The Parole Board of Canada has rejected a request from a Hells Angel who wanted to leave the halfway house where he is residing because it doubts his claim of having quit the world’s most notorious outlaw motorcycle gang.

Mario Brouillette, 42, a man who joined the Hells Angels in 1994, just as the gang initiated a bloody war with rival criminal organizations all over Quebec that dragged on for seven years, was informed of the board’s decision on Thursday. During a hearing on Wednesday, he claimed he has left the gang because he doesn’t want his son to become a third-generation Hells Angel. Brouillette’s father, Aurele, 63, is a Hells Angel as well and is also serving a lengthy prison term.

The younger Brouillette is someone the police will probably be keeping a close eye on after he completes the eight-year sentence he is serving for drug trafficking and taking part in a general conspiracy to murder rivals during the conflict the Hells Angels engaged in. Before he was arrested in 2006, in a drug trafficking case, some police sources speculated Mario Brouillette was one of the gang’s more influential leaders in Quebec.

As his sentence nears its end, the gang is slowly re-establishing its chapters after almost all of its members were arrested in 2009’s Operation SharQc. But during his parole hearing on Wednesday, Brouillette claimed he quit the gang a couple of years ago and has found a new social network by attending his son’s hockey games and hanging out with other hockey parents.

In 2013, he reached the statutory release date, the two-thirds mark of his sentence, but the parole board ordered that he reside at a halfway house until it expires. On Wednesday he asked that the condition be lifted because he felt it was unnecessary. The members of his case management team, the people who prepare inmates for a release, informed the board they believe Brouillette is sincere.

The parole board disagreed. In a written summary of its decision, the two commissioners who heard the case felt “we have not seen a change of your values in the identified risk factors (of reoffending). Prudence remains appropriate.” The board noted that as recently as December, Brouillette continued to receive Christmas cards from Hells Angels chapters all over the world. The board also has concerns over how Brouillette will make a living while he owes the government $500,000 in taxes on undeclared revenue.

According to previous parole decisions, Brouillette was involved in drug trafficking from age 16. In 1990, at age 18, he became a founding member of the Rowdy Crew, an underling gang based in Lavaltrie that worked for the Hells Angels’ Trois-Rivières chapter. Four years later, he became the youngest Hells Angel in Quebec after he was promoted into the world’s largest outlaw motorcycle gang and joined his father in the Trois-Rivières chapter.

Brouillette timeline

May 12, 2006 — Mario Brouillette is arrested, along with 28 other people, in Project Bromure, a two-year investigation into several drug trafficking conspiracies in the Montreal area. Police sources said at the time that even though Brouillette was a full-patch member of a Hells Angels chapter based in Trois-Rivières, he appeared to be filling the void left in Montreal after the gang’s Nomads chapter, led by Maurice (Mom) Boucher, was shut down by Operation Printemps 2001.

May 21, 2008 — After having reportedly acted as a bodyguard for octogenarian Mafia boss Nicolo (Zio Cola) Rizzuto while both were detained at the Montreal Detention Centre, Brouillette pleads guilty to being part of a drug trafficking conspiracy, drug trafficking and a gangsterism charge. He is sentenced to nine years but with time served factored in he was left with a 67-month prison term. During Project Bromure, police learned Brouillette was supplying cocaine to dealers in downtown Montreal, Sherbrooke and as far away as Thunder Bay, Ont.

April 16, 2009 — Brouillette is re-arrested, while inside a federal penitentiary, as part of Operation SharQc, the police investigation that led to murder and conspiracy charges being filed against almost every member of the Hells Angels in Quebec. The case brought against more than a hundred gang members alleged they took part in a general conspiracy to murder rival gang members while the Hells Angels were involved in conflicts with rival organizations, mostly during the 1990s.

Sept. 30, 2011 — With the statutory release date on his 67-month prison term approaching, the Parole Board of Canada decides to impose several conditions on Brouillette’s release. That includes an order that he reside at a halfway house for the remainder of the sentence. During the hearing, the parole board was informed that, a few months earlier, an investigation had been launched after guards at a penitentiary were told that Brouillette and a group of other “influential” inmates had taken part in a conference call where they allegedly discussed putting out a contract on a fellow inmate. The written summary of that decision notes that nothing came as a result of the investigation.

