Hells Angels boss headed to halfway house
When the 67- year- old former head of Niagara’s Hells Angels gets statutory release next week, he’ll be headed to a halfway home.
The Parole Board of Canada has determined Gerald “Skinny” Ward needs a residency condition on his release because of his long criminal history and suspected jailhouse smuggling.
“Th e board fi nds no appropriate way to monitor your gains on release and safeguard the public from you reoff ending without residency being imposed,” documents obtained by the Standard from the parole board say.
Th e founding president of the Niagara Hells Angels chapter that operated from a clubhouse on Darby Rd., has been in jail since his 2006 arrest.
He’s scheduled to be released to an unidentified community residential facility on or around March 26.
Ward’s case management team believes he is likely to commit an offence before his full sentence is up in 2018 and so recommended the residency condition be imposed.
The parole board decision says Ward was suspected of smuggling drugs, tobacco and cellphones into his federal prison while serving time for criminal organization and traffi cking.
The parole board decision says Ward was suspected of smuggling drugs, tobacco and cellphones into his federal prison while serving time for criminal organization and trafficking.
As recently as August, Ward was suspected of being involved in an incident in which a large quantity of steroids, drugs and tobacco were seized from a jail unit.
Ward’s arrest at his Quaker Rd. home in September 2006 was part of a crackdown on the Hells Angels by the Ontario Biker Enforcement Unit, which decimated the local chapter.
Ward was said to be the drug pipeline for chapters across Ontario, supplying cocaine with more than 90% purity. Caught on wiretaps bragging about his pure supply, Ward was ultimately one of 24 people convicted as part of Project Tandem.
He pleaded guilty in September 2008 to trafficking four kilograms of cocaine and possessing $ 304,430 in proceeds of crime. The cash, found stuffed in an entertainment unit in his home, was forfeited with his orange 2000 Harley Davidson motorcycle.
Ward was also found guilty of a criminal organization charge in December 2008 for instructing five local people to traffic cocaine.
He was sentenced in a Toronto courtroom on March 26, 2009 to a further nine years in jail, after serving two and a half years in pretrial custody that were credited as five years. It wasn’t Ward’s first jail stay. Since 1965, he’s had 23 convictions for violence, weapons, fraud, drugs, property and motor vehicle offences.
A psychologist who conducted a risk assessment in February 2014 found Ward was in the lowmoderate range for general reoffending and the moderate range for violent reoffending.
The parole board decision document says Ward completed an “Alternatives, Associates and Attitudes” program in September 2014 and was found to be “generally respectful” toward his program facilitator.
“Despite this, your long history of criminal association gives the Board concern that your gains in this regard may be minimal and are certainly untested on this sentence,” it says.
By law, federal inmates who haven’t been released on parole and aren’t serving life sentences are given statutory release after serving two- thirds of their sentences.
The parole board’s job is to impose conditions for offenders getting statutory release. If an offender breaches the conditions, they can be sent back to jail.
Ward’s statutory release conditions include a special instruction that he not wear gang colours, badges, jewelry and other symbols.
He must avoid anyone he thinks might be involved in criminal activity or is involved in a gang.
He’s also banned from owning more than one cellphone and SIM card because the use of multiple phones is linked to the drug trade.
He can’t have alcohol, go to bars or have drugs that aren’t available over the counter or prescribed to him.
As well, Ward has to provide financial information to his parole supervisor, who will watch for irregular spending and income.
“You have lived off of the financial gain of criminal activity for a long time,” the board said. “This condition will permit those supervising your release to monitor your sources of income, your assets and your expenses.”
Niagara Regional Police said recently there are a few Hells Angels still in Niagara but they aren’t formed into a chapter. Those members are affiliated with a chapter in Kitchener.