OFF THE WIRE
MONTREAL — About 20 men wearing Rock Machine colours were spotted at a Montreal strip club Sunday morning in the latest indication the biker gang might be regrouping in the province.
Gang members were spotted at the Amazones club in the city's west end. Police spokesman Raphael Bergeron said detectives met the individuals, and there was no violence.
The Rock Machine is the sworn enemy of the Hells Angels, and the two gangs battled it out in Eastern Canada in the 1990s and early 2000s.
A 2001 police raid ended the war, but not before 160 people were killed, including adult bystanders and an 11-year-old boy who was hit shrapnel in a 1995 truck bombing.
The war and the raids drove the Rock Machine out of Quebec, but its website says it has since reopened a chapter in Quebec.
The gang is at its strongest in Manitoba, where it has waged war against a group linked to the Hells Angels.
The weekend Rock Machine meeting in Montreal is one of several such gatherings in the past 12 months.
In January, police saw two Rock Machine members in a bar in east-end Montreal.
Ten members from Quebec, Manitoba and British Columbia were arrested last July at Chez Pare, a famous downtown strip club.
In April 2011, several Rock Machine members with jackets from Germany, Nevada and Australia were seen in a Montreal hotel.
Fact box:
Important Rock Machine events in Quebec:
1985: Brothers Salvatore and Giovanni Cazzetta found the Rock Machine.
1994: War begins against the Hells Angels.
2000: Short-lived truce announced between Hells and Rock Machine.
2001: Rock Machine officially becomes a chapter of the American biker gang, the Bandidos.
2002: End of the biker war against Hells Angels.
2003: Former Rock Machine headquarters in Montreal is demolished.
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