Free Republic

It was supposed to be "Woodstock West" — a free concert that would draw hundreds of thousands of fans, feature some of the biggest names in rock and solidify the still-blossoming Flower Power movement.The Altamont Speedway Free Festival was also envisioned as something that would emerge as the most famous music event in Bay Area history. It did just that, but for all the wrong reasons."It was just a big mess," says Rock Scully, the longtime manager of the Grateful Dead and one of the primary organizers of the festival. "But the ball was rolling and it couldn't be stopped."Some...

SNIPPET: "COPENHAGEN (AFP) — A grenade tossed into a cafe, gunfire in the street, dead bodies splayed on the pavement, residents living in fear -- all sounds out of sync with the medieval cobbled streets and copper roofs of the Danish capital. But a bloody gang war between bikers and youths of immigrant origin has shattered Copenhagen's customary calm and jolted officials to boost action against violence that has left three dead and 17 wounded in seven months. [...] The battle over drug sales, revenge and wounded honour pits Hells Angels bikers and their offshoot called AK81 against gangs of...

A prominent Swedish member of the Hells Angels motorcycle gang will have to survive without the sickness benefits he has been receiving for the past 10 years as he was shown to have hidden income sources. Hells Angels member Thomas Möller in Malmö will no longer be able to cash in more than 200,000 ($24,500) per annum in sickness benefits after a decision by the Social Insurance Agency (Forsäkringskassan) to freeze the payments, Svenska Dagbladet reports. Möller had been the subject of an investigation after it had emerged that he had kept incomes totalling several million kronor from the tax...

After deliberating over most of three days -- and at one point saying they couldn't reach a verdict -- jurors acquitted two Hells Angels bikers of attempted murder for a 2006 gunfight that injured rival Outlaws Motorcycle Club members. Prosecutors said they still plan to try Chad Wilson of San Diego and John Midmore of Valparaiso, Ind., on a more serious conspiracy charge for the Aug. 8, 2006, shootout at Custer State Park, though the judge asked for legal briefs on whether that would be double jeopardy. Attorneys for the state said Wilson and Midmore went to Legion Lake Resort,...

The Meade County State’s Attorney said Friday that members of the Hells Angels initiated a bar scuffle that led to the shooting of one of club’s members at the Loud American Roadhouse in Sturgis earlier this month. Meade County State’s Attorney Jesse Sondreal said in an e-mail that the investigation has revealed the Hells Angels “instigated the assault” in a fight with the Iron Pigs on the evening of Aug. 9. The two clubs got into a fight just before the shooting, according to witnesses at the scene and authorities. The Iron Pigs is a national motorcycle organization made up...

The Hunt for American al Qaeda The United States is turning up the heat in the hunt for the California boy turned al Qaeda operative, Adam Gadahn, who has been charged with treason and is believed to be hiding in Afghanistan. If caught and convicted, Gadahn could face the death penalty. The State Department along with the Department of Diplomatic Security announced the beginning of a publicity campaign in Afghanistan urging locals to provide any information on Gadahn's whereabouts, with a reward if the information leads to his capture. Radio advertisements with information concerning the $1 million reward have...

Page last updated at 09:55 GMT, Monday, 21 April 2008 10:55 UK Hells Angel sues over biker film Barger was in charge of security at the Rolling Stones' disastrous Altamont gig Hells Angels veteran Sonny Barger is suing US TV company HBO over a biker drama which he claims he helped to develop, says the Hollywood Reporter. In legal papers filed last week, he accuses producers of cutting him out of the project after he demanded changes. He also says the drama, called 1%, too closely resembles his own life story. Mr Barger was the leader of the Hells Angels'...

Two Hells Angels bikers charged with starting a gunfight acted in self defense because rival Outlaws Motorcycle Club members targeted them, lawyers for the men say. Chad Wilson, 32, of Lynnwood, Wash., and John Midmore, 34, of Valparaiso, Ind., are accused of shooting at Outlaws bikers Aug. 8, 2006, at Legion Lake Resort in Custer State Park, where the Outlaws gathered for the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally 70 miles away. According to a federal court document, an Outlaws member who was not wounded said he returned fire at the man who shot at his group. Wilson is a member of the...

