It wasn’t a traditional love story.

When Thomas Elton and Brenda Turcan married in 2005, both were convicted killers.

Then Elton strangled and stabbed his chronically ill wife in June 2009.

He was later convicted of second-degree murder, despite explaining that the couple had a suicide pact and that he only killed Turcan because he thought she had overdosed in an attempt to die that day.

In 2012, a trial judge accepted that Elton believed he was committing a mercy killing, but ruled he was still guilty of murder because the evidence showed his wife died by his hand and had not overdosed.

In 2014, Elton was sentenced to life in prison with no parole eligibility for 25 years.

He appealed the verdict, arguing that the trial judge erred by not fully considering whether “he aided the victim’s suicide or committed her murder.”

On Wednesday, the B.C. Court of Appeal dismissed Elton’s appeal and upheld his murder conviction.

A July 1989 picture of convicted murderer Brenda Turcan, then Blondell, in Kingston Prison for Women.

Appeal Court Justice Gail Dickson said in her written reasons that the trial judge properly concluded “that even if Mr. Elton honestly believed Ms. Turcan was attempting suicide, by strangling and stabbing her he did not assist her suicide; he killed her by his own overt acts, intending to cause her death.”

“The judge concluded this amounts to murder. I see no error in his conclusion,” Dickson wrote.

Appeal Court Justices Peter Lowry and Elizabeth Bennett agreed.

Elton’s appeal was heard last March, four months after the two-time killer was found dead in his jail cell at Matsqui Institution in Abbotsford. The B.C. Coroners Service is still investigating his death, official Barb McLintock said Wednesday.

Dickson noted in her ruling that Elton and Turcan “were a loving and devoted couple” and that Turcan’s health had deteriorated “significantly” after a 2004 heart attack.

Elton testified at his trial that on the morning of June 22, 2009, Turcan had told him, “Well it’s time. It’s over. I’ve already gone. I’ve had enough.”

“He said these were code words that it was time for the agreed upon double-suicide,” Dickson said.

Elton took the dog for a walk and returned to find Turcan “sleeping or unconscious with a bottle of Valium in her hand.”

“In response to finding her in this state, he said, he fed the dog eight pills and took 23 pills himself, intending to fulfill the suicide pact. Wanting to ensure that Ms. Turcan’s wishes were carried out, he also strangled her and stabbed her with a bayonet,” the ruling said.

Elton called his dad to explain what he’d done and called a friend to pick up the dog. When paramedics arrived at the scene, Elton declined medical assistance.

A forensic pathologist testified that Turcan died from strangulation and had only taken “therapeutic levels of medication.”

“She had not taken a drug overdose,” Dickson wrote. “The judge found that Ms. Turcan was not attempting to commit suicide.”

The couple first met in 1995 when both were prison rights activists.

Elton was convicted in 1977 of second-degree murder after the fatal stabbing of a fellow inmate at Matsqui. He was granted full parole in 1986.

Turcan, then known by the surname Blondell, was convicted in 1987 of second-degree murder for strangling 21-year-old Mya Kulchyski in Coquitlam a year earlier.

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twitter.com/kbolan

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Hey Real Scoop readers, I have been neglecting you for a few days. Sorry about that! I was consumed with election coverage south of the border. But time to focus on my own work again!

So I am just putting up a few stories that I wrote over the last week and didn’t post on the Real Scoop.

I first wrote about Bryce McDonald when he was charged in 2014 on a series of firearms counts.

He was convicted last April on a dozen charges. That ruling was just released last month and I reported it at the time.

Now McDonald has been sentenced.

Here’s my story:

Courtenay man jailed after ‘fabrication’ of story about 30 missing guns

A Courtenay man who has refused to reveal the location of at least 30 missing firearms was sentenced to more than three years in prison on Monday for a dozen gun-related convictions.

B.C. Supreme Court Justice Robin Baird handed Bryce Cameron McDonald 40 months in jail and a lifetime ban on possessing firearms.

In April, Baird convicted McDonald, 34, of 12 charges, including careless storage of a firearm, possession of a loaded restricted firearm and storing a firearm contrary to regulations – related to a loaded Boberg handgun found in a dresser drawer at his house when anti-gang police raided it three years ago.

McDonald was also convicted of seven counts of storing other firearms in locations that weren’t authorized by his licence, as well as a single count each of possessing brass knuckles and possessing cocaine.