April 5, 2013 — Brouillette pleads guilty to taking part in the general conspiracy to murder rival gang members after the Crown requests a stay of proceedings on the 22 first-degree murder charges that were part of the same case. As part of the plea bargain, Brouillette was able to have time he had previously served, for crimes committed during the conflict, count against his overall sentence. His existing 67-month sentence was recalculated to a 96-month sentence, but he reached his statutory release date only months later.

July 4, 2013 — Despite a formal complaint from Brouillette’s lawyer, the Parole Board of Canada again ordered that he be required to serve the rest of his sentence at a halfway house. Brouillette claimed he was leaving the Hells Angels to reconnect with his son and to look after his elderly mother.

Feb. 19, 2015 — Despite hearing Brouillette claim that he has since quit the Hells Angels, the parole board rejects another request to he no longer be required to reside at a halfway house.

pcherry@montrealgazette.com

Some Montreal letter carriers are on edge after several armed attacks involving two men who use knives and scissors to steal keys to mailboxes.

Union spokesman Alain Duguay said there have been a dozen such incidents in northeastern Montreal since the beginning of the year.

One man usually distracts the carrier while the other approaches from behind and demands the keys, said Duguay, the local president of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers.

The assailants then use the keys to steal credit cards, passports and other important documents.

“With the keys, they can retrieve the mail that’s either in the grey boxes or in a series of letter boxes,” he said in an interview.

Some of the keys also provide access to apartment buildings.

Duguay said two of the attacks took place at community mailboxes, with the most recent incident occurring at the beginning of this week.

“What we’re telling our members is to not resist, to hand over the keys and call the police as quickly as possible,” he added.

“We’re asking our members not to take any chances with their safety.”

The union official added that one female carrier was targeted twice but that nobody has yet been injured.

Duguay said similar incidents occurred four years ago in the same sector and involved “organized” street gangs.

During those earlier attacks, a male postal worker was injured.

Montreal police spokesman Raphael Bergeron said an investigation is underway but that it’s too early to link the incidents to street gangs.

A spokesperson for Canada Post said that to his knowledge, no mail has been stolen as a result of these attacks, and that no new mail is delivered until the mailbox locks are replaced.

“We encourage our customers to report any missing mail to our customer service department,” Anick Lozier said.

The Crown corporation is not giving many details on how they’re responding to these attacks. “We don’t want to give the criminals any clue as to what we’re doing,” Lozier said.

Duguay is worried the arrival of community mailboxes across the country will make it a lot easier to rob the mail.

He said there have been more than 4,800 thefts involving community mailboxes in B.C. in recent years, mainly in the Vancouver area.

Lozier said these fears are “ludicrous.”

“We’re been delivering to community boxes for 30 years without problems,” she said. “These thefts are few and far between and confined to that specific region.”

Canada Post is adamant about moving ahead with plans to gradually reduce home mail delivery despite court challenges and calls for a moratorium by some mayors.

Jacques Côté, who’s responsible for the file, told The Canadian Press this week the Crown corporation has no choice but to go that route because of a continuing drop in letter volume.

He also said Canada Post is ready to defend its position all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada.

“We think we’re on solid footing and that our position is legal,” Côté added.

Roberto Rocha of the Montreal Gazette contributed to this report.

Montreal police arrested nine people Wednesday night who allegedly took part in a drug-trafficking operation.

One of the arrested is Jean-Philippe Celestin, who police allege is the mastermind of a group with ties to street gangs.

All nine arrested men appeared at the Court of Quebec on Thursday:  Celestin, 34; Glenold Billy Fleury, 25;  William Routhier Ouellet, 29;  Mussa Ali Gulud, 43;  Jean-François Lapointe, 31;  Josue Ivan Flores Bojorquez, 26;  René Ouellet, 53;  Juan Carlos Suarez, 25; Brayan Pena Christian Suarez, 25.

They face various charges related to drugs, charges of conspiracy and receiving stolen money.

Two of the men, Celestin and Lapointe, also face an additional charge of gangsterism.

The investigation, which began in 2014, was directed at a narcotic distribution network for heroin and cocaine, primarily in licensed establishments on St-Laurent Blvd. in the Plateau-Mont-Royal.

Police also seized small quantities of heroin, marijuana and cocaine, $1,300 and a cell phone.

The investigation is not finished and more arrests will follow, police said.

Leslie Greenwood, the man accused of being the getaway driver in a double murder in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, told a jury Wednesday that a man he considers an uncle is a Hells Angel who has been sought by police for more than a decade.

