafficking network operating in the west end of the city produced evidence it was controlled by one of the most powerful Hells Angels' chapters in Canada. While executing search warrants at 13 addresses in points west of the downtown core like Verdun, Point St. Charles and Little Burgundy, Montreal police officers found clothing with the biker gang's tell-tale paraphernalia.
"We have seized clothing with the emblems of the Sherbrooke Hells Angels," said Commander Françe Théoret, head of the Montreal police youth and street gang prevention squad for southern Montreal.
The raids were carried out Thursday as part of Operation Scirocco, an investigation of drug trafficking in southwestern Montreal. Théoret said the investigation began a couple of months ago and Thursday it produced the arrests of 17 people, including five women. She said some of the people arrested were more known to police than others. "But they are people who are tied to an outlaw motorcycle gang, the Hells Angels," she said. "It was a network that sold drugs to certain street gangs that we are aware of." Théoret was unable to say how long the drug trafficking network is believed to have operated before it drew the attention of police investigators this year. The investigation was initiated after Montreal police received a series of complaints from citizens ranging from reports of frequent comings and going at residences to violent crimes like assault and attempted murder. Arrests and search warrants were carried out in St. Henri, Point St. Charles, St. Paul Ville Émard, Verdun and Lachine. Officers seized 1,000 rocks of crack cocaine, 500 marijuana plants and $25,000 in cash. The biker gang's Nomads chapter fought a bloody war and took control of drug trafficking turf in the same area in the late 1990s. But most of the members of the Nomads chapter are behind bars and serving lengthy sentences for crimes committed during their war with organized crime groups like the Rock Machine. Thursday's police operation indicates the biker gang is still present in southwestern Montreal. The Sherbrooke chapter has operated quietly for years even though some of its members have been recently investigated for financial crimes. According to a recent police estimate, the chapter, which has a bunker in Lennoxville, next to Sherbrooke, has 27 full-patch members, making it one of the biggest in Canada. And while the gang's five other chapters in Quebec were hit hard by police operations in the past decade, the Sherbrooke chapter went through the period relatively unscathed. Evidence heard in recent trials suggests the Sherbrooke chapter also has considerable influence over at least two of the gang's chapters in Ontario.The people arrested Thursday are expected to be charged at the Montreal courthouse on Friday with possession of drugs with intent to traffic and drug possession