Bacchus MC members misunderstood

Bacchus MC members David John Pearce, Duayne James Howe and Patrick Michael James are pulling out the stops in appealing their extortion convictions. The three men threatened, intimidated and extorted in an effort to maintain the “power of the patch.” Bacchus MC has a three-patch ranking, the highest of the one-percenter outlaw motorcycle club designations.

The Nova Scotia Court of Appeal heard arguments to overturn those convictions. Among many other things the bikers claim respected cop Sgt. Leonard Isnor is biased against them.

Court stays weapons, gambling charges for HA connected cousins

A Superior Court judge has stayed charges against two cousins, one of whom has links to the Niagara Falls Hells Angels. A 12-day delay in providing cousins Michael and Raffaele Simonelli with a “special bail hearing” breached their charter rights. They were ensnared in Project Hobart and charged with weapons offences, bookmaking and commission of an offence for a criminal organization.

Bad Beef Baron Blaze

There has been another arson at the Beef Baron strip club, the fourth. The fire caused $5k damage. It comes five months after another suspicious blaze gutted a nearby duplex where peelers from the club stayed.

Beef Baron operator Vincent Barletta, the brother of former London Hells Angels chapter president Robert Barletta, didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Trump smiles on pot dealer Jonathon Braun

Braun was 5 years into his mandated mimimum sentence.

Jonathan Braun was one of 70 people to have their sentence commuted by Trump before he left the White House. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined $100k for spearheading an operation that illegally imported more than 110 tons of pot from Canada through a Native American reservation on the New York border. Braun was supplied by a consortium with ties to the three most powerful organized crime groups in Canada, including the Hells Angels. The contraband was concealed in vehicles entering New York from Canada through the Akwesasne reservation in upstate Franklin County.

Notorious Albanian gangster stays connected

He was convicted and jailed for 27 years after three counts of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs but Abainian Valjet Pepaj is staying connected from a Uk jail cell. Showing off the beef, Valjet is ready to promote the gangster lifestyle.

Gangster Disciples leader pulls 40 years

Shauntay “Shake” Craig, 42, was sentenced to 40 years. He was arrested in 2016 during a roundup in nine states of 32 gangsters. Gangster Disciples employ a highly structured organization and are divided into geographic groups which are called a “count” or a “deck.” Hierarchy of leadership have posts known as “Positions of Authority” or “POAs.” The gang strictly enforces rules for its members, the most important of which is “Silence and Secrecy”. Craig and Gangster Disciples were responsible for 24 shootings from 2011 through 2015, including 12 murders.

946 kg of Cocaine in bananas

£76m worth of cocaine was found in Southampton concealed in a banana shipment. The cocaine weighed 946kg. The cocaine is thought to have been placed in the cargo in Colombia. It was bound for Antwerp, Belgium.

Kelowna banana cocaine splained

Kelowna RCMP landed 20 kg of cocaine inside two banana shipments in 2019. The drugs were found by two unsuspecting grocery stores, leading cops to conclude a pickup was missed by traffickers. No charges were laid.

HA 'Brutal South' chapter busted again

Steven Belshaw, sergeant-at-arms for the 'Brutal South' chapter of the Hells Angels outlaw motorcycle gang has been arrested during a series of police raids. "This mob prance around, taking steroids, lifting weights and standing over people," a cop said. "We will allege that these people are part of a large criminal group and we know they are responsible for a number of violent crimes and drug supply."

Underbelly - Williams and Veniamin

Smiling, one couldn't tell two of Australia's most notorious killers were bumping off scores of rivals. Youthful-looking drug kingpin Carl Williams and hitman Andrew 'Benji' Veniamin were at their height. By the end of their gangland conflict, 36 men would be dead - seven personally murdered by Veniamin. Both men would soon meet their doom. Veniamin bought two bullets in the neck and one in the head. Mick Gatto claimed self defense and was acquited. Williams was beaten to death at Barwon Prison by inmate Matthew Johnson.

Their story was told in a made for TV series called Underbelly.