The B.C. Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit executed search warrants at McDonald’s Courtenay house and a storage locker he rented, in December 2013.

Officers found just 19 firearms, both restricted and unrestricted, even though records showed McDonald had purchased 49 restricted guns since getting his licence in the fall of 2009. That meant at least 30 others were missing.

Police began investigating the Vancouver Island man after the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team was tipped off to the location of a bag of guns near 76th Avenue in Surrey on Sept. 17, 2013.

 “The RCMP located this bag and one of the three firearms inside it was traced back to Mr. McDonald. He had purchased it, the police discovered, sometime in 2011,” Baird noted in his earlier ruling.

“Gun crime is extremely serious and deeply affects people’s feeling of personal and community safety. People who commit gun crimes must know that it is completely unacceptable and that they will be held accountable,” Houghton said.

Baird earlier expressed concern over what might have happened to the guns that vanished.

“Frankly, I shudder to think where these firearms are likely to have gone,” Baird said.

Bryce McDonald

He said McDonald’s explanation about the missing guns was “strange and probably sinister.” 

Baird rejected McDonald’s testimony at trial that police must have either taken the additional guns during their search and failed to document them or that they left his door unlocked and someone else stole the guns after the police left.

“Mr. McDonald alone knows what really happened to them,” Baird said. “Mr. McDonald’s evidence on this subject is an after-the-fact fabrication.”

At the time of McDonald’s arrest, police said he had affiliations to at least one organized crime group. On Facebook, some of his friends say they are members of the Hells Angels and are wearing colours of the biker gang.

Bryce is facing some new charges laid in recent months, including breaching his bail conditions over the summer, two counts of possession of a controlled substance and one count of theft under $5,000. He is due in court on those charges on Nov. 10.

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

Earlier this week, I noticed a ruling on the Appeal Court website in the case of Thomas Elton – a man charged back in 2009 with killing his wife.

I remember covering the original case. Both Elton and his wife, Brenda Turcan (who we referred to at the time as Brenda Blondell) had both been convicted of murder and had met when both were prisoner rights’ activists. That in itself was pretty unique. Then Elton was accused of killing again – this time the woman people said was the love of his life.

Neighbours told me right after the murder that Turcan was terminally ill and that they thought this might have been a “mercy killing.” In fact, that ended up being Elton’s defence on a second-degree murder charge.

But he was convicted anyway. He was sentenced to life without parole for 25 years given that it was his second murder conviction.

He appealed and lost. 

I also learned this week that he was found dead in prison a year ago, yet the appeal still went ahead in March, with the ruling on Tuesday.

I tried to find out why a dead man’s appeal would go ahead anyway. I didn’t get a final answer as his lawyer didn’t respond to be query. But a Crown spokesman said the prosecution was not aware he had died.

Here’s my story:

Appeal court rejects killer’s argument that he aided wife’s suicide

It wasn’t a traditional love story.

When Thomas Elton and Brenda Turcan married in 2005, both were convicted killers.

Then Elton strangled and stabbed his chronically ill wife in June 2009.

He was later convicted of second-degree murder, despite explaining that the couple had a suicide pact and that he only killed Turcan because he thought she had overdosed in an attempt to die that day.

In 2012, a trial judge accepted that Elton believed he was committing a mercy killing, but ruled he was still guilty of murder because the evidence showed his wife died by his hand and had not overdosed.

In 2014, Elton was sentenced to life in prison with no parole eligibility for 25 years.

He appealed the verdict, arguing that the trial judge erred by not fully considering whether “he aided the victim’s suicide or committed her murder.”

On Wednesday, the B.C. Court of Appeal dismissed Elton’s appeal and upheld his murder conviction.

Appeal Court Justice Gail Dickson said in her written reasons that the trial judge properly concluded “that even if Mr. Elton honestly believed Ms. Turcan was attempting suicide, by strangling and stabbing her he did not assist her suicide; he killed her by his own overt acts, intending to cause her death.”

“The judge concluded this amounts to murder. I see no error in his conclusion,” Dickson wrote.

Appeal Court Justices Peter Lowry and Elizabeth Bennett agreed.

