OFF THE WIRE
BLAIR ENSOR AND MICHAEL BERRY - The Marlborough Expr
The family of a man murdered by a patched Lone Legion Motorcycle Club member has criticised the Marlborough District Council and the police for allowing the club to build a new gang pad in Blenheim.
Shooting victim Carl MacDonald's cousin and the family's spokesman, Andrew MacDonald, said he believed the Lone Legion was involved in selling drugs.
To peddle drugs efficiently, the gang would need a warehouse and now it had one, he said.
"If they are just a motorcycle club, why do they need a pad? Why can't they meet at each other's homes?"
Mr MacDonald, who was a policeman for 10 years, said the family was concerned that the police and the district council had allowed the Lone Legion to set up shop in town again.
"The family have shown a lot of restraint since Carl was murdered, but now there's some anxiety. If you allow something, you become complicit. By allowing something to gain strength, you become complicit in its growth."
The gang had not learned anything or changed in any way since the murder, he said. It had simply laid low for a few years and was re-emerging. However, he was more concerned about the confidence the gang was showing.
The view by some people that the Lone Legion kept worse gangs from establishing themselves in Blenheim was false, he said. The Maori community of Picton and Blenheim had more of an influence in keeping them away.
The re-emergence of the Lone Legion would bring more racism and white supremacist attitudes to Blenheim, which could be the catalyst for the Mongrel Mob establishing itself as guardians of Maori, he said.
"You have to make sure that justice is seen to be done, otherwise other people will want to do something about it themselves."
Acting Marlborough police area commander, Senior Sergeant Ciaran Sloan, said it was up to the council whether it could issue or turn down consent for the warehouse: "I think the council has been duped. It's been set up as a warehouse when it looks like [it is] a gang pad.
"If the police were aware of drug dealing or any other illegal activity, we would be investigating it."
Marlborough Mayor Alistair Sowman said the MacDonald family's criticism was unfair.
"We had no idea this was going to be used for this purpose. We had issued a building consent for a commercial building in an industrial area. I've had a look at the building. It looks no different from any other operation."
The police briefed him about the situation yesterday.
Asked whether the council would introduce bylaws to stop the Lone Legion from fortifying the warehouse, Mr Sowman said: "If it needed to be looked at, but certainly it's not an issue.
"We've just got to work with the parties involved to make sure gang activity doesn't escalate."
Council regulatory manager Hans Versteegh said the owners of the warehouse would have to apply for a code of compliance certificate when it was finished. That had not yet happened, he said.
Council staff would inspect the building to ensure it complied with its consent before they issued a certificate.
"If they've built what they have applied to build, then they are entitled to have built it.
"We don't control who can use a property. There's nothing in legislation which prevents people from building a gang house, as long as it complies with building code requirements."
A spokesman for the Lone Legion could not be reached for comment.
Carl MacDonald was shot dead during an altercation outside the old Lone Legion club in Gascoigne St on September 15, 2007. Aaron James Harvey was sentenced to 10 years' jail for the murder.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/marlborough-express/news/4414590/Outrage-at-return-of-Legion-pad
