Son of anarchy reveals all (Opinion)

OFF THE WIRE
I’ve just read one of the most extraordinary true crime autobiographies. When Anthony Menginie was born in 1977 his father was a leader of the Pagans outlaw motorcycle gang in Philadelphia. Life was rough for the kid – he attended 13 funerals of people he knew by age 13 - but got a lot worse when dad went to jail for a long time and mum became a drug addict. Anthony, known as “LT” (Little Tony) because there were so many other Anthonys in the gang, hit the streets, hanging out with gang members whose treatment of him ranged from kindly to brutal.

You might have read books about motorcycle gangs before – you might have seen Sons of Anarchy on TV, a series LT describes as “a pretty cool show”. But so far as I know, this is the first non-fiction book to give a picture of a gang from the inside. It is packed with stories of rampant criminality, shocking abuse of women – including many straight women who are attracted to bikers for a night of rough sex – and casual violence and massive betrayal.

“My father was also called Anthony and he was a piece of shit,” LT told me this week. “He ran down the Pagans because – although we didn’t know that at the time – he’d been paid US$300,000 by the Hells Angels who wanted to open a chapter in Philadelphia.”

This occurred, and LT’s father and some of the Pagans crossed over, but eventually the remaining Pagans regrouped and drove the Angels out of the city in a violent gang war. These days LT’s father lives in fear, hated by the Pagans and pursued by the Hells Angels who want to recover a debt they now put at US$400,000. (Compound interest is an awful thing.) Recently a Pagan “prospect” - a sort of apprentice - found Anthony senior in a supermarket and cut off his ponytail, a terrible insult to a biker. As his reward, the prospect was “given a set of colours” (ie. made a full member by being given the club’s full symbols to wear ).

But membership is not what it used to be. The Pagans have always been, in LT’s words, “the smallest, the poorest, and the hard-core-est gang on the east coast” but a member of their ruling council, known as “the mother club”, has rolled over. This man was responsible for maintaining the trademark on the club colours, and the government has taken over that trademark legally. This means police can now stop any member of the Pagans and force them to remove their colours, which has thrown the club into turmoil.



To add to this indignity, 44 members of the Pagans have been arrested based on information provided by the turncoat. The gang used to have 400 members, but thanks to its vicissitudes is now down to about half that.

LT, presently in Australia to promote his book, which he co-authored with true-crime writer Kerrie Droban, is not impressed by the behaviour of local gangsters. In America, serious criminals like bikers settle their differences in private and do not indulge in public shootings and fights, such as the one that occurred at Sydney Airport between the Hells Angels and the Commanchero.

“That would never happen back home,” LT says, “it creates too much trouble. In America the gangs would meet in a field or a warehouse and settle their differences there. I was brought up to have respect for my enemies.”

This is LT’s first time out of America, and he’s enjoying the experience, although some of it he finds strange. “The other day I was out with my publicist and she put her bag and phone down on a table,” he says. “I told her not to, in Philadelphia you wouldn’t do that, everyone is always watching their back. There’s no tension here.”

Here is an extended quote from Prodigal Father, Pagan Son by Anthony 'LT' Menginie and Kerrie Droban (Allen & Unwin)

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/blogs/crime-and-punishment/son-of-anarchy-reveals-all-20110629-1gpxb.html#ixzz1Qf7r56GW