Greenwood, 46, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the Jan. 24, 2010 deaths of Kirk (Cowboy) Murray and Antonio Onesi. He is also charged with conspiracy to commit murder. The men were shot in the parking lot of a McDonald’s restaurant on St-Jacques St. The Crown’s theory is that Jeffrey Albert Lynds, a Hells Angel based in Nova Scotia, ordered the death of Murray and that Onesi was killed because he happened to be Murray’s frequent driver. The victims were shot by Robert Simpson, 53, while his brother Timothy, 49, watched his back armed with a shotgun. The Simpson brothers have testified at the trial as collaborating witnesses and said Greenwood knew why he drove them from Nova Scotia to Montreal and then brought them back east immediately after Murray and Onesi were killed. Greenwood denies this and testified that Lynds simply asked him to bring the men to Montreal and never explained why.

Greenwood has told the jury, at least a few times, that he and Lynds were “best friends” before his arrest and grew up together near Truro, N.S. But while being cross-examined on Wednesday, by prosecutor Richard Audet, Greenwood revealed for the first time that he has close ties to David (Wolf) Carroll, 63, a Hells Angel who has been wanted in Quebec since 2001. As Greenwood himself pointed out to the jury “he’s one of the most wanted (suspects) in Quebec.”

“He is my uncle,” Greenwood said. But he later clarified that Carroll “dated my father’s sister” for a long period. He acknowledged that the information “might come as a shock” to the jury” even though the connection has nothing to do with the murder trial. Greenwood told the jury that Carroll was a member of the 13th Tribe, an outlaw motorcycle gang based in Halifax that was turned into a Hells Angels chapter decades ago.

Greenwood also correctly mentioned that Carroll later became a founding member of the Hells Angels’ Nomads chapter in Quebec (which no longer exists). He also said he is aware that Carroll is “on the lam.” But when asked by Audet if he might know where Carroll is now, Greenwood said he had no idea.

Greenwood also revealed he knows a lot about Lynds’ history with the Hells Angels. He said that after the Halifax chapter fell apart, sometime after 2001, Lynds became a member of the Sherbrooke chapter (here in Quebec) and later joined a Hells Angels’ Nomads chapter based in Ontario. He also mentioned that Lynds was kicked out of the gang before Murray and Onesi were murdered. But Greenwood also testified that Lynds’ membership in the gang had little to do with their friendship.

“Jeff became a Hells Angel because he wanted to. It had nothing to do with me,” Greenwood said, adding he never questioned Lynds’ involvement with the gang “because he ain’t never done me wrong.”

During the cross-examination Wednesday, some of Audet’s questions touched on the murder of Mark Stewart, a South Shore resident who was killed by Robert Simpson, weeks after Murray and Onesi were killed. Both Simpson brothers testified that Stewart was killed because Lynds knew Stewart had a large supply of marijuana and wanted to steal it from him. Robert Simpson said he went along with the plan to kill Stewart because Lynds was unable to come up with the $40,000 he had offered to Simpson for murdering Murray and Onesi and that the stolen marijuana would serve as a form of payment.

Greenwood is not charged with Stewart’s murder, but Audet wanted Greenwood to clarify comments he made about his death in a wiretapped conversation with an RCMP officer in Nova Scotia on June 4, 2010, shortly after Lynds had been arrested. Greenwood had not been arrested at that point in the double homicide.

The trial resumes on Monday.

pcherry@montrealgazette.com

A man was seriously injured when he was stabbed several times during an attack by a group of people Wednesday night.

Witnesses called police after they found the man, 24, bleeding on the sidewalk on Côte-St-Catherine Rd., across from the Ste-Justine children’s hospital. Police believe the attack occurred nearby, around Darlington and Willowdale Aves.

Montreal Police don’t believe the attack was related to recent settlings of accounts involving street gangs.

About two hours earlier, another man was stabbed in the Notre-Dame-de-Grâce district.

Police believe armed aggressors stole the 18-year-old man’s phone about 8 p.m., and stabbed him in the process, near the intersection of Sherbrooke St. W. and Marcil Ave.

The man checked himself into the hospital about two hours after the incident occurred, and that’s when police were informed about the attack. The man’s life is not in danger, and he is co-operating with police on the investigation.

Thirteen people were arrested by police forces in and around Montreal in an operation that targeted criminals the Montreal police allege were willing to use violence to achieve their goals. 

