The gang war between bikie gangs the Rebels and the Bandidos is being linked to as many as 13 shootings on Sydney streets in the last two weeks.

The gang war between bikie gangs the Rebels and the Bandidos is being linked to as many as 13 shootings on Sydney streets in the last two weeks.A new elite police unit, originally set up to investigate the night-time shooting of a gang member in Seven Hills last month, is widening its net to examine the outbreak of violence among the outlaw gangs.first Sydney arrests in relation to the feud occurred on Wednesday night, when police pulled over four men in a Holden Commodore for a routine check and discovered two semi-automatic rifles, one loaded.Half an hour before the road stop, a house in Sadlier, believed to be linked to the Rebels, had been shot at. The four men, aged 21 to 46, are understood to be Bandidos associates.
Codenamed Highcro and made up of gangs squad officers, the strikeforce will examine the series of shootings in western Sydney.On November 28, a 25-year-old was shot several times in the head and chest while a passenger in a car driving on the Prospect Highway. The car was hit by about 19 bullets fired from at least two high-powered rifles. He was taken to hospital in a critical condition.
The Highcro detectives are using that incident as a springboard to look at 12 other shootings they believe may be linked to the warring bikie gangs, who have a history of enmity that often boils over into street warfare.A prominent Bandido was murdered in Melbourne in October and rumours of a planned "hit" marred the Friday extradition hearing in New Zealand of a Rebel member accused of a vicious bashing in Queensland last year.Only four days after the Seven Hills shooting, a Gypsy Joker was shot and knocked from his bike as he rode on the Great Western Highway before midnight.
In the early hours of the same day, December 2, a tattoo parlour in Belmore and a Bass Hill house were fired at. No one was injured in either shooting. Since then there have been nine shootings across Sydney's west.The NSW violence comes on the back of a flare-up between the two gangs in Victoria. On October 22, a Bandidos enforcer, 51-year-old Ross Brand, was shot dead outside the gang's Geelong clubhouse.
Two brothers, both members of the Rebels, have been charged with his murder.
The continuing gang violence has also led to high security during an extradition hearing for New Zealander and Rebel member Peter Douglas Rauhina, 37.The first Sydney arrests in relation to the feud occurred on Wednesday night, when police pulled over four men in a Holden Commodore for a routine check and discovered two semi-automatic rifles, one loaded.Half an hour before the road stop, a house in Sadlier, believed to be linked to the Rebels, had been shot at. The four men, aged 21 to 46, are understood to be Bandidos associates.

THE CLUBS REBELS MC The Rebels, with 29 chapters, are the largest outlaw motorcycle club in Australia. They are seen as a more traditional club and are run by former light-middleweight boxer and founding member, Alex Vella. GYPSY JOKER MC The Gypsy Joker MC are another Australian-formed club and are most notorious for the 2001 car-bomb murders of West Australian police senior investigator Don Hancock and Lawrence Lewis. BANDIDOS MC The Bandidos, whose motto is: "God forgives, Bandidos don't", are one of the "Big Four" gangs identified by the US FBI, and have 19 chapters across Australia. One of the clubs that has actively recruited from ethnic groups in recent years.

Rodney Wayne Irons wearing a jacket with the emblem of the "Hell's Angels" motorcycle club was tasered while resisting arrest

Rodney Wayne Irons wearing a jacket with the emblem of the "Hell's Angels" motorcycle club was tasered while resisting arrest at a Prince Frederick restaurant on Jan. 26.Dfc. Christopher Childress responded to Houligan's Bar and Grill at 135 West Dares Beach Road at about 1:20 a.m. for a call reporting a suspicious vehicle in the parking lot. Upon arrival, Childress saw sheriff's office Sgt. Roscoe Jones had a man at gunpoint, according to a Calvert County Sheriff's Office press release. The man, later identified as Rodney Wayne Irons, 48, of Lusby was wearing a black leather vest displaying a "Hell's Angels" motorcycle club patch. Irons allegedly told Jones, "You're going to have to shoot me, just shoot me." Irons pulled away as officers attempted to handcuff him.Childress used his taser on Irons, and after a brief struggle, officers were able to get Irons handcuffed. He was charged with possession of a controlled dangerous substance, Diazepam, and carrying a dangerous and concealed weapon, a folding buck knife and a Winchester knife. He was released on $15,000 bond on Jan. 26 at 3:55 p.m.