While hundreds of Mexican soldiers are deserting the army to join drug trafficking gangs, California is facing the opposite problem: A growing number of gang members here have infiltrated the U.S. Armed Forces in order to receive military training. The numbers speak for themselves: In 2003 there were just 16 incidents of gang members in the U.S. Armed Forces, while in 2006 the total was 10,309, according to the study, "Gang-Related Activity in the U.S. Armed Forces Increasing," released in 2007 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Twenty-two official entities, including the Los Angeles Police Department, participated in the...

Denver and Mountain View police apologized to members of the Hells Angels and settled a federal lawsuit over a 2005 traffic stop with a $14,000 payment to the bikers, their attorney said Thursday. The apologies signed by Denver Manager of Safety Al LaCabe and Mountain View Police Chief Eric Gomez mark the second time Denver police have had to say "sorry" to the Hells Angels.

For the second time in five years, Denver Police have apologized to the Hells Angels motorcycle club for possibly violating the group's Constitutional rights. In a settlement released Thursday, attorney David Lane said Denver and Mountain View Police agreed to pay a total of $14,000 to the group, and apologize for a Sept. 2, 2005 traffic stop in Mountain View

PHOENIX — The state of Arizona is the new owner of a clubhouse that belonged to the Hells Angels. The state will pay a member of the biker group $102,500 for the Phoenix clubhouse, money that comes from anti-racketeering funds forfeited to the state. "We've eliminated the home base of a criminal enterprise," said Chuck Johnson, an assistant attorney general. "This was a very useful and even laudatory use of $102,500." The state outbid the Hells Angels for ownership of the clubhouse that's been used for twice-weekly meetings of the biker gang since 1999. Some of the options for the...

Hells Angels prepare birthday celebration By KIM CURTIS OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) - The Hells Angels motorcycle club, which in the 1960s became synonymous with the U.S. outlaw biker counterculture, plans to celebrate its 50th birthday this weekend, and police are putting extra officers on duty. But police downplayed the chance for trouble. The club's Oakland chapter is best known for providing security at a 1969 Rolling Stones concert during which a Hells Angel member killed a fan, an incident captured in the 1970 documentary "Gimme Shelter." George Christie, the group's Ventura chapter president, said the party is drawing members from...

The Dutch Public Prosecutor wants a ban on all seven chapters of the Hell's Angels in the Netherlands and has filed petitions with six district courts. The seven chapters are accused of forgery, handling stolen property, embezzlement and attempted fraud. The prosecution wants to bring civil proceedings against the Hell's Angels for these crimes. According to the PP, this is the first time the judiciary has attempted to ban the Hell's Angels in any country and the case could attract international attention.

The president of the Vancouver chapter of the Hells Angels says people have been rude to him and his feelings have been hurt since the group was ruled a criminal organization by an Ontario judge last year. In an affidavit filed in B.C. Supreme Court, Rick Ciarnello lists a number of public snubs including a couple in a restaurant who asked to be moved because they didn't want to sit next to him after he walked in wearing Hells Angels colours. He also claims he has been treated rudely by his local supermarket staff, and he says many people are...

Jurors in Hells Angels trial surprised to see flaws in government's case Grainy video, sketches with little meaning and lengthy testimony from drug addicts -- those pieces of evidence had jurors presiding over the Hells Angels trial questioning the strength of the federal government's racketeering case against the motorcycle club. Four years after the 2002 Laughlin River Run, during which the Hells Angels engaged in a violent battle with the rival Mongols, prosecutors attempted to nail 11 bikers for attempted murder and being a criminal enterprise, a gang

Plea deal ends state, federal cases ByADRIENNE PACKER and K.C. HOWARD With their case against the Hells Angels unraveling, federal prosecutors agreed to a plea bargain Wednesday that reduced charges against the six main defendants and dismissed all charges against three dozen other members of the infamous motorcycle club. Forty-two Hells Angels had faced the possibility of life sentences as a result of a gunbattle with their rival club, the Mongols, in Harrah's Laughlin during the 2002 River Run motorcycle festival. But under the deal approved Wednesday, six Hells Angels will serve no more than 30 months in federal prison,...

