Canada - Director of Civil Forfeiture wins another round against Nanaimo Hells Angels

OFF THE WIRE
Kim Bolan
 vancouversun.com

The Director of Civil Forfeiture has won the latest round in its long-running court battle with the Nanaimo Hells Angels.
The B.C. Supreme Court has ruled that the government agency can have access to evidence police uncovered - including wiretaps - during a two-year investigation of the Nanaimo chapter dubbed Project Halo.
The RCMP recommended a series of charges resulting from the probe in a report to Crown Counsel (RTCC,) but none were ever laid.
So the Civil Forfeiture office sought to use the police material in its court challenge to maintain control of the bikers' clubhouse in Nanaimo.
The cluhouse was seized in November 2007 because the civil forfeiture's office alleged the property was being used as an instrument for unlawful activity.
Since then, the company that owned the property -- Angel Acres Recreation and Festival Property Ltd. -- has lost a bid to have the case thrown out and another to maintain control of the clubhouse pending a full trial on the issue.
On Friday, Justice Paul Pearlman also ruled against the Hells Angels' claim that the civil forfeiture office should not be allowed to review police evidence or listen to wiretaps made between 2001 and 2003.
Their lawyer argued that letting the government agency listen to the wiretaps would violate the "privacy interests of both the defendants and non-parties who were the subject of electronic surveillance."
But the government's lawyer said the police evidence was important to the civil forfeiture case because "the wiretaps include conversations involving many of the personal defendants in this action."
And the civil forfeiture director said the evidence given to Crown prosecutors "is relevant to demonstrating that members of the Nanaimo Hells Angels Motorcycle Club are participants in a criminal organization, that particular unlawful activities have occurred and that the clubhouse facilitated or was intended to facilitate some of those unlawful activities."
Pearlman agreed and ordered the materials turned over to lawyers for both sides.
"I have found that the RTCC contains evidence that is relevant and is likely highly probative of the issues in this action," Pearlman said. “The request for production of wiretap evidence is limited to those portions of the wiretap identified by the RCMP as providing support for the specific charges recommended.”
But Pearlman also ordered police to first remove anything from the material that would hamper on-going criminal investigations, amounted to solicitor-client privilege or that would identify confidential informants.
Transcripts of the wiretaps are several thousand pages long, Pearlman said, with 200 pages of police narrative.
During the 2007 seizure of the clubhouse, heavily armed police also confiscated three Harley-Davidson motorcycles, a number of unregistered shotguns stored in an unlocked gun case in a closet and a .25-calibre restricted handgun located in an insecure locker with two boxes of ammunition.

kbolan@vancouversun.com
Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/Director+Civil+Forfeiture+wins+another+round+against+Nanaimo+Hells+Angels/4312352/story.html#ixzz1ERtsT09O