Cynthia Pelletier said she has no idea why Andrew Cilliers, 26, was gunned down in his driveway early Tuesday morning

Cynthia Pelletier said she has no idea why Andrew (Drew) Cilliers, 26, was gunned down in his driveway early Tuesday morning, but is traumatized by the loss."He was an excellent, excellent guy, okay," she said. "We loved Drew like our own family and we are just devastated."Pelletier's husband, Leonard, who police say is an associate of several full-patch Hells Angels, was shot in September 2007, as he was about to drop off his 14-year-old son at a Langley high school. The boy was uninjured.Leonard Pelletier co-signed for Cilliers' Harley-Davidson motorcycle loan, according to personal property records. Cilliers, who was convicted of drug trafficking in 2004, also got financing for the purchase of a 2006 Lincoln Navigator.Cynthia said her husband did not want to talk about the murder."It is too sad. It is too f---ing sad . . . . all I can say is he [Cilliers] was a great kid . . . the young people today don't realize once you're gone, it's gone."Surrey RCMP were called to the tidy rental home at 6267 131A St. about 12:30 a.m. and found Cilliers critically wounded in his driveway.Several police cars arrived and officers put up yellow crime tape as snow began to fall.
A few hours later, Integrated Homicide Investigation Team spokesman Cpl. Dale Carr confirmed that Cilliers had died of his injuries about 3:30 a.m."Cilliers was known to police. This incident has all the indicators of being a targeted attack," Carr said.Despite Cilliers' criminal associations, Carr said investigators don't have a motive for the shooting."We haven't linked it to any other murder yet," Carr said. "It is currently a mystery to us."For his January 2004 conviction, Cilliers got a six-month conditional sentence and nine months' probation, as well as a 10-year ban on owning a firearm.He and his brother had rented the two-storey home for almost a year, owner Shafqat Ali Bajwa said.
"Oh no, oh no, oh God," Bajwa said. "It is very bad, very shocking."
He said Cilliers was a good tenant who said he worked in the auction business and had provided references."I did not have any problems with him," Bajwa said. "He paid his rent on time. He left the house clean.Bajwa said that at one point there was a bad domestic situation, but it had been resolved"He had [a] problem with his girlfriend in the summer, but now they are separated. He was living there with his brother," Bajwa said.He said he knew nothing about the young man's drug trafficking conviction and had spoken to Cilliers' father and employer when he moved in.
"They said he was all right," he said.Cilliers' distraught father Gerald had a colleague answering his Langley office phone Tuesday after learning of his son's death.

Brian Jeffrey, the sergeant-at-arms of the Simcoe Chapter of the Hells Angels, pleaded guilty to trafficking four kilograms of cocaine

Last fall,Brian Jeffrey, the sergeant-at-arms of the Simcoe Chapter of the Hells Angels, pleaded guilty to trafficking four kilograms of cocaine, with a purity of 88 to 91 per cent, but adamantly denied that his biker club is a criminal organization.
At a hearing attended by family, friends and Hells Angels members, Ontario Superior Court Justice John McMahon sentenced the ailing tow truck supervisor to nine years in prison, less six months for pre-trial custody and his stringent bail conditions. Jeffrey's wife cried out in anger at the result."Do you think I can see him before you take him away for 10 years?" she angrily asked the court officers as they led away her handcuffed husband, who walks with a cane.Despite his credentials as a good family man with a dated criminal record, a lifetime of steady employment and contributions as a father figure to an abused 11-year-old girl, the fact that Jeffrey sold cocaine was certain to "cause havoc" in other families, the judge said. The judge found otherwise, and on that basis yesterday tacked 3 1/2 years onto what would have otherwise been a 5 1/2-year sentence. "It was a good day for the Crown and police," prosecutor Tom Andreopoulos said outside court.Jeffrey portrayed himself as a benign family man, but he is not, just as the Hells Angels are not "good ol' boy motorcycle enthusiasts," Andreopoulos said. Jeffrey will likely have to serve two-thirds of his sentence before he is paroled, Andreopoulos said.

Hells Angels member Edward Proudfoot "They came here full of aggression," . "They came here ready for a war."