When the Hells Angels trial began, I wondered how a collection of bikers who insisted on sporting their notorious club colors around the federal courthouse could actually find a fair and impartial jury. Few things in this life say "bad ass approaching" like the Hells Angels' trademark winged skull symbol. The last I checked, not even the mafia wore an official jacket. The average baggy pants barrio gang kills more homeboys in a year than the worldwide Hells Angels does in a decade, but the Harley-Davidson riders enjoy legendary status in America's outlaw mythology. Just days into the trial of...

Federal prosecutors aim to prove bikers are part of organized criminal entity Sorting out what happened during the gunfight inside Harrah's Laughlin won't be the toughest challenge for federal prosecutors trying Hells Angels members; the true obstacle will be proving that the motorcycle club is an organized criminal enterprise, an expert sayAdrie

The city of San Jose agreed to pay nearly $800,000 to the Hells Angels motorcycle club to settle claims police needlessly killed three dogs during raids on club members' homes. Ninety officers participated in the raids on the club's San Jose headquarters and nine members' homes following a 1997 killing at a strip club. Steve Tausan, a bouncer and Hells Angels member, was later acquitted of murder and none of the bikers whose homes were targeted was ever charged. In a lawsuit, the club claimed the dogs were killed after police refused to give owners and caretakers a chance to...

RAPID CITY -- Nothing will keep most bikers away from the Sturgis Rally, not even the recent motorcycle gang violence in the area, several bikers said Friday. Bikers will keep coming back for the concerts, the babes and the bikes, they said. Even the first-timers said they would not be deterred. Brian Sherman, 53, of Lafayette, Colo., said it was all about fun for him, not worries. "I don't care," Sherman said. "This is my first time. I'm having a blast. This is a wonderful venue

RAPID CITY, S.D. (AP) - A judge on Thursday set bond at $5 million each for two bikers charged with shooting five rival Outlaws Motorcycle Club members in a gunfight. Chad John Wilson, 30, of Lynnwood, Wash., and John James Midmore, 32, of Valparaiso, Ind., each face five counts of attempted first-degree murder for a shooting Tuesday at Custer State Park.

STURGIS, S.D. (AP) -- Biker gangs have made the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally a violence-marred affair in the past. The rally, which draws about half a million people each August to the Black Hills in western South Dakota, has since gotten older, laid-back and more diverse. But this year, gunshots about 75 miles away reminded attendees about the gangs. Authorities said two men affiliated with the Hells Angels shot and wounded five Outlaws Motorcycle Club members in Custer State Park earlier this week. Suzanne Church, who has ministered to biker gang members at Sturgis since 1997, said she hopes there's no...

(04-25) 16:30 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- A man sought after last week's federal raids targeting the Hells Angels motorcycle club in San Francisco was found shot to death at Ocean Beach today, a day after telling his girlfriend he was going to turn himself in, authorities said. Authorities say Michael Demetrescu Sr., 46, was found about 8:15 a.m. in the sand dunes on Ocean Beach near the Great Highway and Kirkham and Lawton streets, a handgun by his side. He had been shot in the head. Police say they suspect Demetrescu committed suicide, but are awaiting the outcome of tests...

Biker massacre an inside job: OPP5 from Bandidos circle face 8 counts of first-degree murder in shootingsBy ALAN CAIRNS, TORONTO SUN ST. THOMAS -- Four men and a woman, each facing eight counts of first-degree murder in what police call an "internal cleansing" massacre of eight bikers, appeared stunned during brief court appearances. As forensic cops pored over Wayne Kellestine's Iona Station farmhouse seeking clues to the murder of the Bandidos members, the accused man told court he would ask a lawyer "to find out what it is all about." Kellestine, 56, a former bike gang boss with the Annihilators...