The Montreal police issued a statement Thursday saying the arrests were made following an “investigation that began recently centred on a criminalized group in the greater region of Montreal and more particularly in the Montreal North sector.” According to the release, the head of the group, a person with ties to a street gang, was among the 13 people arrested. The Montreal police stated that they “arrested several individuals who are considered as dangerous and did not hesitate to use violence while committing their crimes.” 

The operation was carried out with assistance from the Sûreté du Québec, as well as the Laval and Terrebonne police. While carrying out search warrants on Wednesday, the police seized firearms, ammunition, $5,200 in cash as well as stolen credit cards. 

The best way to know what is going on in your children’s lives and hopefully get ahead of a situation where they could feel compelled to run away is to have an open line of communication with them, says Pina Arcamone, director of the Missing Children’s Network.

“We need to make our home a safe place for these kids, a place where they can confide in the parents (about) the good things going on in their life, but also when something is not going well,” she said Thursday. 

Arcamone believes it’s important to make sure they feel a sense of belonging and acceptance, and that they get the attention they need or they are going to seek it outside of the home.

She says if your child mentions running away, even if you think it’s just to push your limits, it’s important to sit down and talk to them.

“Sometimes kids will threaten to run away just to test the parents’ reaction, and that is the opportunity to tell them that we do love them, that we will work through problems together and that you would never want anything terrible to happen to them.”

Arcamone says if your children are coming home with expensive gadgets like iPads or new jewelry and clothing that you know they could not buy on their own, it’s something that should be discussed, but carefully.

“We need to stop as parents and sit down and have the courage to speak to our children about these things and point them out, without accusing,” she said. “Remind them we are coming from a place of concern, not because we don’t trust them.”

The recent cases of missing girls in Laval possibly linked to street gangs shows just how those groups can exploit the most vulnerable.

“These gang leaders are manipulating … young girls,” Arcamone said. “They are going to prey on the vulnerable. So when you run away from home, that’s the time you become vulnerable because what will you do to survive?”

Related

• Rash of recent Laval runaways shines spotlight on difficult issue

“These predators, they are able to zero in and recognize what is the weakness in this young girl. And they will shower them with affection or attention, bring them to the nicest restaurants, take them under their wing.

“So they will appear like a prince charming and offer them a much better life. And once this trust has been built, then these girls may be led into a life of exploitation.”

kmio@potsmedia.com

twitter.com/kevmio

The doors at the Centre jeunesse de Laval have been locked, at the request of the director, after several girls ran away from the Cartier Blvd. W. building.

The law forbids youth centres from preventing young people from coming and going as they please, but over the last two weeks, five girls ran away from the Laval institution.

Several of them have left repeatedly and become the target of street gangs.

Tuesday, Minister for Rehabilitation, Youth Protection, Public Health and Healthy Lifestyles Lucie Charlebois raised the possibility that the freedom to circulate could be suspended. She added that she wanted to determine how to better monitor the use of cellphones that the adolescents are using to access social media.

That would require changes to Law 125 on youth protection.

The Quebec government announced this week it would appoint a monitor to oversee the Laval youth centre to determine what can be done. A report is expected in 30 days. 

A Montreal man appeared in Quebec Court on Thursday afternoon to face charges of first degree murder and conspiracy to murder related to the shooting of a 25-year-old man last September.

Julien-Fagnani Bergeron, 27, is charged in connection to the 19th homicide in the city of Montreal last year.

On Sept. 13, Edwidge Jacques was fatally shot while in a car on Lacordaire Ave. near Crevier St. in Montreal North. The victim later died of his injuries in a hospital. Jacques had ties to a street gang and, at the time of his death, he was facing a drug trafficking charge and had been sentenced in May to perform 240 hours of community service after an assault conviction.

Police have arrested a suspect in connection to the shooting outside a Montreal night club Monday.

Officers tried to apprehend the 22-year-old on Le Corbusier Blvd. in Laval around 8:30 a.m. Thursday when, according to police, he tried to flee on foot. As the cops gave chase, the suspect allegedly dropped a handgun before being nabbed outside a motel on des Laurentides Blvd.

The arrest was carried out by officers working for the Laval, Montreal and Sûreté du Québec police.

The man was “known to police” and will meet with investigators from Montreal’s street gang task force, according to police spokesperson Daniel Lacoursière. He’s scheduled to appear in court Friday, where he’ll face charges related to the shooting.

