UN founder vowed violence against Scorpions would go on, court hears
A Vancouver cop testified Wednesday that United Nations founder Clay Roueche told him that gangland murders would continue shortly before a fatal shooting in Burnaby in 2008.
Sgt. Dave Colton told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon that he was part of the regional gang task force on May 9, 2008, when he pulled over Roueche’s van in Port Moody near where the Bacon brothers were living.
Colton said he had a casual conversation with Roueche about the ongoing violence and what could be done to stop it.
Colton said he raised the issue of the public being at risk if the UN gang was bent on seeking revenge for the murder of popular member Duane Meyer the day before.
And he told Roueche that if the violence was going to happen, it would be better if it did not occur in a public setting.
Roueche, who is now serving a 30-year sentence in the U.S., told him the violence would continue and suggested police would respond the same way if an officer had been killed, Colton said.
“That’s the way that it is,” Colton quoted Roueche as saying.
Crown David Jardine wants the Roueche comments admitted as evidence of a conspiracy between Roueche and his UN brethren to kill the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpion associates in retaliation for the Meyer hit.
“Roueche’s statement was made in response to the question what can stop the violence and specifically the homicides,” Jardine noted.
“Roueche’s response indicating that the homicides would continue was a candid — and the Crown submits — matter-offact defiant confirmation that the existing conspiracy to kill the Bacon brothers would be further pursued.”
Alleged UN gangster Cory Vallee is charged with conspiracy to kill the Bacons, as well as the first-degree murder of Bacon associate Kevin LeClair in February 2009.
Defence lawyer Eric Gottardi said Roueche’s statement should not be allowed into evidence at the judge-alone trial.
“Its probative value is nil and its prejudicial effect is high,” he said, adding that the casual comments were not part of formulating or carrying out the murder plot.
Less than two hours after Colton pulled Roueche over, stereo installer Jonathan Barber was gunned down in Burnaby as he was driving a Porsche belonging to one of the Bacons.
Several UN members and associates have admitted they were hunting Red Scorpions that night and mistook Barber for one of the notorious brothers. Dillon has already heard that there had been two other shootings in Burnaby linked to the gang hours before Barber was killed.
Roueche has been named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the same case, but has never been charged.
Dillon reserved her decision on whether to allow the Roueche statement into evidence at the trial.