SHEDDEN, ONT. and TORONTO — A long-simmering rivalry between criminal biker gangs appears to have exploded in the largest gangland slaying in Ontario history. Three members of the Bandidos motorcycle club, long-time rivals of the Hells Angels, were reported missing Friday and may be among the eight bodies discovered Saturday morning. One of the missing men is believed to be associated with Superior Towing, the Toronto-based company whose truck was found abandoned on a side road south of London, Ont., not far from the home of a well-known biker-gang leader.

AP) WEST HAVEN, Conn. A motorist opened fire on a group of Hell's Angels motorcyclists along Interstate 95 on Sunday, killing one and injuring another, police said. The bikers were traveling near West Haven around 3:30 p.m. when they were shot, said State Police spokesman Sgt. J. Paul Vance. Police were considering a number of possible motives including road rage, and were searching for a sport utility vehicle with Florida license plates, Vance said. Roger Mariani, 61, of Stratford, pulled over before realizing he had been shot in the upper torso, Vance said. He later died at the Yale-New Haven...

The Stockholm chapter of the biker gang Hell's Angels is being investigated for fraud after police found 70 percent of members were certified as depressed by the same doctor and were getting state sickness benefits. "It seems to be depressing being a member of this club," Christer Nilsson, deputy head of Stockholm police's criminal investigation department, told newspaper Dagens Nyheter. Biker gangs like the Hell's Angels and their deadly rivals the Bandidos have a history of violent crime in Scandinavia including shootouts and bomb attacks, but have also branched out into benefit and tax frauds in recent years, police say....

SPOKANE -- A statewide series of raids were conducted Tuesday morning by several federal and local law enforcement agencies. In Spokane, three locations were been raided, including the Hells Angels headquarters at 1308 East Sprague, a building located near Addison and Broad and a building located near Nine Mile Falls and Francis Avenue. The agencies involved included agents from Federal Bureau of Investigation, Alcohol Tobacco & Firearms, the Spokane County Sheriff's Office, Washington State Patrol, and the Spokane Police Department. Several Agencies were involved in this morning raid on the Hells Angels HQ on East Sprague. The raids were conducted...

Hells Angel Busted A member of the Hells Angels wanted for two murders is on his way back to Montreal to face the charges. Louis Cartier, 39, was arrested last Thursday at the Kelowna courthouse while visiting his probation officer. He's wanted for two murders in the Montreal area linked to the biker war that rocked Quebec between 1994 and 2001. Cartier is charged with two counts of first degree murder. The first murder was a case of mistaken identity. A 39-year-old Montreal man was killed in 1999 after being mistaken for a drug trafficker with links to the Dark...

Santa Clara County agreed Monday to pay nearly $1 million to settle a lawsuit by the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club over a 1998 police raid that resulted in three dead dogs, a torn-up sidewalk and little meaningful evidence. The $990,000 settlement was spurred by the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection in December of the county's argument that sheriff's deputies were immune from liability. Lower court judges previously had said the actions of the deputies and San Jose police officers were unreasonable. The judges ruled that the ``truckloads'' of evidence the officers obtained to show that some of the homes' occupants belonged...

The owners of a home in Trois-Rivières, Que., have handed $100,000 over to police after finding the stacks of bills in the ceiling of their bathroom while renovating. The $20 bills were stuffed in a plastic bag and hidden above a ceiling panel. The couple who owns the home in the Pointe-du-Lac area promptly surrendered the cash to authorities.

Hells Angels clear legal hurdle to sue city, county officers Supreme Court denies review of earlier ruling Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer Tuesday, December 6, 2005 The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for the San Jose chapter of the Hells Angels to sue city and county officers for killing three dogs and hauling away truckloads of items, including motorcycles and part of a driveway, during 1998 raids. The court, without comment, denied review of a lower-court ruling that said police who searched the homes of motorcycle club members during a murder investigation might have caused needless destruction and...

Richmond's Hell's Angels say the Sheriffs Office violated their constitutional rights when it blocked a party in Crockett. The county discriminated against the club when it halted the fund-raising benefit late last year, the club says in a formal claim that county supervisors rejected last week. "If they're not doing anything illegal, targeting them isn't fair," said club attorney Jai Gohel. "These individuals should be allowed to assemble and follow the rules." A county official demurred: It was the club's misrepresentation that led to the action, said county risk manager Ron Harvey. The club violated the county's application rules by...