Hells Angels member Edward Proudfoot opened the door of his East Oakland home and saw that they had him surrounded.Helicopters whirred overhead, officers from the Alameda County Sheriff's Office and the Oakland Police Department were stationed outside and on nearby rooftops with guns aimed at the house, and TV news cameras were ready to roll video. Proudfoot's wife, Shelley Milliorn, who had been running errands nearby, was being detained.The police were there to search Proudfoot's house for two murder suspects connected to a family friend who had visited Proudfoot's home in the last few days. The suspects, who Proudfoot says he does not know, were wanted in connection with the murder of a San Leandro man.
By the end of that night, September 23, images of a handcuffed Proudfoot were all over the local evening news, his house had been searched with nothing found, and his dog Jade had been shot at close range by a member of the Oakland police. Now, months after the incident, Proudfoot and Milliorn say they are still wondering: What exactly happened?According to Proudfoot, an officer informed him that they'd seen two murder suspects jump the fence of his home and that the pair could be inside his home at that very minute. Would he please allow officers to do an immediate search of his house?Before Proudfoot signed a document allowing the officers to search the premises, he said he made one request. "One of the first things I asked them, 'Let me take care of my dogs,'" Proudfoot recalled. Both of his dogs, Jade and Bear, were inside the home. "I'll put them away in the bathroom or somewhere so they're out of the way. I told them at least half a dozen times."
But later that night, Jade was shot. According to lead detective Pat Smyth of the Alameda County Sheriff's Office, a member of the Oakland police shot the dog. Although he was not present at the scene, Smyth said, "It was the Oakland Police. They were doing a protective sweep of the house of the resident. An aggressive pit bull was shot. There were two pit bulls, one they were able to lasso. The other one they were not, retreated into the house. When they did a protective sweep of the house, the dog charged them aggressively and subsequently it was shot."Civil rights attorney David Beauvais says the couple is making preparations to file a federal civil case within the next month. Although Beauvais declined to state the grounds for the lawsuit, he mentioned that he was looking into the reasons for the search.Proudfoot and Milliorn, who say they do not know the murder victim or the two men publicly identified by Smyth and other officers as suspects, Aaron Hammond and Ben Eddleman, have not been charged in connection with the homicide.

And as for the story that either murder suspect had been sighted jumping the fence of Proudfoot's property? Dickson said, "No, we never said anything like that. I've never heard anything like that as a part of this investigation. I would have no idea where that information came from." He added that his officers did not see Hammond or Eddleman in front of the house. In a separate interview, detective Symth agreed that neither suspect had been spotted in front of the home.

Yet Milliorn, like her husband, claims that she was told by police that Hammond and Eddleman had jumped their fence and might be in their house. "They said, 'We told you ... that the two suspects jumped the fence.' I said, 'Well if you want to, give my husband a call and let him know that that he's in there with two homicidal maniacs.'"
Proudfoot's legal advisor, criminal attorney Portia Glassman, who was called to the scene on the night of the search, sees the search as a case of bungled, misplaced showmanship. "They came here full of aggression," she said. "They came here ready for a war." Glassman also represents another Hells Angels member in a criminal case against the Alameda Sherriff's Office in a search of his home that took place a month before the search of Proudfoot's home.
Milliorn added, "They exploited his name and our address and everything on every newspaper and every news channel for two days. It was nothing related to the murder."As for Jade the pit bull, she was taken to the Pet Emergency Treatment Service in Berkeley. The veterinarian, Dr. Shea Cox, pronounced the dog brain-dead and Milliorn allowed the dog to be put down. She had been beanbagged several times before being shot in the head.Weeks after the search, Proudfoot's anger is still palpable. "They explained it to me: the suspects that they were looking for were here, and just in case there was a gun, they didn't want to endanger me to come in here while I was getting my dogs," he said on a weekday afternoon at his home, where blood stains of his dog remain in the carpet. "That's just bullshit, you know. I mean, they're just lying."

Paul Fontaine is charged with first degree murder for the 1997 killing of prison guard Pierre Rondeau

Paul Fontaine is charged with first degree murder for the 1997 killing of prison guard Pierre Rondeau. The guard was killed during an ambush of a prison bus in the east end of Montreal. The principal witness in the case, Stephane "Godasse" Gagne, was also involved in the crime, making it a difficult deliberation for the jury. Gagne pleaded guilty to charge of murder related to the death of Diane Lavigne, a prison security guard who was killed a few weeks earlier than Rondeau. He was able to plea bargin out of the charges for the murder of Rondeau. Initially it was believed the killing of the guards was intended to destabilize the justice system. However, it was revealed in court that the killings were also ordered to test the loyalty of Fontaine, Gagne and others.
The jury has been sequestered since Tuesday evening.

