How the Hells Angels took over Montreal

Outlaw gang biker Gilles Cadorette, 27, was killed by car bomb 

   As outlined previously here on Coolopolis, local biker gangs such as the Satan's Choice, Devil's Disciples, Popeyes and Rockers formed the local drug dealing landscape in the 70s before the big American chains moved in.
   They forced bikers to choose sides between the Outlaws and the Hells Angels. If you chose wrong, you might be killed.
   And that's just what happened to a couple of Outlaw gang bikers here in Montreal prior to the big Hells Angels takeover.
   Top-ranking Outlaw Gilles Cadorette left the gang bunker at 1915 Bordeaux - which became the Hells bunker afterwards for many years before the city demolished the whole street and made it part of a bigger park near Ontario and De Lorimier -- and hopped into a car with Outlaw member Donald McLean, 28.
   He turned the ignition and kaboom. The car had been rigged with a bomb and exploded. Cadorette was dead but McLean survived the explosion on Tuesday March 21, 1978 at 8 p.m.

Outlaw biker gang member Athanase Markopoulos, 21, was shot dead on the street in St. Hank

   The Outlaws had another bunker at 144 St. Ferdinand, in St. Henry a home just a stone's toss away from the diving board in the loveliest park in the area.
   The bikers had moved in after police busted 45 Outlaws in a pair of raids on other clubhouses on Feb. 24, 1978. St. Hank was irritated by their noisy and vile arrival in the area.
   Outlaw member Athanase Markopoulos, 21, left to hit the corner store a few steps north (it's no longer there) and knocked on the window, as it had just closed, being 11 p.m. on Wednesday 26 April, 1978.
   The woman came to see who was knocking and witnessed the Greek immigrant getting shot dead right in front of her eyes.
   Cops chased a car fleeing the scene but were unable to catch it. Such were the methods employed by the Hells Angels to take over Montreal.