SOMERVILLE, N.J. Somerset County authorities say two members of the Pagans motorcycle gang shot and killed a man because he was wearing a Hells Angels T-shirt. A friend had given the shirt to John Grover, who didn't even own a motorcycle and was not a member of the gang. William ``Rodent'' Martin and Peter Ciarletta are charged with murder. Authorities say the two Pagans were sent to Gatto's Sports Cafe in Manville looking for someone associated with the Hells Angels on Sunday. Authorities say Martin opened fire on Grover, who was shot in the leg and abdomen. The 40-year-old died...

DENVER - Hunter S. Thompson, the "gonzo journalist" with a penchant for drugs, guns and flamethrower prose, might have one more salvo in store for everyone: Friends and relatives want to blast his ashes out of a cannon, just as he wished. "If that's what he wanted, we'll see if we can pull it off," said historian Douglas Brinkley, a friend of Thompson's and now the family's spokesman. Thompson, who shot himself to death at his Aspen-area home Sunday at 67, said several times he wanted an artillery send-off for his remains. "There's no question, I'm sure that's what he...

AP News Alert ASPEN, Colo. (AP) -- The son of Hunter S. Thompson says the author shot himself to death at his Aspen-area home.

THE SUICIDE of Hunter S. Thompson, aged 65, according to the New York Times, or 67, according to the Washington Post, at his home in Aspen, may definitively mark the conclusion of the chaotic "baby-boomer" rebellion that began in the 1950s and crested in the 1960s, and which was dignified with the title of "the counter-culture." "Counter" it was, as an expression of defiance toward everything normal and reliable in society. "Culture" it was not, any more than Thompson's incoherent scribblings constituted, as they were so often indulgently described, a form of journalism. When a major representative of any dramatic...

SALEM, N.H. -- A judge has ordered police to grant a concealed handgun permit to a member of the Hells Angels, ruling the man's affiliation with the motorcycle club doesn't make him a bad person. Chief Paul T. Donovan twice refused to grant the permit to Thomas J. O'Donnell Jr., saying O'Donnell is a member of the "outlaw motorcycle club." O'Donnell appealed, and Salem District Court Judge Michael E. Jones found the police chief failed to prove O'Donnell was unfit to carry a handgun. New Hampshire law requires police chiefs to grant gun permits as long as the applicant is...

NOVATO, Calif. (AP) - A Kern County man who has spent more than 17 years on death row for killing his girlfriend and her 14-year-old son died Wednesday of complications from cancer, prison officials said. Hells Angel motorcyclist Robert Garceau was convicted for the 1984 stabbing deaths of girlfriend Maureen Bautista and her son, Telesforo Bautista, both of North Hollywood. According to trial testimony, Garceau buried the bodies in cement in the backyard of a fellow drug dealer's house in San Luis Obispo County and claimed that his drug-dealing friends, not him, killed the two. He killed them in Bakersfield,...

PHOENIX -- A judge threw out key evidence against a man accused of assaulting a police officer during a drug raid on an alleged Hells Angels clubhouse, noting the raiders waited only a few seconds to move in after an early-morning knock on the door. Judge Michael Wilkinson chastised members of a multiagency crime task force and ruled they illegally entered the building on July 8, 2003, violating search-and-seizure laws. Wilkinson said it was understandable that Michael Wayne Coffelt, 42, came to the door carrying a handgun. The knock on the door came around 4:45 a.m., and officers then waited...

PHOENIX -- A judge threw out key evidence against a man accused of assaulting a police officer during a drug raid on an alleged Hells Angels clubhouse, noting the raiders waited only a few seconds to move in after an early-morning knock on the door. Judge Michael Wilkinson chastised members of a multiagency crime task force and ruled they illegally entered the building on July 8, 2003, violating search-and-seizure laws. Wilkinson said it was understandable that Michael Wayne Coffelt, 42, came to the door carrying a handgun. The knock on the door came around 4:45 a.m., and officers then waited...

