The Notorious Bacon Brothers (18 page)

Jonathan Barber was no gangster, and his fate demonstrated how fatal even the most tenuous link to the Bacons could be. He was just a hardworking guy. He worked a few jobs, but the one he was best at was installing stereo equipment into high-end vehicles. It was a great job, not only because he could use his skills and get paid, but because he could drive around Vancouver in some of the hottest cars available.

On May 9, 2008, Barber was excited to be working on a black Porsche Cayenne, a luxurious SUV made by a sports car manufacturer that delighted drug dealers the world around as much as it horrified Porsche purists. As he drove it from the owner's place in Abbotsford to his Vancouver shop, he had his 17-year-old girlfriend drive his own, lesser SUV close behind.

He didn't know who the owner was; he was just happy to be driving the Cayenne. But others were well aware of exactly whose car it was. In fact, an armed group of UN members were surprised to see Jonathan Bacon's car cruising down the Kingsway.

Barber had no gang connections. But because the gangster look was in fashion, his short dark hair and gold chain gave him a passing resemblance to Jonathan Bacon.

The UN members—Barzan Tilli-Choli, Dan Russell, Dilun Heng, Karwan Saed, Yong Lee and Ion Croitoru (better known as “Johnny K-9,” a Hamilton, Ontario–born former professional wrestler and member of Satan's Choice)—took their shot. Oblivious to the other vehicles and pedestrians on one of the busiest streets in Canada, at ten in the evening, they sprayed the luxurious SUV with gunfire. Barber slumped down, dead. The weight of his right foot pressed on the accelerator, and the Cayenne's powerful engine vaulted the big vehicle over the sidewalk and into a nearby furniture store, knocking a big hole in the wall. Panicked by the gunshots and seeing the Cayenne veer off the street, Barber's 17-year-old girlfriend driving the man's own SUV accelerated and collided with several other cars. She was hurt but survived.

Three gang-related murders in less than 48 hours proved to even the most cynical observer that there was a war on. And it was more widespread than simply the UN against the Bacon Brothers. The UN, of course, had a tenuous relationship with the Hells Angels and, by extension, many other gangs, including the Independent Soldiers. And the Bacon Brothers had become synonymous with the Red Scorpions. In fact, once Kabovanec was back out of jail, he shared a car lease with Jamie Bacon and gave the Bacon family home as his address.

From information they learned during Project Frozen Timber, police in both Canada and the United States knew that Roueche was a major player in drug trafficking from Canada to the United States. And the evidence they collected allowed them to tap his phone.

One of the first things they learned was that Clayton Roueche, like many Canadians involved in the drug trade, was afraid to travel to the United States, where sentences are much stiffer. On April 2, 2008, just before noon, he received a call from a friend named Pam Lee, who asked him if he knew anyone who could give her a ride to the airport in Bellingham, Washington. She pointed out that she knew it wouldn't be him. “Yeah,” he said with a snicker. “I'll never come back.” When she pressed him on it, he told her, “I wouldn't even get down there; they'd throw me in jail.”

But Roueche did go to Mexico. Not only was it essential to his business, but he also had friends there. And when he was invited to a wedding in May 2008, he did not hesitate to go. On May 19, Roueche landed in Mexico. When he handed over his passport—which had stamps from Vietnam, Japan, Macao, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon and Thailand, but not the United States—he was asked to wait in a separate room. Two officers met with him and told him that American authorities asked them not to allow him into the country. Roueche said he understood and told them he'd get on the next flight back to Vancouver.

He did. But shortly after the plane he was on was in American airspace, the pilot made an announcement: the plane was being rerouted to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. He did not give a reason why. “Once on the plane and in his seat,” said U.S. prosecutors, “Roueche quickly began sending BlackBerry messages, indicating he was concerned about flying through the United States, saying that perhaps he was being paranoid but he was worried about being arrested. He also BlackBerried information about bank accounts and access codes before he had to turn off the device.” Once on the tarmac, the plane was entered by U.S. Customs agents, who arrested Roueche.

Roueche was charged with conspiracy to import cocaine and marijuana into the United States and money laundering. Emily Langlie, spokesman for the federal attorney's office, told media that Roueche was wearing a significant amount of UN-related jewelry at the time of his arrest.

At a federal lockup in Oklahoma, Roueche immediately started making calls, while the feds listened in. When they determined he had been speaking in code (he had actually left a codebook in his holding cell), his phone privileges were lifted.

Langlie also said that he would be flown to Seattle to stand trial. He requested bail, but prosecutors pointed out that the last UN member they granted bail to, Joe Curry, had fled. To emphasize that point, they showed the judge a photo of Roueche and Curry arm in arm at Duane Meyer's funeral. Bail was not granted.