355 members of 'Ndrangheta in 'maxi-trial'

The trial grew out of an investigation of 12 clans linked to convicted 'Ndrangheta boss, Luigi Mancuso. Mancuso, 66, is head of one of the 'Ngrangheta's most powerful crime families, based in the town of Vibo Valentia. Once a band of thugs, today they are said to control 80% of Europe's cocaine trade, raking in about £50b a year — or 3% of Italy's GDP. They formed an allegiance with cartels in South America, who manufacture the cocaine, and Albanians, who distribute it.

Extreme brutality is the 'Ndrangheta's trademark. Three judges are assigned to oversee Italy's largest mafia trial in more than 30 years. Prosecutors claim the gangsters infiltrated almost every aspect of life in Italy's Calabria region. The trial is expected to take at least a year and will involve 355 defendants, 400 lawyers and 900 witnesses.

Another Barletta arson

A luxury home destroyed in a recent fire had been restrained in a police crackdown on an HA gambling ring. It has connections to three men charged with money laundering. The five-bedroom home at 189 Lake Dr. had just sold for $7.9m. The home on Georgian Bay is the third connected to Robert Barletta to be destroyed by fire.

Homebuilder Michael Curtis, 37, and developer Douglas Lang Adams, 58, were charged with money laundering and possessing proceeds of crime as part of Operation Hobart. Robert Barletta narrowly survived a March 30, 2020, attempt on his life.

Gangsters land free money

Solid Gold is a peeler bar with a tight connection to the Calabrian Mafia.

A list published by CRA reveals those who have cashed in from a program, created last spring, that finances 75% of companies' payroll. It cost taxpayers $55 billion.

Solid Gold has received government assistance. Influential Calabrian mobster Moreno Gallo was expelled from the country for serious criminality in January 2012 and murdered the following year in Mexico was once the owner. In recent years, arson and gunfire have occurred often around Solid Gold. The Pro Gym, linked to the Hells Angels for years has also received free money. Vice-president of Pro Gym is Christian Ménard, a Sherbrooke Hells Angel.

"The subsidy was used to pay part of the salaries of the employees with whom we have kept an employment relationship" says the biker, who has pledged to ignore Covid-19 lockdowns. Individuals convicted of tax fraud by Revenu Québec had no problems. WE Charity (UNIS in French) is also on the list. It is embroiled in scandal after Trudeau hired it to manage a $900m student volunteer program. The program earned WE Charity nearly $43m million in management fees.

SC cops land huge drug haul

The Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office in SC announced the largest meth seizure in the county’s history. More than 500 pounds of meth was seized. Also found was 9 pounds of fentanyl, cocaine, weapons, and $415k in cash. Mexicans Christian Eduerdo Tinejero Pena, 22, and Jairo Martinez Covarrobias, 37 face a mountain of charges.

Cops say the bust is worth $8m and is cartel related.

Cocaine smuggling route through Libya

Drug traffickers are increasingly looking to North Africa as a transhipment point for cocaine. Customs inspectors at Malta Freeport seized 612 kg of cocaine worth $84m in December, a record haul. Three days earlier, authorities at the port of Guayaquil in Ecuador seized 582kg of cocaine hidden in 19 pieces of teak bound for Libya and Syria. The size of the two shipments to Libya strongly suggests onwards transport to Europe.

Christian Deschênes’s plea denied

It all added up to a 45 year sentence.

After passes to leave prison to visit his dying wife were cancelled due to COVID-19, Christian Deschênes sued. His plea has been denied. In 2001 he was arrested in a plot to kidnap Francesco Arcadi, the street boss of the Rizzuto Mafia clan. While he faced trial, he was nailed as a conspirator in a $1m armoured truck heist.

Deschênes, now 64, isn’t the man he once was, the parole board was told. Housed in a minimum-security facility in Laval, he was granted unescorted temporary absences, although he was turned down for full parole and day parole. His wife has terminal cancer with a dire prognosis of about a year.

