22 murder charges against alleged Hells Angels boss

OFF THE WIRE
Canada - MONTREAL
The Canadian Press

MONTREAL — Twenty-two murder charges have been laid against an alleged biker boss once tied to the construction company now involved in the renovation fiasco on Parliament Hill.

The whopping litany of accusations was delivered in a Montreal courtroom against an alleged Hells Angels boss, Normand (Casper) Ouimet, whom police had been seeking for almost two years.

There were charges of first-degree murder. Conspiracy to commit murder. Gangsterism. And a slew of others related to criminal corruption in the construction industry.

All the murders date back to Quebec's infamous biker war that reached its peak in the 1990s with frequent bombings, drive-by shootings, and victims' bodies being disposed of in burning cars.

Ouimet was arraigned in court under very tight security Tuesday, behind a set of metal detectors and airport-style scanners.

The previous evening, police swooped in on a taxi cab Ouimet been riding in and arrested their suspect, who had a Canada-wide warrant out for his arrest since April 2009.

"It was a very important arrest," said Crown prosecutor Madeleine Giauque. "There's . . . 22 murders over 17 years, from 1992 until 2009."

The handcuffed Ouimet sported a scruffy beard and shoulder-length hair Tuesday -- a change from the poster issued by police in which he appeared clean-shaven.

Ouimet actually had to appear before two different judges to be arraigned on charges from two separate police investigations.

He faced a Quebec Superior Court Justice in connection with Operation SharQc, which originally targeted about 155 associates and members of the Hells Angels.

That operation helped liquidate the province's powerful Hells Angels last year -- but about two-dozen of the wanted suspects remained missing.

Ouimet, 41, was one of them.

He was allegedly one of Quebec's most powerful Hells Angels members and was on the province's top 10 most wanted list since the operation in April 2009.

Ouimet will next make a court appearance on Dec. 10 along with others facing charges in the SharQc file.

He also faces charges stemming from his involvement in a construction firm that has been making headlines across Canada lately.

The other police operation -- codenamed Diligence -- was a broad crackdown against organized crime's infiltration of the bricklaying industry.

Ouimet, the alleged Hells Angels regional boss for Trois-Rivieres, is accused of masterminding an operation that saw criminals take over businesses and use them for money-laundering.

In that separate case, Ouimet appeared before a Quebec court judge to face charges of fraud, extortion, gangsterism and money-laundering.

The alleged biker was involved in the family company of Paul Sauve, who won a $9-million renovation contract on Parliament Hill.

Sauve has said the Hells finagled their way into his own family business at a time when he needed quick cash to finish a major project. Then the threats and bullying began, he says.

Sauve has since lost the contract because his company, LM Sauve, ultimately went bankrupt.

The problem-plagued renovation has become embroiled in political scandal and work has ground to a halt. A masonry company walked off the job last month and contacted police. The project is being investigated by a parliamentary probe and the RCMP.

Sauve was outside the country on business on Tuesday but said through an assistant that he had no immediate comment when an attempt was made to get his reaction to the arrest.

In an interview with The Canadian Press last year, Sauve described the troubles he suffered as the Hells started muscling in on his family business in 2006.

He said they tried to take over his company. After a series of threats, he says he went to the police.

"I had taken some serious hits -- cars getting rammed into, trucks burning, being told there wouldn't be a trial because there wouldn't be a body," Sauve said in an interview last year.

"But the day the threats came against my 10-year-old daughter I said, 'That's enough."'

Court documents allege Ouimet and others uttered death threats against employees of Sauve's company between February and December 2006.

Ouimet was no longer involved with the company by the time Sauve won the Parliament Hill contract in 2008.