The founder and brightest star of the UN was behind bars. It wasn't a hugely crippling blow, as most members of the gang had their own connections and suppliers, or could easily get in touch with Roueche's. But it was a terrible hit to the gang's morale. The big guy, the founder, the face of the UN, grinning from behind designer sunglasses while cruising around in his Maserati, was off the streets.

But it wasn't just the UN who was being forcibly reordered. Cedric Michael Smith was one of the founding B.C. Hells Angels and generally considered a heavy player. He was arrested for trafficking a number of times, but the most recent was a big one. In January 2005, nine Hells Angels and Renegades were arrested, including Smith and Norman Krogstad, who had been selling one-kilogram bags of coke—many delivered to a Wendy's fast food location—to an informant who was building a case. The pair were charged, tried, and sentenced and served time, and both were granted parole in March 2007.

Many other Hells Angels blamed Smith for the 2005 arrests, including his own, because he had introduced them to the informant. Of course, he didn't know the man was an informant, but it was still considered a huge faux pas in the industry. So huge, in fact, that there was a price to pay. Smith's old partner from the Renegades, William “Billy” Moore, had been killed shortly after the arrests, and his house had been set on fire in a similar situation.

So when Smith missed a June 17, 2008, meeting with his parole officer, the RCMP sent a pair of officers to his house in Langley. He wasn't there and has not been seen since. There are lots of rumors that explain his absence and fate, but nothing concrete has emerged.

And gang members did not have to be in the Lower Mainland to be in danger. Ahmet “Lou” Kaawach looked like a gangster. A 26-year-old, he shaved his head, had a pencil-thin beard and moustache, had prominent tattoos on his pumped-up biceps and always wore a big gold chain. He also liked to show off his wealth with his vehicle—a red Cadillac EXT pickup truck tricked out with six TV screens and doors modified to open vertically.

That kind of truck and lifestyle do not come cheaply. But money was no problem for Kaawach. He owned a car customization business and law enforcement agencies also say he was the UN's chief contact with the Mexican drug cartels, arranging for shipments of cocaine to be traded for BC Bud. Roueche himself described Kaawach as a wannabe “ladies' man” and spoke about his earnest, if not entirely productive, efforts to rap about his gangster lifestyle.

Things were working out well for him until he was deported after a weapons conviction. Unlike Omid Bayani, who was ordered deported but just never left, Kaawach did actually leave Canada for his native Lebanon. Roueche is known to have visited him there. He also had a residence in Guadalajara, Mexico, where he continued to work as a go-between, between the Sinaloa Cartel and the UN.

His contact in Canada, according to police in both countries, was his good friend Elliott “Taco” Castañeda, a Guatemala-born Canadian citizen who worked as a realtor but seemed to have a lifestyle and set of possessions—like three houses with a value of $1.1 million and a top-of-the-line BMW—that far outstripped his sales commissions. When a joint law enforcement/Canada Revenue Agency operation looked into his earnings and those of other UN members, and then a revenue agent and 10 cops paid a late-night visit to his house, Castañeda quit HomeLife Glenayre Realty and relinquished his license.

Castañeda went to visit Kaawach in Mexico, probably to iron out their new situation and to meet some people. On a sunny July 12, 2008, the pair went for a bite to eat at the open-air Tacos de Barbacoa El Cuellos restaurant on Calle Pedro Buzeta in the Santa Teresita neighborhood of Guadalajara. They were both mid-taco when a group of heavily armed men burst from a minivan and showered the restaurant with automatic weapons fire. Both died on the scene.

Perhaps, like many Canadian tough guys who go to Mexico, they were in way over their heads. Any of the cartels or sub-cartels could easily have known who they were and killed them in an increasingly commonplace way of doing business in Mexico. Or UN members, afraid Castañeda was going to spill information about them now that he was under severe legal pressure, had him eliminated. Although there was a wake for him at the Rain Bar and Grill in Abbotsford (police seized two handguns from the crowd), it's unlikely too many in the UN would miss Castañeda.

Jonathan Bacon, his girlfriend Rayleene Burton and his business associate Godwin Cheng had been in and out of court, fighting against the charges that arose after the police found them with drugs, weapons and cash in 2005. Their defense team based their argument on the thesis that since the police did not have an active search warrant, the decision to arrest Bacon and Cheng was illegal. Since the police only saw them exchange bags for cash, they did not have reasonable evidence to believe that what was inside the bags were drugs or that there were weapons in the car.

Despite the fact that Bacon and Cheng were caught red-handed, the judge agreed that the police had no right to arrest or search them or the car. And, of course, since Burton was only stopped on the basis of the earlier arrest, her arrest was unlawful, as well.

On July 16, 2008, Bacon, Burton and Cheng walked out of court free. It was just another in a growing list of law-enforcement attempts to stop the Bacon Brothers that had failed. Caught with drugs and weapons? No problem for the Bacons, just a matter of showing up in court a few times. They were beginning to appear untouchable, even invincible.