Maurice Boucher led the Hells Angels in Quebec during the biker war of the 1990s, a conflict with the Rock Machine over the province's drug trade that cost more than 160 lives between 1994 and 2002. In 1997 two prison guards, Diane Lavigne and Pierre Rondeau, were killed in Quebec, and a third man survived an attempt on his life. Boucher was charged with ordering these killings. A jury in the Superior Court of Quebec acquitted him in November 1998. The Court of Appeal of Quebec allowed the appeal in October 2000, quashed the verdict and ordered a new trial. At that second trial, in May 2002, he was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder, and he was sentenced to life with no eligibility for parole for 25 years.
He was convicted of ordering the killings. The man who pleaded guilty to the murder of Lavigne, Stéphane Gagné, became the principal witness against him, and a second man, Paul Fontaine, was later convicted of the murder of Rondeau. Boucher remained in custody for the rest of his life. In 2018 he pleaded guilty to a further charge of conspiracy to commit murder and received 10 more years. He died in custody in Quebec on July 10, 2022, aged 69.
Maurice Boucher was born on June 21, 1953, in Causapscal, a town in Quebec. In the early 1980s he and Salvatore Cazzetta led a white-supremacist motorcycle club known as the SS. The two men later fell out after Boucher joined the Hells Angels, which he did in the late 1980s.
The conflict that surrounded the 1997 killings began in 1994. After Cazzetta was sentenced in Florida, Boucher issued an ultimatum that anyone dealing drugs in Montreal had to buy from the Hells Angels, acting with the approval of the Oakland chapter. Within weeks all of the Quebec Hells Angels chapters had voted to join the war under his leadership, and he set up smaller affiliated clubs to recruit members.
The fighting was over control of illegal drugs and of smuggled alcohol and cigarettes. By March 1997 the turf war had killed 36 people in Quebec over three years. In August 1995 an 11-year-old boy had died in Montreal in violence tied to the war, and the public outrage that followed led to the creation of a provincial anti-gang squad in October 1995. The Quebec public security minister told reporters in 1997 that the province was "in a state of crisis." By the time the war ended in 2002 the death toll was put at more than 160.
Diane Lavigne was killed in Quebec on June 26, 1997. The charges against Boucher named her and a second victim as prison guards.
Stéphane Gagné, a former member of the Hells Angels who became an informant, pleaded guilty in 1998 to first-degree murder in the death of Lavigne and to attempted murder of a second guard. He was sentenced to life, with no eligibility for parole for 25 years at the outset. Prosecutors agreed to drop a separate murder charge against him in return for his testimony against Boucher.
Pierre Rondeau was killed on September 8, 1997, in the Pointe-aux-Trembles district of Montreal. A colleague who was with him survived, and Paul Fontaine was later charged with Rondeau's murder and with the attempted murder of that survivor.
In December 1997 Montreal police arrested two men connected to the gang, who agreed to become informants. At the trials that followed, the Crown argued that the two guards had been chosen so as to unsettle the justice system and to frighten informants. Testimony at a later trial said the victims were picked at random and that the orders also served to test the loyalty of the men who took part.
Boucher was charged in connection with the killings and tried before a jury in the Superior Court of Quebec. On November 27, 1998, the jury acquitted him. A criminologist said in 2000 that the prosecution had relied too heavily on the testimony of informants and that the outcome sent a "message of impunity" to the gangs.
On October 10, 2000, the Court of Appeal of Quebec allowed the appeal against the acquittal, quashed the verdict and ordered a new trial. Boucher applied to the Supreme Court of Canada for leave to appeal that decision, and on April 19, 2001, the Court dismissed the application. The file was closed on May 17, 2001.
During the same period Boucher pursued a separate challenge to his detention. On February 26, 2001, the Superior Court of Quebec dismissed his application for habeas corpus, which was based on a claim of illegal and arbitrary detention, and granted his application to review a publication ban. The Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal on June 12, 2001, and the Supreme Court of Canada refused leave on April 4, 2002. In March 2001 he was among 42 people arrested in a large police operation against the Hells Angels in Quebec.
The new trial took place in the Superior Court of Quebec and ended in May 2002. On May 5, 2002, the court convicted Boucher of two counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder, in relation to Lavigne, Rondeau and the third man who survived. Gagné's testimony was central to the Crown's case. His indeterminate sentence began on May 6, 2002. The sentence for first-degree murder in Canada is life, and the court set no eligibility for parole for 25 years. His recorded convictions are two counts of first-degree murder, attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, and related offenses.