Elton’s appeal was heard last March, four months after the two-time killer was found dead in his jail cell at Matsqui Institution in Abbotsford. The B.C. Coroners Service is still investigating his death, official Barb McLintock said Wednesday. 

Thomas Elton strangled and stabbed his chronically ill wife Brenda Turcan in June 2009.

Dickson noted in her ruling that Elton and Turcan “were a loving and devoted couple” and that Turcan’s health had deteriorated “significantly” after a 2004 heart attack.

Elton testified at his trial that on the morning of June 22, 2009, Turcan had told him, “Well it’s time. It’s over. I’ve already gone. I’ve had enough.”

“He said these were code words that it was time for the agreed upon double-suicide,” Dickson said.

Elton took the dog for a walk and returned to find Turcan “sleeping or unconscious with a bottle of Valium in her hand.”

“In response to finding her in this state, he said, he fed the dog eight pills and took 23 pills himself, intending to fulfill the suicide pact. Wanting to ensure that Ms. Turcan’s wishes were carried out, he also strangled her and stabbed her with a bayonet,” the ruling said.

Elton called his dad to explain what he’d done and called a friend to pick up the dog. When paramedics arrived at the scene, Elton declined medical assistance.

A forensic pathologist testified that Turcan died from strangulation and had only taken “therapeutic levels of medication.”

“She had not taken a drug overdose,” Dickson wrote. “The judge found that Ms. Turcan was not attempting to commit suicide.”

The couple first met in 1995 when both were prison rights activists.

Elton was convicted in 1977 of second-degree murder after the fatal stabbing of a fellow inmate at Matsqui. He was granted full parole in 1986.

Turcan, then known by the surname Blondell, was convicted in 1987 of second-degree murder for strangling 21-year-old Mya Kulchyski in Coquitlam a year earlier.

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

And he lost 

Growing up in East Vancouver, Danny “Mouse” Williamson was taught to be tough and stand up for himself, even against the police.

“We didn’t trust the police. My dad had been arrested for different things. He was always a fighter and a drinker and he always taught me not to take shit off anybody,” Williamson recalled this week.

Now 63 and living in Grand Forks, Williamson is one of the original members of the Clark Park Gang that battled both police and rivals from other Vancouver “park” gangs in the 1960s and 1970s.

“We were young, rambunctious and thought we were undefeatable. And that included the police. … We either ran like hell and got away from them or we stood our ground and beat them fair and square.”

The story of the infamous Clark Park Gang has been told by Vancouver writer and historian Aaron Chapman in his new book The Last Gang in Town.

Chapman interviewed Williamson and other former Clark Parkers and pored over news archives, police records, court transcripts and other documents in researching his latest book.

He also interviewed retired Vancouver police officers charged with disrupting the gang, which could mobilize hundreds on short order for a street brawl.

Chapman said in an interview that he’s been interested in the history of the Clark Park Gang since the 1980s.

“As somebody who was born and raised here, I’d thought about it in high school since the night I was at a house party where people who were apparently the Clark Park Gang showed up and trashed the place and beat up a bunch of people and I escaped out a back window,” Chapman said.

In fact, the party crashers were just using the name of the mythical gang, which had largely dispersed by the late 1970s.

“It was one of the great unknown stories of Vancouver — the Clark Park gang and that name and who they were was such a myth for so long,” Chapman said. “It’s one of those old sort of secret stories of Vancouver.”

They were disorganized crime, which made it all the more volatile. – author Aaron Chapman

What he learned was that the Clark Parkers emerged from Vancouver’s east side when the city was very different than today.

“It all hearkens back to when Van was a tougher, scrappier place.”

Other gangs named after their neighbourhood parks — Riley, Dunbar, Bobolink — were no match for the tougher, bigger group of teens and young men based in the park between 14th and 15th Avenues and running from Commercial Drive almost to Clark Drive.

Chapman takes his readers through some critical events that put the Clark Park Gang on police radar.

At a Vancouver telethon in February 1970, Clark Parkers fought with Riley Park gang members live on TV. They were also part of a huge brawl at the Seafest, which was broken up by mounted police. When a large Gastown protest erupted into a riot in August 1971, the Clark Park Gang was front and centre.

A couple of months later, Williamson and others from his gang attended a concert at the Pacific Coliseum that was supposed to feature Chuck Berry. Things turned ugly when Berry decided not to take the stage. Audience members began throwing bottles of booze smuggled in.

