[7] The Hells Angels are the most significant motorcycle gang involved in drug trafficking in Massachusetts,[5] and have also collaborated with the Boston faction of the Patriarca crime family in loansharking and narcotics distribution.
[8][9] Hells Angels members were among a group of twenty people – fifteen men and five women – charged with various offenses after a battle with police on Lowell's Andover Street on December 14, 1969.
[12] The Massachusetts Appeals Court reversed all convictions because, in its view, the trial judge improperly forbade cross-examination of the Condons designed to show bias because criminal charges stemming from a 1971 drug indictment were pending against them at the time.
[13] In September 1984, Salem Hells Angels chapter member Billy Leary and another motorcyclist were arrested by the Massachusetts State Police (MSP) for operating under the influence after leaving a nightclub in Revere.
[15] Salem Hells Angels members James Costin and Thomas M. Duda were charged with assault and battery following an attack on off-duty police lieutenant Vernon "Skip" Coleman at a Lynn bar on November 24, 2004.
[18] During a traffic stop on Route 107 on January 6, 2005, Hells Angels member Christopher Ranieri fled into a marsh after state trooper Daniel Crespi observed what he believed to be a gun under his jacket.
[22] The victim was lured to the Red Devils' Byfield clubhouse on October 15, 2012, where he was interrogated before being knocked unconscious and having his hand broken with a ball-peen hammer, causing permanent injury.
Urban, a Hells Angels member from Buffalo, New York, was fatally shot in the heart after an unidentified gunman fired four rounds from a pistol into a bar in Lynn on April 23, 1974.
[26] Mark W. Veherbon, a Menlo Park, California Hells Angel, was also wounded after being shot three times in the stomach and leg, while two other club members escaped unharmed.
[38] On November 4, 1979, the dismembered torso of Robert "Bino" Garbino, Gagnon's roommate and a Hells Angels prospect, was discovered by children playing in a dump near where DeQuina's car was found.
According to police, DeNino refused to pay Simard approximately $10,000 owed over a cocaine deal and, after learning that the Hells Angels had put a contract out on his life, sought protection from the rival Trampers MC.
[41] A fourth suspect, Trampers associate and future Patriarca crime family soldier Darin F. "Nino" Bufalino, fled to Kingscourt, Ireland before being apprehended in Fuengirola, Spain, on June 11, 1987.
[42][43] Charges of first-degree murder against Bufalino, Burke and Simard were dismissed on December 10, 1990, when a judge ruled Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) wiretap evidence in the case to be inadmissible because there had been an eight-day delay in sealing the tapes.
[47] Five Hells Angels members, including the vice-president of the club's East Coast faction, were arrested in the Greater Boston area on charges of conspiracy to distribute cocaine on May 2, 1985, in connection to the FBI's Operation Roughrider.
[citation needed] Authorities seized $2 million in cocaine, marijuana, methamphetamine, hashish, PCP and LSD, as well as weapons including Uzi submachine guns and rocket launchers during the operation.
[citation needed] Lynn chapter members Glenn "Hoppy" Main and Steve "Fee" Sullivan were sentenced to three years in prison after being convicted, and another – Linwood "Lee" Barrett III – was acquitted.
[49] On January 12, 1993, chapter president Charles T. "Doc" Pasciuti and fourteen others were sentenced after earlier pleading guilty to possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine, and conspiracy.
As part of an undercover operation, DEA agent Phil Muollo infiltrated the club for eighteen months and purchased kilograms of drugs from Gregory "Greg" Domey, the chapter president as well as the Hells Angels' leader on the East Coast, and other members.
On July 1, 1995, John R. "Johnny Bart" Bartolomeo and another Hells Angel chased Girard Giorgio – a member of the Devil's Disciples – down Route 3 as he rode his motorcycle and badly beat him and stripped him of his colors after catching up with him, leaving him in critical condition.
[51] The operation culminated with the arrests of sixteen Hells Angels members and associates during raids on ten locations, including the Salem chapter clubhouse, on September 5, 1996.
[47] The Hells Angels took over ancillary activities of the Patriarca crime family's Boston faction, such as loansharking and drug dealing, from the East Boston-based Trampers, who had previously overseen operations under contract with the Mafia, circa 1986.
[56] A joint investigation of the Hells Angels' Boston and Salem chapters by the ATF, DEA, MSP and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that began in January 2007 resulted in the arrests of six club members on various charges during a series of raids on September 20, 2007.
[58] Christopher Ranieri was sentenced to one year in prison and restitution to the U.S. Treasury in the amount of $33,438 on February 3, 2009, after pleading guilty to two counts of failure to file federal income tax returns.