Boucher appealed the 2002 conviction. The Court of Appeal of Quebec rejected the appeal on May 11, 2006. He applied to the Supreme Court of Canada for leave to appeal in August 2006, and on November 23, 2006, the Supreme Court dismissed the application. The conviction and the sentence became final on that date.
In October 2018 Gagné was still serving his life sentence. In 2015 he won the right to apply for release earlier than the 25 years first set, and on October 17, 2018, the Parole Board of Canada granted him temporary escorted leaves.
Paul Fontaine, a lieutenant in the Hells Angels' Nomads chapter who had acted under Boucher's direction, was tried before a jury on a charge of first-degree murder in the death of Rondeau and attempted murder of the survivor. The jury returned a verdict of guilty on both counts after six days of deliberation, and he was sentenced to two life terms. Gagné was the principal Crown witness. Because he had agreed to testify, he had not been charged with Rondeau's murder.
While serving his life sentence Boucher faced a further charge of conspiracy to commit murder. The Crown said the conspiracy was formed between July and November 2015. He pleaded guilty on April 17, 2018, before Justice Eric Downs of the Superior Court of Quebec, and in May 2018 received a 10-year term under a joint sentencing recommendation.
Boucher died on July 10, 2022, in custody in Quebec, Correctional Service Canada announced. He was 69 years old. After his conviction he was expelled from the Hells Angels.
In Canada, first-degree murder carries an automatic sentence of life imprisonment, with no eligibility for parole for 25 years. A verdict of the Superior Court of Quebec can be appealed to the Court of Appeal of Quebec and, with leave, to the Supreme Court of Canada. In Boucher's case the same sequence arose twice: once after the 1998 acquittal, when the Court of Appeal quashed the verdict and the Supreme Court refused leave, and again after the 2002 conviction, when the Court of Appeal rejected his appeal and the Supreme Court again refused leave.
The case also sits in a period of legislative change. Amendments to the Criminal Code in 1997 allowed heavier sentences for offenses committed as a member of a criminal organization and targeted the proceeds of crime. By September 2000 authorities had seized assets worth about 140 million dollars across Canada. Membership in such a group was not itself an offense, and the federal justice minister of the time said any further laws would come only after consultation with the provinces and territories.
The motive for the 1997 killings is described differently at different stages. The Crown argued that the aim was to destabilize the justice system and to intimidate informants; testimony at Fontaine's trial added a loyalty test for the men involved. These are the prosecution's accounts, accepted by the juries that convicted Boucher and Fontaine.
Boucher's 1998 acquittal is the principal unresolved question about the case in public discussion. A criminologist said in 2000 that the prosecution had relied too heavily on informant evidence, and the appeal court later quashed the verdict. The second jury, hearing the case again, convicted him.
1953, June 21: Maurice Boucher is born in Causapscal, Quebec.
Early 1980s: He and Salvatore Cazzetta lead the SS motorcycle club.
Late 1980s: He joins the Hells Angels.
1994: The Quebec biker war begins.
1995, August: An 11-year-old boy dies in Montreal in violence tied to the war.
1997, June 26: Diane Lavigne is killed in Quebec.
1997, September 8: Pierre Rondeau is killed in Montreal; a third man survives an attempt on his life.
1997, December: Montreal police arrest two men connected to the gang, who become informants.
1998, November 27: Boucher is acquitted by a jury in the Superior Court of Quebec.
2000, October 10: The Court of Appeal of Quebec allows the appeal, quashes the verdict and orders a new trial.
2001, February 26: The Superior Court of Quebec dismisses his habeas corpus application.
2001, March: He is among 42 people arrested in a police operation against the Hells Angels.
2001, April 19: The Supreme Court of Canada dismisses his application for leave to appeal the new-trial order.
2002, May 5: He is convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder.
2002, May 6: His indeterminate sentence begins.
2006, May 11: The Court of Appeal of Quebec rejects his appeal.
2006, November 23: The Supreme Court of Canada dismisses his application for leave to appeal.
2018, April 17: He pleads guilty to conspiracy to commit murder.
2018, May: He is sentenced to 10 years for that offense.
2022, July 10: He dies in custody in Quebec, aged 69.