Williamson was one of several guys who ended up on the stage as objects flew.

“We threw a bunch of that equipment off of the stage into the crowd — the microphones and I think even a guitar went off. The piano went down the back stairs. It was quite the thing that erupted,” he said. “We didn’t start it. The whole crowd started it really.”

In June 1972, as the Rolling Stones played the Coliseum, Williamson and some of his gang-mates joined hundreds of youth outside the venue attempting to get in at the last minute.

Riot police were on hand as tensions mounted. Soon, rocks, bottles and even Molotov cocktails were hurtling threw the air. Several police and rioters were injured.

Williamson said that police always pointed the finger at the Clark Park Gang.

“They blamed us for everything,” he said.

Following the Stones riot, the VPD formed a special undercover task force that the Clark Parkers dubbed the Heavy Squad or H Squad.

Gang members told Chapman that they were beaten and harassed by the H-Squad.

Williamson said he was one of those victimized.

“Then they started using dirty tactics,” Williamson said. “They couldn’t beat us fair and square so they were going to throw the book away.”

The H-Squad was disbanded a few months later after claiming to have broken up the gang.

Williamson was in and out of prison for a few years.

But he later moved out of the Lower Mainland, reconnected with his Métis heritage and began doing community work.

“I go into the schools and teach kids how to carve sandstone,” he said this week. “I was quite the hell raiser. Maybe this is my way of giving back.”

Chapman said the Clark Park gang was much different than gangsters today who are entrenched in the drug trade and armed with guns, not “bats or bike chains.”

“These guys weren’t organized crime. They were disorganized crime, which made it all the more volatile.”

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

Aaron Chapman’s latest book, The Last Gang in Town, was launched at the Biltmore a couple of weeks back. I didn’t make it to the launch, but did manage to catch up with Aaron last week and interview him about the book.

I also enjoyed reading about the years when the Clark Park Gang was the most infamous of Vancouver’s “park gangs.” They were always brawling with police and others. They became the focus of a special police task force that the gang dubbed the H-squad.

Aaron also put me in touch with former gang member Danny “Mouse” Williamson who told me that he always figured their lives in the 60s and 70s would make a good book.  

“We’ve always been talking about doing it because people just wouldn’t believe the stuff that happened. I see stuff in the movies and say `hey we had stuff like that happen but it was even better than the movies.'”

Here’s my story:

In Vancouver’s scrappy days, the Clark Park Gang ruled East Van

Growing up in East Vancouver, Danny “Mouse” Williamson was taught to be tough and stand up for himself, even against the police.

“We didn’t trust the police. My dad had been arrested for different things. He was always a fighter and a drinker and he always taught me not to take shit off anybody,” Williamson recalled last week.

Now 63 and living in Grand Forks, Williamson is one of the original members of the Clark Park Gang that battled both police and rivals from other Vancouver “park” gangs in the 1960s and 1970s.

“We were young, rambunctious and thought we were undefeatable. And that included the police. … We either ran like hell and got away from them or we stood our ground and beat them fair and square.”

The story of the infamous Clark Park Gang has been told by Vancouver writer and historian Aaron Chapman in his new book The Last Gang in Town.

Chapman interviewed Williamson and other former Clark Parkers and pored over news archives, police records, court transcripts and other documents in researching his latest book.

He also interviewed retired Vancouver police officers charged with disrupting the gang, which could mobilize hundreds on short order for a street brawl.

Chapman said in an interview that he’s been interested in the history of the Clark Park Gang since the 1980s.

“As somebody who was born and raised here, I’d thought about it in high school since the night I was at a house party where people who were apparently the Clark Park Gang showed up and trashed the place and beat up a bunch of people and I escaped out a back window,” Chapman said.

In fact, the party crashers were just using the name of the mythical gang, which had largely dispersed by the late 1970s.

“It was one of the great unknown stories of Vancouver — the Clark Park gang and that name and who they were was such a myth for so long,” Chapman said. “It’s one of those old sort of secret stories of Vancouver.”

What he learned was that the Clark Parkers emerged from Vancouver’s east side when the city was very different than today.

“It all hearkens back to when Van was a tougher, scrappier place.”

Other gangs named after their neighbourhood parks — Riley, Dunbar, Bobolink — were no match for the tougher, bigger group of teens and young men based in the park between 14th and 15th Avenues and running from Commercial Drive almost to Clark Drive.