Ballistics specialists will inspect the gun allegedly discarded by the suspect to see if it matches the one used in Monday night’s club shooting.

Around 3:25 a.m. Monday, 30-year-old Michael Duchard was gunned down as he exited the Muzique Audio Bar on St-Laurent Blvd. He had hailed a cab and was accompanied by two women when a man came upon Duchard and fired several rounds into his abdomen.

The 30-year-old survived the attack and is expected to make a full recovery. He is also known to police.

Meanwhile, there will be an emergency hearing by Quebec’s liquor board Friday to determine if Bar Muzique can keep its liquor licence. The police want to suspend the nightclub’s liquor licence because they say it’s become a hangout for members of the city’s street gangs.

According to a liquor board notice sent to Muzique Audio Bar’s ‎owners on Thursday, requesting their presence at Friday’s hearing, “the attempted murder with a weapon targeted an individual (with a criminal record) who is a regular client of your establishment and has ties to street gangs.”

‎The notice also goes on to list several dates on which police observed members of known criminal organizations at the bar. That includes three dates between Jan. 11 and Feb. 22, of this year where “several members of organized crime” were “at your establishment.”

The names of the gang members observed at Muzique Audio ‎Bar are redacted from a copy of the notice obtained by the Montreal Gazette. But one date in particular that is listed, Sept. 8, 2014, mentions that individuals were seen wearing the gang colours of the Hells Angels, one of the most powerful criminal organizations in Canada as well as members of their underling gang, the Red Devils.

The Régie des Alcools, des courses et des jeux received the initial request to have the bar’s licence revoked on July 30, 2014. The request came from city councillor Alex Norris, who says several citizens also came forward with similar demands.

“I’m relieved the investigators have requested this emergency hearing and that the Régie agreed to hold it,” Norris, the city councillor for the district where the bar is located, wrote in an email exchange after the emergency hearing was called. “There’ve been far too many acts of violence at this club and it’s urgent that it be shut down.”

Detectives from Montreal’s street gang task force are expected to testify at the hearing, which takes place at the Montreal courthouse at 9:30 a.m.

A conflict within a Montreal street gang might have been behind an attempted murder outside a bar on St-Laurent Blvd. this week, the provincial liquor board was told on Friday. 

The Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux held an emergency hearing at the Montreal courthouse to listen to arguments on the Montreal police’s request to have Muzique Audio Bar’s liquor licence temporarily revoked because it fears more violence in the near future. 

After a 13-hour hearing, Quebec’s liquor board ruled late Friday night that the club could remain open provided it implement a number of new security measures. Namely, the board said the club’s managers must hire additional security staff, use metal detectors and keep “undesirable” clients out of the nightclub.

The club’s owners said they would close the Muzique for the next two Sundays while police investigate the shooting and new security measures are put into place. The owners will also sit down with Montreal police to hash out a list of potential customers with gang ties and determine how to keep them away from the bar.

After spending time inside the bar, which is near the corner of Roy St., Michael Duchard, 30, was shot three times on Monday, April 25, after he and three others climbed into a taxi around 3:25 a.m. 

The two Régie board members — Jocelyne Caron and Jean Lepage — were informed that one witness, a person who knows Duchard, told police that the victim had earlier seemed reluctant to leave the bar.

Montreal police have video evidence that the shooter, who was wearing a hoodie, was waiting across the street from the bar and received a signal from another man who followed Duchard out. The second man appeared to give a series of signals, after which the shooter approached the taxi, opened the driver’s-side back door and shot Duchard at close range.

At one point during the hearing, Sébastien Sénéchal, a lawyer for the bar, asked Montreal police Det. Jean-Philippe Leblanc whether investigators believe that Duchard, who is alleged to have ties to a Reds-affiliated street gang, was shot as part of a conflict within the gang. Leblanc said it is one hypothesis being considered. 

A 22-year-old man who was arrested in connection with the attempted murder on Thursday also allegedly has ties to a Reds-affiliated gang.

Muzique Audio Bar owner Michael Bourgeois, left, leaves the Montreal courthouse Friday, April 29, 2016. 

He was charged with several offences, including the illegal possession of a revolver, at the Montreal courthouse on Friday, but he was not charged with the attempted murder.

The 22-year-old man is to return to court on Monday for a bail hearing. 

Through a series of other questions asked by Sénéchal, Leblanc confirmed that Duchard and his brother, Patrick Duchard Lazarre, were investigated for a stabbing that took place in a different bar, on Jan 1. The victim in that case was also tied to a Reds-affiliated gang. 

