ROUGH RIDE FOR JUSTICE

'ARE THEY BAD GUYS?'

This is "Biker 101."

That's what RCMP Cpl. Denis Huot called the questions posed to him - and the
answers he gave - in a recent interview about outlaw bikers in Edmonton.

The description is apt.

The first question was: Are there outlaw bikers here?

The last was: Are they bad guys?

Huot, an investigator in the RCMP-Edmonton Police joint bike gang
intelligence unit, said yes to both.

This is what Huot and his three colleagues in the unit, RCMP Sgt. Bill
Appleby, Edmonton Police Service Detective Tony Caughell, and Edmonton
Police Service Detective Daryl Dittrich, told The Sun about local bikers:

There are 13 full members of the Hells Angels Edmonton chapter. There are
also two prospects. Two members of the Edmonton chapter live in Grande
Prairie. "But they are in Edmonton quite often, very often," Huot said.

Additionally, at least five Edmonton-area residents are members or prospects
to the ten-strong Hells Angels "Nomads" chapter, based in Red Deer.

The Nomads, Huot said, are sometimes thought by people to be a separate club
from the Angels. They are not. They are thought by others, Huot said, to be
an especially elite group of Hells Angels. They are not, although in Quebec
and elsewhere that may once have been true.

The Angels have a Calgary chapter with 18 full members and one prospect.

The Hells Angels is the only club police call an "outlaw motorcycle gang" in
Alberta. It was officially formed in July of 1997 when members of the Grim
Reapers became Hells Angels. Members of the Rebels became Hells Angels in
September 1998.

"The only other gang left in the province were the King's Crew," Huot said
of a Calgary club. "They ceased to exist in December, 1998."

In November 1999, six former Edmonton Rebels and two Red Deer Grim Reapers
formed the Nomads chapter. Huot said that happened because the ex-Rebels and
the Edmonton ex-Reapers weren't really fond of each other.

The total is 39 Hells Angels, five prospects and three hangarounds.

"There is also a number of associates," Huot said. The associates, who all
have different weight with the club, may or may not ever be considered for
formal status with the Angels.

Huot said police know each chapter has a president, a vice-president, a
secretary and treasurer, a sergeant-at-arms and a road captain. Many
chapters, he said, also have intelligence officers.

The Angels are involved in the drug trade, the police officers allege, but
"they don't control all of it here," said Sgt. Appleby.

Det. Dittrich said police believe the club shares the market with many other
players, including Asian crime gangs. "I think they've each got their own
little niche."

Police allege the Angels traffic in cocaine, ecstasy, pot and speed. They
buy and sell weapons, move stolen cars or run frauds involving vehicles such
as rolling back odometers on autos for sale.

"A lot of auto sales are fronts for a lot of their associates," Huot said.

"Then there's the violent offences."

These, he said, centre largely on extortion and debt collection. Some people
"sell" debts to Angels, who in turn go out to collect the debt by simple
intimidation or brute force.

Police suspect some Angels may extort money from prostitutes, but not from
many, and not very much. They do not appear to be involved in escort
agencies, although Edmonton Police spokesman Annette Bidniak asserts that
they do control many strippers who sometimes prostitute themselves for the
bikers' benefit. Bidniak further charges that the strippers, although
working for agencies that have no documented links to Angels, are in fact
controlled by the Hells Angels and are the club's premier source of
"intelligence." They tell the Angels who sells what drugs in bars, what
prominent or important individuals may be vulnerable to extortion or bribery
and what level or nature of police presence they see in the bars or around
the drug scene.

"They (strippers) are their front line," Bidniak said.

Huot further noted that the Angels seek out friends who work at jobs that
can get them important information. He said police had found such insiders
in the federal and provincial governments - Bidniak said one was found in
the municipal government.

Cops further believe the Angels have friends at private-sector motor vehicle
registry offices, Huot said, but added "I have to be really careful on that
because I don't think it was ever proven."

The Angels also value associates in the military, Huot said, as a source of
weapons, and in the transportation industry for smuggling.

