WHY BIKER GANGS STILL THRIVE
Police in Ontario say they’re curbing unruly biker gangs, but some Ottawa residents say they’re befuddled by a lack of enforcement. Taylor Blewett reports on the impasse between bikers and the law.
The Outlaws haven’t tried to camouflage their clubhouse at 18 Ladouceur St. Spotlights and blacked-out windows make it clear this isn’t your average Hintonburg home, to say nothing of the Outlaws’ signage and acronym marking the property as biker turf. Even its black and white paint job pays homage to the motorcycle gang’s colours, which flood the street on warm weekend evenings when its members roll up, ready to party.
It was the most run-of-the-mill neighbourhood concern that prompted residents to reach out to the Citizen about the Ladouceur Street clubhouse. Their neighbour makes noise — a lot of it — at all hours when they’re in town. Bikes idle, rev and roar down the street, startling sleeping households. It’s a cycle that continues until the festivities finally wind down.
These residents say calls to bylaw, police and the area’s city councillor have done nothing to curb this ongoing headache.
Ottawa bylaw said it’s received “a few complaints” about noise on Ladouceur “that have been investigated,” and directed inquiries about a specific property to the city’s freedom of information and privacy office. Kitchissippi Coun. Jeff Leiper declined repeated requests to be interviewed for this story, referring questions about the Outlaws to police. Ottawa police said noise concerns should go to bylaw, who can call for police assistance if they need it.
The Ladouceur residents who approached the Citizen did so after years of biker noise and a circular search to hold the perpetrators accountable. An access to information request revealed six bylaw complaints about muffler, music and other unspecified noise at 18 Ladouceur St. since 2015, including two in 2019.
The residents also raised a nagging fear that one night, something far worse than loud noise would happen at the clubhouse and endanger themselves or others. But they feel this concern has fallen on deaf ears.
“Why are there different rules for them? Why are they so held up?” one resident asked, who requested not to be named in this story, citing fear of retribution for speaking out.
“Why is this allowed in a residential area? Why (are they) allowed to have a clubhouse for a motorcycle gang here?”
Indeed, the existence of Ottawa’s biker bunkers presents a paradox.
For years, Ladouceur Street in Hintonburg and Piperville Road in Carlsbad Springs have played host to chapters of the country’s most notorious motorcycle gangs — the Outlaws’ Ottawa chapter, and the Nomads chapter of the Hells Angels, respectively.
Members of these gangs have described themselves as “one percenters” (the American Motorcyclist Association once said that 99 per cent of riders respect the law). Yet the same self-professed criminals are accepted, even welcomed by some law-abiding residents into the fabric of their neighbourhoods.
Add to this puzzle the fact that law enforcement officials continue to insist on the danger posed by these gangs and their real estate. An RCMP webpage says that “living near an outlaw motorcycle club can affect your safety and decrease your property value,” while the Ontario Provincial Police website cautions that “the sight of outlaw motorcycle gang members in any community should be a concern.” But at the same time, officers aren’t often seen breaking down doors, closing clubhouses and ordering gang members out of town, at least in Ottawa.
So what gives? Are motorcycle gangs still the threat to public safety that police purport? If so, why do their clubhouses appear to have permission — both social and legal — to exist in the middle of residential communities?
“Don’t believe anything the cops are telling you. Lots of it is BS,” a representative of the Outlaws’ Ottawa chapter wrote, before declining a request for interview from this newspaper. Its national contact also declined the same opportunity, and the Hells Angels did not respond to repeated requests for interview.
Both gangs have websites, and their messaging reveals a lot about the way they’d like to be viewed. They declare they are a brotherhood of motorcycle enthusiasts. Criminal activity goes unmentioned or, in the case of the Outlaws, is explicitly denied.
“Although the media like to portray us as being criminals, the truth is we share a common goal of enjoying life to the fullest,” the Outlaws’ website reads.
OPP Deputy Commissioner Rick Barnum doesn’t buy it for a second. “In my experience in this type of work, I’ve never found an outlaw motorcycle gang chapter in any part of our country that’s not involved in some sort of serious criminality.”
He also noted that for the last 15 or so years, “every one of our intelligence assessments that exists in Canada has the Hells Angels as the No. 1 organized crime group in the country.”
Although the Red and White might reign supreme, they’re far from the only force in the biker world. The RCMP defines an outlaw motorcycle gang or one-percenter club as any group of motorcycle riders and supporters who have made a voluntary commitment to band together, abide by organizational rules, and commit crime. The Hells Angels and the Outlaws are pre-eminent examples.
Chief Supt. Rob Gilchrist, director general of Criminal Intelligence Service Canada (CISC), listed the criminal activities in which outlaw biker gangs are known to dabble.
From economic crimes, such as money laundering and counterfeiting, to crimes that threaten community safety — drug trafficking, firearms dealing and murder — "outlaw motorcycle gangs are a serious criminal threat in Canada,” Gilchrist said.
They’re also remarkably flexible. “In essence, outlaw motorcycle gangs seek to make a profit whenever and however they can. So new trends will always come to surface, as long as there’s money to be made from the activity,” Gilchrist said.