Sénéchal asked an earlier witness, Det.-Sgt. Frederic Dubé, the person who made the actual request for the emergency hearing, why the Montreal police did not make a similar request to shut down a bar on St-Laurent Blvd. (just north of Muzique Audio Bar) where two women were recently stabbed while they were outside at closing time. 

“It’s a real farce, what is happening here. (The attempted murder) is not the fault of the bar,” Sénéchal said, arguing that Muzique Audio Bar is being treated unfairly. 

The Muzique Audio Bar on St-Laurent Blvd.

Evidence was also presented suggesting that the bar not only tolerates known criminals on its premises, but affords them special treatment. One investigator said Jean-Philippe Celestin, a well-known street gang leader, was once observed by members of Groupe Éclipse, the Montreal police unit that gathers intelligence on street gangs, walking into the bar past a lineup of people without waiting. When a police officer asked why Celestin merited special treatment, the doorman replied: “We have no choice.” 

Two Hells Angels from Ontario, Carlos Fernandez and Philipp Boudreault (who was recently the victim of an attempted murder in Lachute), were also recently observed inside the bar, as was a man with known ties to the Mafia in Montreal. The liquor board is still considering another request, made in 2014, that the bar’s permit be permanently revoked.  

As the emergency hearing dragged on into Friday evening, Caron and Lepage grew concerned that they wouldn’t be able to hear all of the evidence and arguments before the day ended. They offered the possibility of resuming the hearing on Monday but Stéphane Cossette, a lawyer for the Régie, insisted that a decision had to be made before the weekend.

Cossette said that based on the attempted murder and the bar’s regular clientele, the possibility of retaliation “is imminent.” 

pcherry@postmedia.com

Four people, including two men allegedly linked to street gangs, will appear Monday at the Montreal courthouse to face charges relating to the possession of a prohibited weapon and ammunition.

Montreal police spokesperson André Leclerc confirmed two men and two women will face charges of joint possession of a prohibited loaded firearm.

Police officers had initially stopped a vehicle at the intersection of Giroux and Béique Sts. in LaSalle.

After finding a gun inside the car, they arrested a man age 35 and a woman, 36.

The investigation eventually led investigators from the organized crime unit to a residence on Paquette St., where they arrested a man age 24 and a woman, 34.

A 23-year-old man was being treated for minor injuries after he was shot at least once in the lower body in the St-Michel district on Friday afternoon.

The man was standing on the sidewalk at the corner of Jarry St. and 12th Ave. about 12:20 p.m. when he was shot, said Montreal police Constable André Leclerc. He ran from the scene heading south on 12th Ave. and finding refuge in a house on that street.

Witnesses called 911 and police found the victim, and called an ambulance. He was sent to a hospital, where his injuries were not considered to be life threatening. He never lost consciousness, Leclerc said.

Police were still searching for a suspect, and didn’t have a description to provide as of Friday afternoon. Police believe the attacker may have fled toward the north. A perimeter was erected Friday, closing off Jarry between St-Michel Blvd. and 13th Ave. Montreal’s street gang unit was on the scene investigating. Police believe the victim knew his attacker.

The man arrested more than two weeks ago as a suspect in the attempted murder of a known street gang member has since been released on bail without ever having been charged with the crime. 

Cibanda Cris (Red Baby) Kamuena, 22, was arrested on April 28 and later identified by Montreal police as a suspect in the April 25 shooting outside Muzique Audio Bar on St-Laurent Blvd. that left Michael Duchard Lazarre, 30, an alleged member of a Reds-affiliated street gang, in critical condition. The shooting prompted Montreal police to request an emergency hearing before the Régie des alcools des courses et des jeux to ask that the bar’s liquor license be temporarily revoked because it feared more violence would follow at the bar. During the hearing on April 29, police detectives listed several known organized crime figures who had been seen inside the bar in recent months. Included on that list was Marco Pizzi, a 46-year-old Montreal North resident with alleged ties to the Mafia in Montreal who was arrested by the RCMP on Wednesday as part of Project Clemenza, an investigation into cocaine smuggling and trafficking. 

