One of the few bikers still serving time for Project SharQc, the investigation that shook the Hells Angels in Quebec a decade ago, has been denied parole because he continues to act like a kingpin while behind bars.
Pierrot Lachapelle, 47, the former president of a Hells Angels support club called the Evils Ones, is serving the 11-year-prison term he was left with after he pleaded guilty to taking part in a general conspiracy to commit murder during Quebec’s biker war. The conflict between the Hells Angels and a collection of organized crime groups called The Alliance began in 1994 and continued into 2002. More than 160 people died as a result of the Hells Angels’ plan to monopolize drug trafficking in Quebec.
Project SharQc produced charges against 156 people, including 111 full-patch members of the club. Dozens of Hells Angels ended up pleading guilty to being part of the general conspiracy, but most have since completed their sentences or have been granted parole.
Lachapelle was originally sentenced to a 17-year prison term in 2013, but he was part of a group of 35 men who managed to have their sentences significantly reduced by Quebec’s Court of Appeal because they pleaded guilty to taking part in the conspiracy to kill members of The Alliance before a serious problem with part of the Crown’s evidence was eventually revealed during a murder trial held in 2015.
The trial involved five alleged members of the Hells Angels’ chapter in Sherbrooke, which the Evil Ones worked for. Lachapelle received one of the lengthier sentences in Project SharQc because the Crown had evidence directly linking him to two murders carried out in 2000. In the first homicide — the murder of Dany Beaudin, a man who was shot in St-Frédéric-de-Beauce on April 17, 2000 — Lachapelle was alleged to have participated in the planning, did surveillance on Beaudin and accompanied the shooter to the crime scene.
In the second homicide — the murder of Martin Bourget, who was shot at a campground in Granby on July 7, 2000 — Lachapelle was alleged to have helped to prepare the hit, delivered firearms to a motel and instructed the shooters on how to carry it out.
Lachapelle’s roles in both murders were part of a statement of facts both sides of the case agreed to when Lachapelle pleaded guilty in 2013. But according to the written summary of a decision the Parole Board of Canada made on Thursday, Lachapelle now denies he had any role in either murder and called the informant who supplied the evidence a liar. He told the parole board he only agreed to plead guilty to “move on to other things” and did not want to spend money on a lengthy trial.
The summary describes Lachapelle as having been a past president of the Evils Ones and that he was considered to be tied to the Hells Angels until 2001. He told the parole board he left the club in 2001 after a different investigation dubbed Operation Springtime 2001 hit the Hells Angels hard that year. He also said that between 2001 and 2009, he spent his winters in Costa Rica running a company that taught scuba diving. He went into hiding when arrests were made in Project SharQc in April 2009 and remained a fugitive until his arrest in 2013.
Lachapelle was denied any form of parole because he has been a problem for authorities at the penitentiary where he is being held.
“In March 2015, you were involved in influence trafficking, the intimidation and reprisals toward other inmates, on behalf of the Hells Angels,” the summary notes.
The following year, in April 2016, he was believed to have intimidated smaller inmates into doing odd jobs for him, including cleaning his cell. He was also suspected of having sold drugs and contraband tobacco to other inmates. Lachapelle denied all of the allegations during his hearing this week. He admitted he hangs out with Hells Angels who are incarcerated with him but argued some are people he grew up with. He claimed he isn’t involved in their illicit activities behind bars and “only eats and trains with them.”
Lachapelle can appeal the board’s decision.
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Source: Montreal Gazette