CISC produced a 2018-19 report on the Canadian illicit drug market that found organized crime group involvement in fentanyl had increased by 1,500 per cent since 2015, and “entrenched (organized crime groups) such as outlaw motorcycle gangs are becoming more involved.”
On Aug. 7, following a 14-month investigation, police announced drug trafficking and other criminal charges against 15 outlaw bikers and associates in Ottawa, Niagara and Sudbury. According to police, one of the four Ottawa men charged was a full-patch member of the Hells Angels Nomads, while the other three were full-patch Red Devils.
Last December, police in Brockville arrested four men in connection with Outlaws gang activity. They faced a slew of charges, including kidnapping, robbery and assault with a weapon.
In 2018 alone, the OPP’s Barnum said the biker enforcement unit (BEU) made 15 arrests of outlaw motorcycle gang members across Eastern Ontario, laying 127 charges.
“We’re constantly monitoring, we’re constantly sort of waiting for the right opportunity because as you can imagine, we’re talking about professional criminals so they don’t drop too many breadcrumbs for us,” he said.
At the centre of it all is the biker clubhouse, serving both symbolic and functional purposes. Not only does having a clubhouse mean formal recognition as a one-percenter chapter, but the property also facilitates its membership’s illicit dealings.
During a sweeping series of Outlaws arrests in 2002, police raided the Ladouceur Street clubhouse as well as two other properties in Ottawa and Toronto. They recovered a sawed-off rifle, sawed-off shotgun, ammunition, brass knuckles and gang paraphernalia.
After nearly two decades of doing this work, “I can’t think of a search warrant at any clubhouse anywhere in Ontario ... where we have not succeeded in recovering some sort of criminal activity,” Barnum said.
But where they haven’t been successful is the permanent disruption of outlaw biker crime. After the 2002 Outlaws raids, with about 65 per cent of the Ontario membership facing charges, there was speculation that the gang would be wiped out for good. Obviously, it hasn’t worked out that way.
Across Ontario, outlaw biker gang membership has actually undergone “significant growth” in the last five to eight years, according to OPP detective Staff Sgt. Anthony Renton, operations manager at the BEU.
It’s a trend that shows no sign of slowing. Despite years of work by law enforcement, outlaw motorcycle gangs have proven a particularly persistent foe. Clubs have pursued a number of strategies to secure their survival, including what Renton described as a remarkable push by biker gang members to build up their support clubs.
These groups, also known as puppet clubs, act as farm teams from which new members can be recruited. In Ottawa, the roster includes the Red Devils, a Hells Angels support club, and the Black Pistons, who support the Outlaws.
Support clubs can also be used to carry out the gang ’s dirty work, serving as a layer of insulation between full-patch gang members and the criminality they’re engaged in. “It makes it harder for the police to capture the leaders,” said Renton. “It’s (in) some cases easier to capture the people that
We’re talking about professional criminals so they don’t drop too many breadcrumbs for us.
are committing the offences, but not necessarily truly benefiting.”
Globalization has also helped one-percenter clubs survive and thrive in the 21st century. According to Gilchrist, director general of CISC, outlaw biker gangs have expanded their international networks as well as their online activity. Here at home, chapters and criminal networks criss-cross the nation, with strategic allegiances that extend far beyond the world of one percenters. “It’s believed that these networks connect to over half of all organized crime groups in Canada,” Gilchrist said.
Police have also observed a restraint that separates today’s biker culture from that of the 1990s and 2000s, when brazen violence and civilian casualties occurred with greater frequency, and with them, mass biker arrests and chapter takedowns. Clearly, said Renton, lessons have been learned.
“These criminal networks have evolved, and they are existing to make profit. They do not want to, in most cases ... bring negative attention upon themselves.”
There are exceptions, however. Motorcycle gang rivalries run deep.
The Outlaws and Hells Angels are sworn enemies, and when members of both showed up at a biker rally in Port Dover, Ont., last year, it led to a standoff. There were close to 200,000 people at the event. “And if it wasn’t for the actions of the officers that were deployed on the ground that day, that would have been a significant, violent act,” Renton said. “I couldn’t put a number on the potential for casualties.”
Ottawa happens to host chapters of both rival gangs. The Outlaws have had a local presence since the ’70s, much of that time spent in the Ladouceur Street clubhouse. The Hells Angels’ Nomads chapter folded back in 2016, but the gang returned to Piperville Road more than a year ago.
Their presence hasn’t always been peaceful. On April 12, 1994, a car bomb exploded outside 18 Ladouceur St. and knocked the Outlaw biker who opened the vehicle’s door off his feet.
The bomb’s detonator went off, but the explosive itself failed to ignite — if it had, it could have taken several surrounding houses with it, a source close to the investigation said at the time. Officials suggested the bomb was the work of the Hells Angels, potentially trying to muscle in on Outlaws turf.
“As a neighbour, you may not get a problem with the bikers that are living next door to you in their clubhouse,” said Barnum, OPP deputy commissioner. “But you may have a problem with the group that they ’re not friendly with coming into your community and into your neighbourhood.”
Given the potential danger posed by outlaw bikers and their clubhouses, it seems head-scratching that more residents aren’t up in arms about their neighbourhood presence.