Chapman takes his readers through some critical events that put the Clark Park Gang on police radar.

At a Vancouver telethon in February 1970, Clark Parkers fought with Riley Park gang members live on TV. They were also part of a huge brawl at the Seafest, which was broken up by mounted police. When a large Gastown protest erupted into a riot in August 1971, the Clark Park Gang was front and centre.

A couple of months later, Williamson and others from his gang attended a concert at the Pacific Coliseum that was supposed to feature Chuck Berry. Things turned ugly when Berry decided not to take the stage. Audience members began throwing bottles of booze smuggled in.

Williamson was one of several guys who ended up on the stage as objects flew.

“We threw a bunch of that equipment off of the stage into the crowd — the microphones and I think even a guitar went off. The piano went down the back stairs. It was quite the thing that erupted,” he said. “We didn’t start it. The whole crowd started it really.”

In June 1972, as the Rolling Stones played the Coliseum, Williamson and some of his gang-mates joined hundreds of youth outside the venue attempting to get in at the last minute.

Riot police were on hand as tensions mounted. Soon, rocks, bottles and even Molotov cocktails were hurtling threw the air. Several police and rioters were injured.

Williamson said that police always pointed the finger at the Clark Park Gang.

“They blamed us for everything,” he said.

Following the Stones riot, the VPD formed a special undercover task force that the Clark Parkers dubbed the Heavy Squad or H Squad.

Gang members told Chapman that they were beaten and harassed by the H-Squad.

Williamson said he was one of those victimized.

“Then they started using dirty tactics,” Williamson said. “They couldn’t beat us fair and square so they were going to throw the book away.”

The H-Squad was disbanded a few months later after claiming to have broken up the gang.

Williamson was in and out of prison for a few years.

But he later moved out of the Lower Mainland, reconnected with his Métis heritage and began doing community work.

“I go into the schools and teach kids how to carve sandstone,” he said this week. “I was quite the hell raiser. Maybe this is my way of giving back.”

Chapman said the Clark Park gang was much different than gangsters today who are entrenched in the drug trade and armed with guns, not “bats or bike chains.”

“These guys weren’t organized crime. They were disorganized crime, which made it all the more volatile.”

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

Vancouver Police have announced charges against a 27-year-old man in connection with a shooting Monday that sent a woman to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

Andrew Oscar Owusu has been charged with discharging a firearm with intent to wound, aggravated assault and possession of a loaded firearm. 

 The VPD said the shooting happened just before 5 a.m.  near Abbott and West Pender Street.

Officers who attended found the 29-year-old victim in the back seat of a taxi suffering from a gunshot wound. She was transported to hospital by ambulance and is expected to make a full recovery.

Two people were originally taken into custody hours after the shooting, and one has since been released without charges.

Owusu was fined $500 in September 2015 for allowing his dog to bite or attack someone in Vancouver.

He was also convicted along with two others in June 2013 for an incident at the house of a Merritt drug dealer in October 2010, according to a report in The Kamloops News. The dealer testified that Owusu, Fred Agbefe and Agazzy Haddish had tried to tie her up during a home invasion-style attack.

 He testified in his own defence and said he was a “recording artist” from Toronto who had been living on the Lower Mainland.

Vancouver Police want anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call VPD Major Crime investigators at 604-717-2541.

An alleged United Nations Gang killer was struck by Mexican police and had a bag thrown over his head during his August 2014 arrest in Guadalajara, B.C. Supreme Court heard Wednesday.

Lawyer Tony Paisana, representing accused killer Cory Vallee, asked a lead investigator in the murder case why Vallee agreed to return to Canada within 12 hours of his arrest on Aug. 13, 2014.

“Did that give you cause for concern that he might be being mistreated in Mexico?” Paisana asked RCMP Sgt. Wayne Laviolette.  

Laviolette said he presumed that Vallee preferred to be in custody in Canada rather than stay in an overcrowded Mexican jail.

“You are aware that Mr. Vallee told basically everyone he came in contact with that day that he had a bag thrown over his head and that he was hit by police?” Paisana asked.

Laviolette said he knew Vallee had made that allegation.

“In this particular case, I think Mr. Vallee was treated — from my understanding — appropriately and with extra care,” the Mountie told Justice Janice Dillon.