Outlaw biker Jeffrey Albert Lynds has “moved on to the Nomads in Ontario

clubhouse may be gone and their membership decimated by an undercover investigation that nailed the Halifax club, but police now say a former member of the only chapter east of Quebec is now part of a very elite group within the international gang.
Outlaw biker Jeffrey Albert Lynds has “moved on to the Nomads in Ontario,” RCMP Const. Stephen MacQueen said.A member of the RCMP-Halifax Regional Police combined forces intelligence unit, Const. MacQueen wouldn’t say where specifically Mr. Lynds was living, but said: “We still have one full-patch Hells Angel member here in the province and he’s a member of the Ontario Nomads.”On Jan. 29, 2003, the courts brought the hammer down on Mr. Lynds and fellow gang members, Arthur (Art) Daine Harrie and Clay Gordon McCrea. Mr. Harrie and Mr. McCrea got six years each all on drug charges, while Mr. Lynds was sentenced to three years and slapped with a lifetime firearms ban. The very same day, the bikers lost their Dutch Village Road clubhouse to the Crown under new anti-gang legislation.
The charges and the seizure stemmed from Operation Hammer, an undercover case that ended with a series of raids and arrests in December 2001.With three of its members awaiting trial on drug charges and a fourth, Neil William Smith, awaiting trial for murder, the Halifax chapter had slipped below the organization’s six-member minimum. Only Michael (Mike) Shawn McCrea, Michael (Speedy) Christiansen and Daniel Fitzsimmons remained and this time, they couldn’t rely on the support of Quebec Nomad, David (Wolf) Carroll. The godfather of the Halifax chapter is still wanted on 13 counts of murder stemming from the Quebec biker war. Instead, the Hells Angels pulled its trademark winged Deaths Head patch and rode off into the sunset.

Clay McCrea told the National Parole Board in June 2005 that he’d retired in good standing, along with his older brother, Mike, but was surprised at the club’s collapse. Mr. Harrie told the board in November 2005 that the Hells Angels had offered him a transfer to another chapter, but he decided to retire.

When released on parole, Clay McCrea and Mr. Harrie were banned from contact with any past or present member of the Hells Angels, including Mike McCrea.Const. MacQueen confirmed that all three did retire, but wouldn’t say whether they left on good terms.Mike, whose last name is often misspelled as McCrae or MacRae, was the reputed president of the Halifax chapter president, world secretary and international webmaster. The married father of one, who has always maintained that he was simply a member, is recovering from a battle with cancer and running a computer consulting business from his Porters Lake home.Mr. Smith recently lost an appeal of his murder conviction and remains in jail, while Mr. Fitzsimmons was booted out of the club, police previously said. In 2004, police said that Mr. Christiansen had transferred to the East End Hells Angels chapter in B.C. where his former 13th Tribe brother, David Giles, was a member. But the Kelowna Daily Courier reported in June 2007 that Mr. Christiansen was one of the founding members of a new chapter in Kelowna.Thursday is the first full day that Clay McCrea and Mr. Harrie can have contact with any past or present members of the Hells Angels because their sentences have expired. But Const. MacQueen won’t say that biker investigators are going to keep a sharp eye on these long-time criminals.“I guess we have an interest in anybody committing criminal offences, so if they commit criminal offences, they’ll be looked upon like anybody else. Right now, they’re not Hells Angels members so we don’t treat them any different than anybody else,” the officer said. While there’s no official Hells Angels chapter, the gang has “two support clubs in Nova Scotia,” which Const. MacQueen identified as the East Coast Riders and the Highlanders. And, he said, police “often see Ontario and Quebec, and Hells Angels members from across the country come here.”The Hells Angels “definitely have an influence and an impact on criminal activity in Nova Scotia. However, having a chapter here is like having a stake in the ground. It’s more of a visible thing that ‘This is our territory,’” Const. MacQueen said.
Having the Hells Angels patch with the words Halifax or Nova Scotia underneath “gives the perception to the public and to criminals that ‘This is our territory.’ Without that, they are missing that. However, that doesn’t mean that they still don’t have the influence and the fear of them is still very real among the criminal element.”
The public may not see Hells Angels in the headlines anymore, but police say the battle continues.“They’ve been declared a criminal organization. We don’t want them back. We do everything in our power to try to prevent them coming back,” Const. MacQueen said.