A reputed Hells Angel who's been working for state Auditor A. Joseph DeNucci for more than a decade and now stands accused of the bloody barroom beating of a cop is the grandson of a former Lynn police chief. And that's just one root in 40-year-old James T. Costin's politically tangled family tree, which sources contend helped put the outlaw biker bean counter in the State House. Costin, a field auditor for DeNucci who is being held without bail for allegedly stomping Lynn Lt. Vernon ``Skip'' Coleman in the head, is the son of Richard Costin Sr., a former chief...

For more than a decade, federal authorities painstakingly built a criminal case against the man they suspected of being the main drug supplier to the Hell's Angels of Minnesota. After spending untold hours on surveillance, cultivating informants inside the outlaw motorcycle gang, digging through garbage for clues and unraveling cryptic financial transactions, prosecutors this summer prepared to take the case to trial. Then, on the brink of proceedings in U.S. District Court in St. Paul, veteran IRS special agent Jim Shoup came forth with a stunning confession: He was tangled in a romance with the wife of the alleged drug...

A federal judge yesterday ordered the president of the San Diego Hells Angels chapter held without bail pending trial on racketeering, extortion and drug charges. Lawyers for Guy Castiglione, 53, told the judge he is a law-abiding Lakeside resident whose comments in wiretapped phone calls were misinterpreted by federal officials. Prosecutors said the phone calls prove Castiglione – known as "Big Daddy" or "The Boss" – ran a violent motorcycle gang involved in killings and drug trafficking. The Hells Angels extorted money from drug dealers and hunted members of the rival Mongols motorcycle gang, prosecutors said. U.S. District Judge Irma...

Local Hells Angel Members Outraged by Raid Sparks, NV Jennifer Rogers Two people were arrested during Wednesday's raid on the Hells Angel's house on Sullivan Lane in Sparks. We spoke with some club members and got reaction from those who says they are being treated unfairly. Guinea Colucci, a member, said, "It's a witch hunt. It's a witch hunt," says member Guinea Colucci." That was the feeling among all the Hells Angels members we spoke with, hearing comments such as, "There is no reason why this place should be raided." The raid happened around 6 a.m. Wednesday and four...

MONTREAL (CP) - In what one lawyer called a legal precedent in Canada, a jury convicted nine Hells Angels and associates on gangsterism charges Monday and found them guilty on 26 out of a total of 27 criminal charges. The accused, who were arrested in a major police crackdown on biker gangs in 2001, each faced three charges - gangsterism, drug trafficking and conspiracy to commit murder. Eight of the men were convicted on all three counts, while the ninth was acquitted of the murder charge. Crown prosecutor Madeleine Giauque praised the jurors, who heard about 125 days of testimony...

Officials raided Hells Angels' clubhouses across the West on Wednesday and arrested dozens of people - including a Tucson man - as part of a continuing two-year investigation of possible drug and firearm violations. Officials with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives fanned out across Arizona, Alaska, California, Nevada and Washington in pre-dawn raids that mirrored those ATF conducted in July. Targeting specific people and clubhouses, officials altogether arrested 55 members and associates of the motorcycle club. Agency leaders were tight-lipped on exact details of the operation, refusing to say how many locations were raided. They also declined...

<p>Federal authorities arrested 57 Hells Angels Motorcycle Club members Wednesday in the Bay Area and throughout the West, some in connection with a shootout in a Nevada casino last year that left four people dead and others on firearms, drug and racketeering charges, officials said.</p>

Police in raids on Hell's Angels over 'peace' killings Oliver Poole (Filed: 05/12/2003) Armed police raided dozens of Hell's Angels' clubhouses yesterday in the climax of a two-year undercover operation that authorities claim implicates the infamous motorcycle gang in drug dealing, firearms and murder. The operation, the largest co-ordinated action against the Angels for almost two decades, resulted in the confiscation of 127 firearms, 1,000 rounds of ammunition, military explosives, methamphetamine and four stolen vehicles. Fifty-five gang members and their associates were arrested and police said "several" are likely to face federal murder charges, primarily over an incident in April...