CANADIAN BIKERS MORE LIKE MOB THAN GANGS

QUEBEC Thirteen men accused of turning their Hells Angels motorcycle gang
into a Mafia-like network that dealt drugs throughout Quebec province go on
trial this week in Canada's biggest crackdown on organized crime.

Jury selection begins today. The defendants face charges of
drug-trafficking, kidnapping and assault. Conviction for involvement in
organized crime carries a penalty of up to 14 years in prison.

Police say drug trade turf wars between the Hells Angels and a rival group,
the Rock Machine, are blamed for at least 158 murders, 169 attempted
murders and the disappearances of 16 others.

The case already has cost $6,700 in security. At a hearing last month, the
defendants were led into court with their hands cuffed and seated at a
prisoner's dock surrounded by plastic glass. The dock faced away from the
witness stand to keep the defendants from intimidating those who will be
testifying against them.

On Thursday, a judge hearing a separate case convicted four members of the
Rock Machine biker gang and acquitted four others of similar charges under
the federal anti-gang laws.

"Now we know there are motorcycle clubs that are criminalized in Canada,"
prosecutor Jean-Claude Boyer said. "A judge said, yes, gangsterism exists
and we have to fight it."

Quebec Superior Court Judge Jean-Claude Beaulieu already has rejected a
defense challenge to the constitutionality of the anti-gang laws, adopted
in 1997.

With the Rock Machine recently joining the Texas-based Bandidos, Canada's
biker rivalry has expanded southward.

The police believe Hells Angels has about 80 members in six Quebec chapters
and the Bandidos some 30 members in two chapters.

Biker gangs are no longer just the bearded giants who roamed western
highways 30 years ago. Some have evolved into "North America's contribution
to organized crime," said Yves Lavigne, author of three books about the
Hells Angels.

Gang members use less powerful "puppet gangs" to collect money from drug
dealers. Bikers from the puppet gangs become Angels or Bandidos only after
several years of earning trust and building drug rings of their own.

"They've earned their status as businessmen, not as bikers," said Didier
Deramond, the head of an 80-officer anti-gang unit in Quebec. "They ride
around in Mercedes limos, not on Harleys."

The gangs' ruthless style made national headlines last year when crime
reporter Michel Auger of Le Journal de Montreal was shot in the back five
times in what was believed to be revenge for his stories on the bike gangs.