Although police call the Angels a criminal organization, Huot said, "They
really try to stay away from doing things (crimes) as a gang."

Individual Angels do crimes to benefit the club, he alleges.

"This is where it gets really tricky," he said. "Each chapter acts for the
entire organization. They are expected to 'Take Care of Business.'

"Taking care of business is making money. That's the bottom line, and that
comes down to the crime end of it."

But as far as dollar figures go, Huot knows only that individual club
members pay between $100 and $150 monthly to the Angels legal defence fund.

The Angels launder their crime money through legitimate businesses, the
police allege, and hide their control of some businesses and assets. They
don't want provable links to sensitive businesses, and they don't want
assets in their name that police could seize if they're convicted of crimes.

Sometimes it's as simple as a "nominee" - girlfriend, buddy or lawyer - who
is the listed owner. Other times it's someone in their network of
associates.

The greatest asset the Angels have, said the four officers, is their
fearsome reputation. It's also the greatest problem police face in their
investigations.

"The reputation that they have of being a bombing, murdering, drug dealing
fraternity ... becomes a competitive advantage for them in legal and illegal
enterprises," said Appleby.

Other criminals, he said, fade away or eagerly throw in with the Angels.
Both, in the end, help the enterprise grow.

Media reports of their fearsome acts intimidate law-abiding citizens who may
be witnesses to Angel misdeeds, said Edmonton police Det. Tony Caughell.

"A lot of the time we get: 'If it's anybody else but these guys I would
pursue it."

That, the four said, is their greatest frustration as biker investigators.

VISITORS

Luc Michaud is a Filthy Few, and among the filthiest.

He killed Hells Angels for the Hells Angels.

He's serving life for murder in the slaughter of six Hells Angels in the
Laval, Que., chapter in March 1985.

Right before that Michaud was in Edmonton, hanging with the Rebels and -
cops say - dealing coke with them.

The now 48-year-old Michaud was the big catch in a 1983 Edmonton RCMP bust
of four Rebels and two of their gals. He was the Angel.

The common-law wife of the Mounties' key informer in that bust claims today
the RCMP were crushed when prosecutors dropped their case against Michaud,
who had been held for full trial after a preliminary hearing. They had no
evidence to call.

Michaud might wish they had. Clear of Edmonton's lockup, he went home to
Quebec and four months later was part of the single bloodiest incident in
this nation's run with outlaw motorcycle gangs.

He got life with no parole for 25 years.

Quebec Angel Walter Stadnick, 48, is another of the Filthy Few.

Edmonton cops thought he was filthy enough when they saw him urinating
outside a west-end hotel on April 14, 1984. Two city constables were sued by
Stadnick for roughing him up in the old Jasper Place police station when
they brought him in.

A Queen's Bench justice dismissed the suit, ruling cops used no more force
than was needed.

Stadnick, who would become the national president of the Angels, also
complained that someone stole his Filthy Few patch - given to those who kill
for the club - while he was in custody.

From the Los Bravos, of Winnipeg, Man., come apparently two men fleeing
charges of attempted murder for beating a man with a baseball bat at the
clubhouse.

Shane Edward Kirton and Rodney Patrick Sweeney, both 32, were being hidden
in an east Edmonton home, likely by the Hells Angels, cops suspected.

On July 14 the city's tactical cops - Unofficial Motto: We Only Knock Once -
hit the house. They weren't there. Police urged the public to keep an eye
out.

In September, Kirton and Sweeney surrendered in Winnipeg.

Most star bikers from the big cities like to lay low when they're out here.

Not Claude Berger of Sherbrooke, Que., who literally blew his own horn while
visiting the province on Oct. 9, 1999.

Berger played what a Canadian Press report called "a haunting trumpet solo"
at the Sylvan Lake wedding of Angel Grey Holomay, 36, and his bride.

For four years he had been a member of the Quebec Symphony Orchestra when,
in 1985, he was in the news after a biker bust.

"We all fell over backwards when we read the story," an orchestra colleague
said. "He's a good musician and a gentle, calm person."

Berger was later laid off from the symphony.