[5] His father was a meek man who worked as a foreman at the Alcan aluminum smelter in Arvida, and his mother was a domineering woman who physically and psychologically abused Gallant.
When asked during a Sûreté du Québec polygraph test on 6 December 2008 what the most traumatic experience of his life was, Gallant responded: "My childhood".
According to tests he was given while in custody at the Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines penitentiary in 1978, Gallant's intelligence quotient was estimated at 88; the prison's orienteer Jean Olczyk wrote that he "has an intellectual potential below average".
Other tests that Gallant underwent in detention showed that he possessed "above-average dexterity and digital coordination" in addition to being "accurate, focused and meticulous".
He joined a local gang, the Cossacks, with whom he began breaking and entering at grocery and convenience stores in the Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean region, stealing cigarettes and selling them onto a contact.
Although the minimum age for drivers' licenses in Quebec was 21 at the time, Gallant forged the birth date on his baptistery and fraudulently gained a driving licence at 18.
[6] In 1975, Gallant began working for senior West End Gang member Raymond Desfossés, who he first met while they were incarcerated together at the Cowansville penitentiary.
Other gangsters who Gallant met at the penitentiary and who he later worked for or with were Denis Corriveau, who he described as a "great friend", Jean-Claude Gagné, and Raymond Bouchard, the West End Gang's lieutenant in the Quebec City area.
Gallant later admitted that he "pretended to be in love" with Grassette and stayed with her in order to avoid suspicion from probation authorities, although she described him as a "very good father" who "provided a lot of care and affection" according to a parole report.
On 28 December 1978, Gallant committed his first murder when he helped a fellow former inmate, with whom he had served time at Saint-Vincent-de-Paul penitentiary, kill dancers' bar employee Gilles Legris, who had allegedly assaulted a female, in Port-Cartier.
[6] His victim in this case was Louis Desjardins, a drug dealer in significant debt to the West End Gang who Desfossés suspected of cooperating with police.
[5] His next hit took place in the fall of 1982, when he shot and killed André Haince near Quebec City, for which he received $3,000 from massage parlour owner Marcel Lefrançois and $5,000 from Desfossés.
[6] On 28 May 1990, Gallant fatally shot strip club owner Salvatore Luzi in the backyard of his Norman-style house in Lorraine in a $10,000 contract given by Raymond Desfossés.
[7][12] Like in the Gilles Côté hit, Gallant was initially forced to delay the killing as McGurnaghan frequently patronized the tavern while in the company of a young boy.
Aside from André Hardy, Gallant also provided information to other police officers, including Mario Laprise, who became chief of the Sûreté du Québec in 2012.
Although Gallant initially considered his career as a hitman finished due to his ill health, he eventually recovered and he committed four murders between March and August 1993.
He became known as an extremely meticulous and confident killer, often spending several days monitoring his targets before determining the least risky place to attack, and always planning an escape route in order to flee without being apprehended.
Gallant drove his Chrysler to and from numerous murders, using only stolen license plates, which were placed over his own using "big jumbo paper clips".
[10] Gallant frequently met with Frédéric Faucher and Marcel "Le Maire" Demers, the leaders of the Rock Machine in the Quebec City area, at the Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré to receive murder contracts as well as weapons and ammunition.
[6][10] Because the killing took place in Donnacona, the city where Gallant resided, he took extra precautions to avoid suspicion, leaving an oversized item of footwear at the scene to confuse police.
Benoît worked in her family's business, an ambulance service and a funeral home in Donnacona, and she assisted Gallant with surveillance and logistical support in three murder contracts, the first of which was the failed assassination of Louis "Mélou" Roy, the second-in-command of the Hells Angels' elite Nomads chapter, on 23 August 1997.
[6] On 7 January 1999, he fatally shot Luc Bergeron, a private detective who happened to be living in an apartment in Sainte-Foy formerly occupied by his intended target, Quebec City Hells Angels chapter member Jonathan Robert.
[6] In the summer of 2000, Gallant was offered $250,000 by Raymond Desfossés, who had aligned himself with the Rock Machine, to kill Hells Angels leader Maurice "Mom" Boucher.
[7] During the 7 July 2000 assassination of Robert "Bob" Savard, a loan shark and right-hand man to Boucher, by Gallant and Gérard Hubert at a restaurant in Montréal-Nord, an associate of Savard, hockey player-turned-loan shark Norm Descôteaux, and a waitress, Hélène Brunet, were also shot and wounded by Gallant and Hubert after Descôteaux used Brunet as a human shield.
[6] On 30 May 2001, Gallant killed bar manager Yvon Daigneault and wounded patron Michel Paquette in a case of mistaken identity in Sainte-Adèle.
[25] All eleven co-conspirators, including the crime bosses Desfossés, Fred Faucher and Marcel Demers, pleaded guilty to their roles Gallant's killings.