328kg of cocaine landed in Florida

St. Thomas cops Teshawn Adams, Shakim Mike.

Six men, including two police officers, were arrested after agents found 328 kg of cocaine at Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport. The four who were aboard the plane are U.S. citizens residing in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. Shakim Mike, Maleek Leanard, Roystin David and Teshawn Adams were arrested.

Delaware gangsters nailed

Marquise A. Mack

Operation Rise-n-Shyne was named after one of the gangs, the G-Shyne Bloods in Dover, Delaware. 39 were indicted on a combined more than 260 charges tied to four gangs: G-Shyne Bloods, Mob Piro Bloods, Sex, Money, Murder Bloods, and 48-Gang.

Altaf Khanani - Cameron Ortis

Altaf Khanani was one of the world's largest money launderers. The Pakistani was involved in the illicit movement of money between Pakistan, the UAE, US, UK, Canada and Australia. He moved money for cartels and terrorist groups. FinCEN files suggest Khanani moved $14b annually. The Khanani Money Laundering Organization funnelled billions across the globe on behalf of terrorists, drug traffickers, and criminals.

Khanani was arrested in 2015 by the DEA.

Khanani was sent to the US, where he was sentenced to 68 months. He was released from prison on July 13.

A ring of currency traders in Toronto laundered hundreds of millions in drug money annually, and transferring huge sums between Iran and Canada via Dubai, a banking zone used by the Iranian regime. In 2016 spy Cameron Ortis took over the file and began offering to sell intelligence to the Khanani network.

Gambia seizes 3 tonnes of cocaine

Gambian authorities seized nearly three tonnes of cocaine from a shipment of industrial salt from Ecuador. It is one of the largest ever busts in West Africa. Smugglers generally use West Africa as a transshipment point for cocaine en route from South America to Europe.

Cleveland Grover Meredith Jr.

Meredith Jr. traveled to Washington for the Trump rally. He was charged with threatening House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. He sent a text message saying he was thinking about putting “a bullet in her (Pelosi’s) noggin on Live TV.”

Cops found a Glock 19, a Tavor X95 assault rifle and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.

HA cathouse in Bremen causes angst

The Hells Angels are active again in Bremen. A dispute over the approval of a new brothel in Bremen has the cops calling for the zero tolerance strategy against the rocker gang.

Dilraj Johal - 3rd gang death in 4 days

Dilraj Johal, 28, was gunned down Saturday in a suite in the 8100-block of Lansdowne Road in Richmond. Johal’s murder happened two days after that of Anees Mohammed. The murder is thought to be retribution for the slaying of gangster Gary Kang.

Oz 'Gangsta Glam' lifestyle littered with corpses

Michael "Micky D" Davey,'Ruthless', lived it up on Instagram and Facebook but was shot dead in his driveway like a dog.

They have tattoos, muscles fed by steroids, arrogance and social media accounts to flaunt their beautiful girlfriend and proceeds of their drug trafficking and other crimes ... flashy car, luxury holidays, and exotic pets. The Instagram thugs may be bikie gang members, associates, drug importers, standover men, armed robbers or all of the above. The new thugs of Instagram might be a poser, or it may be a gang ready to beat a man half to death with nail-spiked baseball bats in broad daylight on Bondi Beach.

Hamad Assaad met the fate he often dished out to others: execution.

In 2017 gangsters arrived on the idyllic shores of Bondi Beach carrying metal bars and bats wrapped in barbed wire or spiked with nails. Marching toward their target, a 34-year-old sunbather, the thugs passed by picnickers and women and babies. Minutes later, after they had beaten their victim to bloody, dazed pulp, the gang left alarmed mothers and crying babies in their wake to drive off in a white Mercedes.

Instagram thugs like Ricky Ciano share the same fate. The former Rebels bikie president was found dead in the back seat of a luxury sports car. Ciano vanished in Sydney just months after surviving a pizza delivery assassination plot for deserting the gang.

Pretty boy hitman Pasquale Barbaro typified the 'Instagram thug' before his assassination.