Vagos members dispute gang allegations

MC`sIN THE NEWS
By JOHN ASBURY The Press-Enterprise
Following a predawn raid earlier this month, authorities said they crippled one of Riverside County's largest and most violent motorcycle gangs.
Members of the Vagos Motorcycle Club maintain that the group is not a criminal gang and has never been involved in attacks on police.
The Vagos were targeted in a March 17 raid by the Riverside County district attorney's office and the Riverside County Gang Task Force during sweeps in Hemet, Murrieta, Riverside, Corona, and Lake Elsinore.
Terry Pierson/The Press-Enterprise Dr. Harry “Doc” Hart, 61, of Riverside, left, and Mike “Rooster” Murr, 45, of San Jacinto, are Vagos Motorcycle Club members. “They demonize us and start locking everyone up left and right. In their eyes, everyone’s a criminal,” said Hart, a Hemet dentist. At a news conference following the raid, Riverside County District Attorney Rod Pacheco said in recent months, the gang had gained "significant attention" from authorities. He did not give a reason for the exact timing of the sweep.
Pacheco said the members pose "an extreme threat for law enforcement," but did not name Vagos members as suspects in a series of attacks on police in Hemet. He said additional enforcement on the Vagos were planned.
"We've never said they are suspects in this whatsoever. The attacks have been made on gang task force officers. I think it's safe to assume it's not a resident mad at law enforcement," District attorney's spokesman John Hall said.
Hemet police have said the raids on the Vagos were unrelated to the attacks on police, which involved booby trapping a building, gate and car related to Hemet Gang Task Force members and burning city vehicles. They have not been named as primary suspects but have not been ruled them out, Hemet police Lt. Duane Wisehart said.
"As a department, we're leaning more toward it wasn't them than it was," he said. "I think it got taken out of context with the timing of the sweep. Correlations were drawn too quickly."
Two weeks later, two of the 33 people arrested during "Operation Everywhere" remains in custody. Several Vagos members and their attorney said they did not believe any of the those arrested were actively involved in the group.
"They demonize us and start locking everyone up left and right. In their eyes, everyone's a criminal," said Harry "Doc" Hart, 61, a Hemet dentist and Vagos member. "They can cry 'gang' and 'terrorist' to take DNA from people never arrested. We're subject to this because someone cries wolf."
Hart said authorities used the raid as a guise to bring the state licensing board into his dental office and harass him in front of his patients.
But law enforcement sees a different picture. The Vagos have been identified as a criminal gang by a judge's order that has been confirmed through multiple court cases, said Captain Walter Myer, director of the Riverside County Gang Task Force.
"Unfortunately for them, they are a gang," Meyer said. "They're just like other outlaw motorcycle gangs or any other gang. Gangs exist for the sole purpose of supporting themselves. They'll take out violence on any average citizen that gets in their way."
Hemet attacks
Members of the Vagos deny that any members had any involvement in attacks on Hemet police.
"Was it us? Absolutely not," Hart said. "I'm not a terrorist and I'm not a gang member."
An attorney for the Vagos said he sees the raid as a political maneuver by the district attorney's office during an election year for Pacheco and Attorney General Jerry Brown. Both Pacheco and Brown arrived a day after the raid to vow support for law enforcement and to announce a $200,000 reward for information leading to arrests in the attacks on Hemet police.
"The Vagos are an easy target because they ride motorcycles and authorities love to hate them," said the Vagos' attorney Joseph Yanny. "This is for the personal political gain of Gov. Moonbeam, who's behind in the polls and playing this game to get his name in the press at the expense of decent men."
The Hemet-San Jacinto Valley Gang Task Force has been targeted at least three times by unknown assailants.
The first attack Dec. 31 involved drilling a hole through the Gang Task Force building's roof to reroute a gas line and rig the building to explode. Court documents note it followed the gathering two days earlier of about 100 Vagos members who had attended a funeral at a church next door to the former office, a block away from the Hemet police station.
Police said other attempts in recent months were designed to kill officers through booby traps attached to gates and an officer's vehicle at his home. Hemet police also think the torching of four city code-enforcement trucks just before midnight March 23 at City Hall is related to the attacks on police.
The tactics used in the attacks mirror a path by outlaw motorcycle gangs, Meyer said, but he declined to elaborate.
"These gangs commit acts to feed their reputation and gain power," Meyer said. "They try to intimidate and threaten others do whatever they want to do."
Vagos history
Authorities say the Vagos have a long criminal history and have been linked to drug trafficking of methamphetamines, witness intimidation, assaults and motorcycle thefts, according to the warrant.
The gang originated in 1960s as an offshoot of the Psychos Motorcycle gang, with the first official chapter based in San Bernardino in 1965. The group now has about 600 members in California.
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Mark Zaleski/The Press-Enterprise Police say raids against alleged Vagos members were unrelated to recent attacks like the torching of Hemet city vehicles March 23. “As a department, we’re leaning more toward it wasn’t them than it was,” said Hemet police Lt. Duane Wisehart. The organization was defined as an "outlaw motorcycle gang by the California Street Terrorism Enforced Prevention Act in 2000. About 130 to 200 members have been documented in Riverside County in the past five years, according to a Gang Task Force district attorney's search warrant.
Members wear green colors and patches to promote each chapter and rank of the organization. The group has elected leadership, follows bylaws and uses the motto, "We give what we get," according to the search warrant.
The latest raid was in part tied to an investigation of a 2008 Hemet assault that accused the Vagos of the unprovoked beating of a man as he left a bar, putting him into a coma for two weeks.
Authorities have tied the Vagos to white supremacy groups and to infiltrating law enforcement to gain police intelligence, Meyers said. In some cases, active law enforcement officers have joined the group as members to supply information to the Vagos.
Raids decried
Despite law enforcement's claims, Yanny said any criminal activity in the organization isn't tolerated.
District attorney's officials said most of the arrests were for weapons, drug and probation violations. The most serious charges were for felony possession or intent to sell drugs, including a meth lab in Lake Elsinore. One charge was a probation violation for failure to pay a $200 fine.
Four of those arrested were never booked at Riverside County jail. In total, police seized a series of Vagos patches, a stolen motorcycle, 6 grams of methamphetamine and 13 grams of marijuana, guns and other weapons.
Yanny has filed five federal civil rights lawsuits on behalf of families against authorities for raids in 2006, which are still pending.
He added the group has no legal opportunity to defend itself from being labeled as a gang and is instead a brotherhood of mostly middle-aged men, many of whom are veterans, who belong to the motorcycle club.
"This is nothing more than an attempt to boost polls at a time we cannot afford that kind of adventurism," Yanny said.