During the liquor board hearing, detectives identified Kamuena as their suspect in the shooting and claimed he would be charged with attempted murder in a different room at the Montreal courthouse later that same day. The attempted murder charge has yet to be filed but Kamuena was instead charged with seven Criminal Code offences, including the illegal possession of a loaded revolver. He was recently granted bail after a judge heard evidence in a different case where Kamuena faces four charges related to a home invasion carried out two days before Duchard Lazarre was shot. 

On April 23, eight people were playing a friendly late-night poker game inside an apartment on Côte-des-Neiges Rd. when three masked men stormed inside at around 2:40 a.m. The three armed men ordered all of the poker players to lie on the floor and hand over their wallets, jewelry and watches, prosecutor Jean-François Roy said, summarizing the investigation during Kamuena’s bail hearing. 

“(The armed men) left the apartment while saying ‘don’t call the police. We know who you are, we know where you live and we will kill your families’,” Roy told the court. One of the victim’s credit cards was used a few times shortly afterwards and just before the victim filed a complaint with police. 

Roy said investigators gradually gathered evidence that links Kamuena to the stolen credit cards. He became a suspect in the home invasion at roughly the same time another section of the police force linked Kamuena to the attempt to murder Duchard Lazarre. Roy said three sources provided tips to the police alleging a street gang member “known as Red Baby and who drives a red Audi” was the man who shot Duchard Lazarre. Based on the information from the sources, police detectives determined they were referring to Kamuena, who was described as having ties to a Reds-affiliated gang during the liquor board hearing.

During the bail hearing, Roy said one reason Kamuena has yet to be charged with the attempted murder is because investigators are still awaiting results of an analysis they requested on evidence recovered at the scene of the shooting. 

The case related to the home invasion returns to court on June 20. 

pcherry@postmedia.com

A South Shore man who only recently began serving a sentence in a federal penitentiary has been charged with carrying out a homicide in Montreal last year, just weeks before he was sentenced. 

Lentzky Xavier, 20, of Ste-Catherine, was charged at the Montreal courthouse on Wednesday with the Sept. 3 murder of Donald Cesar, a 22-year-old man who had close ties to a Montreal street gang. Cesar was the half-brother of Chenier (Big) Dupuy, a well-known Montreal street gang leader who was murdered in August 2012. 

Cesar was shot in Montreal North following a series of other street-gang related shootings that occurred in northern Montreal in the weeks that preceded his death. Xavier is charged with first-degree murder in the case. 

According to court records, he was arrested by the Montreal police on Oct. 8 and was charged with possession of a prohibited firearm. He pleaded guilty to the offence roughly six weeks later, on Nov. 26, and was sentenced to a three-year prison term on the same date. 

The Hells Angels and similar gangs are in the news from time to time. Yet criminal gangs are not a recent arrival in Montreal, even if the depredations of modern ones are carried out on an unprecedented scale.

We’ve had gangs at least since the early 19th century, and probably before. In 1824, for example, Montreal’s most notorious gang was run by a desperate character named Joseph Bellerose. One day a man was out walking in countryside west of the city and came upon a cave. Inside were Bellerose and his men, cleaning some of their loot. The man ran back and informed the authorities.

Bellerose’s crew were a fearsome bunch, and the unarmed and mostly elderly men of the Watch, Montreal’s peacekeepers before the city had a proper police force, wanted nothing to do with them. A detachment of soldiers from the local garrison had to be called out, and so the gang was captured. Bellerose was hanged for burglary on Sept. 29.

Some two decades later, on William Street in Griffintown, a gang set upon prominent druggist Benjamin Lyman and a warehouse owner named Michael Babcock as they returned home from a church meeting. Though he was struck a few times, Lyman managed to escape, but Babcock, according to a witness, “was nearly murdered.”

In the 1870s, Montreal’s waterfront was home to several criminal crews, among them the Jurors Street gang, the Joyce gang and the Deroy gang, but the most notorious was the Black Horse gang. Members specialized in accosting pedestrians and shaking them down for money, “and when the money was not forthcoming,” one newspaper reported, “and sometimes when it is, they ill-treat the victims who have unfortunately fallen into their hands.”

Late in May 1875, half a dozen Black Horse toughs set upon a man variously known as Francis Gabriel and Gabriel Wren; there is even a suggestion he was a member of the gang himself. It was near the intersection, now long gone, of St-Timothée and de la Commune streets. Wren was badly beaten and died from his injuries.

Witnesses at the inquest were no help. One was “too much under the influence” to remember what happened. A man living opposite where the beating took place “generally answered in monosyllables,” claiming he “heard no disturbance.” A woman standing nearby “professed entire ignorance on the subject.”

No one should have been surprised. The gang’s members were notorious for intimidating potential witnesses into silence.

Their malign influence extended to the coroner’s jury examining Wren’s death. Jury members blithely accepted the gang members’ testimony that Wren had died after playfully running along de la Commune; he tripped, they said, and fatally struck his head against an exposed timber. No charges were brought against them.

Yet it didn’t always go the Black Horse gang’s way. In October 1876, Joe Beef threw four members out of his well known tavern for rowdiness. When one of them had the cheek to try suing Beef for injuries he’d supposedly received, he got nowhere.

And in July 1877, Black Horse members began harassing a volunteer soldier named Frank Fitzpatrick. Just 18 years old, he was on guard duty in front of the army barracks a little to the east of the Champ de Mars. Curses were thrown at him, then stones.

As it happened, one of the gang members, John McKeown, was an older brother of two of Gabriel Wren’s attackers two years before. McKeown tried to grab Fitzpatrick’s rifle. The soldier resisted, and in their struggle McKeown was “progged” — that is, bayoneted. He staggered off toward the harbour, fell to the ground and died some 10 minutes later.

Like Wren’s killers, the soldier did not face charges. Unlike them, it was not through a dubious application of justice but rather because “Fitzpatrick only did his duty.”

lisnaskea@xplornet.com

The man who was arrested in April as a suspect in the attempted murder of an alleged street gang member has finally been charged in connection with the shooting. 

Cibanda Cris (Red Baby) Kamuena, 23, appeared before a Quebec Court judge at the Montreal courthouse on Wednesday where he was charged with the attempted murder of Michael Duchard Lazarre, 30, a man the Montreal police have alleged is a member of a Reds-affiliated street gang.

The shooting occurred just after closing time on April 28, outside Muzique Audio Bar on St-Laurent Blvd. Duchard Lazarre survived the attempt on his life despite having been shot three times, at point blank range, after he got into a taxi with three other people. 

Kamuena was arrested a few days after the shooting but was initially only charged with unrelated crimes. He was granted bail early in May but it appears he will have to go through another release hearing. The Crown objected to his release on Wednesday and he was ordered to be detained for a potential bail hearing on Thursday. 

The shooting prompted the Montreal police to request that the bar’s liquor license be temporarily revoked because it feared more violence would follow the shooting. Following an emergency meeting held on April 29, the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux ruled the bar could remain open after its owners agreed to implement additional security measures. During the hearing, a Montreal police detective alleged that Kamuena also has ties to a Reds-affiliated street gang. 

pcherry@postmedia.com

Montreal police have arrested and charged two men in connection with a series of violent crimes linked to street gangs in Rosemont and St-Michel since the beginning of the year.

The arrests are the result of ongoing investigations by several police units. The two suspects were charged in Quebec Court Wednesday: Keven Lacroix Butler, 23, faces a charge of possession of a prohibited firearm, while Kevin Duroseau, 24, faces charges of probation violations and two counts related to firearms.

Police said that, since January, nine violent events involving street gangs had occurred in the Rosemont and St-Michel areas, including attempted murder and possession of firearms.

Montreal police are asking that anyone with information about these events call 911 or Info-Crime Montreal at 514-393-1133.

Four more people have been arrested in connection with alleged organized-crime drug trafficking involving the Mafia, biker gangs and street gangs.

The Sûreté du Québec said Pascal Lavoie, 41, Tamouro Samy, 29, and Claude Ouellette, 42, are expected to appear Thursday at the Montreal courthouse. They face charges of gangsterism, conspiracy, drug trafficking, money trafficking and possession of property obtained by crime. A fourth suspect, Martin St- Arnaud, 39, was also arrested for breach of conditions.

Police are still looking for Benoit Nantel-Gagnon, 32, of Montreal, as part of this investigation. The public is invited to call in any information that may help locate the suspects at 1-800-659- 4264.

The SQ says its investigation found that while Samy was in prison, he was still collecting money from drug sales, for a total of around $135,000.

The arrests are part of Projects Magot and Mastiff, joint investigations with the SQ into drug trafficking conspiracies allegedly run by the Mafia, Hells Angels and street gangs. On Nov. 19, investigators arrested or issued warrants seeking 48 people — including Leonardo Rizzuto and Stefano Sollecito, whom police described as the heads of the Mafia in Montreal.