Vallee is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy in relation to a bloody gang war that raged in 2008 and 2009 between the UN Gang and the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpions associates.  

Cory Vallee.

He is alleged to have murdered Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009, in a Langley parking lot after hunting the UN enemies for several months.

The trial began Wednesday with a defence application to exclude conversations Vallee had with an undercover cop placed in a jail cell with him after he was flown back to Canada on Aug. 17, 2014.

Paisana alleges that Vallee’s Charter rights were violated by the “cell plant operation.”

Murder and conspiracy charges were laid against Vallee and several other UN Gang members and associates in January 2011.

But Vallee’s whereabouts were unknown at the time, so police here got Interpol to issue a “Red Notice” for his arrest, Crown prosecutor David Jardine said Wednesday.

Jardine said when Vallee was arrested in Mexico, two RCMP officers flew down to escort him home.

A decision had already been made to use undercover officers posing as two men arrested after returning from the U.S. with $175,000 in undeclared cash.

The three were transported from the airport to the Richmond RCMP detachment, where one of the undercover cops was placed in a cell with Vallee, Jardine said.

Laviolette told Dillon he has worked on the UN murder file since April 2009 and was called in from vacation when Vallee was arrested in Mexico.

He said he spoke to an American agent with Homeland Security who was on the ground in Guadalajara to confirm Vallee’s identity.

Vallee was arrested with a California driver’s licence and a U.S. social security card.

The U.S. agent sent an e-mail with a photo of Vallee’s face and his distinctive back tattoo to Laviolette.

A fingerprint check confirmed the man arrested in Mexico was in fact the accused Canadian killer.

Laviolette agreed with Paisana that he was the “quarterback” tasked with co-ordinating police plans for Vallee upon his return to Canada.

He contacted the “UC shop” to arrange for an undercover team, Laviolette said.

As well, other officers were tasked with interviewing Vallee, whom Laviolette said was offered the chance to speak to a lawyer.

The voir dire – or trial within a trial – on the admissibility of Vallee’s statements to the undercover police is expected to last several more days.

kbolan@postmedia.com

Blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

CLICK HERE to report a typo.

Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com.

Related

• UN gangster pleads guilty to fatal Burnaby hit and run
• Judge freezes Hell Angels Vancouver and Kelowna clubhouses pending civil trial
• Metro Vancouver gangs expanding their web across B.C., police say
• Suspects in Surrey gunplay are young yet have long history with police, courts

It’s been more than two years since accused killer Cory Vallee was arrested in Mexico, charged with two murders in B.C. in 2008 and 2009.

He is alleged to have been a hitman for the United Nations gang at the height of its war with the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpion gang-mates.

Vallee was originally charged on Jan. 24, 2011 with two murders – that of Jonathan Barber on May 9, 2008 and then Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009. 

He’s now going to trial only for the LeClair murder, as well as on the conspiracy to commit murder count that has already led to convictions against other UN gangsters.

On Monday, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon imposed a sweeping ban on the names and other information about four key Crown witnesses.

On Wednesday, the trial got underway with a defence application to throw out statements Vallee made to an undercover cop planted in his cell after he was brought back to Canada on Aug. 17, 2014.

Vallee looks a lot heavier than when he was arrested. He wore a dress shirt and dark pants and turned to look at people in the gallery several times. We won’t know what’s in the statement he made to the cop until a tape is played, probably on Monday.

Here’s my story:

B.C. trial of alleged UN Gang killer kicks off with Mexican move

An alleged United Nations Gang killer was struck by Mexican police and had a bag thrown over his head during his August 2014 arrest in Guadalajara, B.C. Supreme Court heard Wednesday.

Lawyer Tony Paisana, representing accused killer Cory Vallee, asked a lead investigator in the murder case why Vallee agreed to return to Canada within 12 hours of his arrest on Aug. 13, 2014.

“Did that give you cause for concern that be might be being mistreated in Mexico?” Paisana asked RCMP Sgt. Wayne Laviolette.  

Laviolette said he presumed that Vallee preferred to be in custody in Canada rather than stay in an overcrowded Mexican jail.

“You are aware that Mr. Vallee told basically everyone he came in contact with that day that he had a bag thrown over his head and that he was hit by police?” Paisana asked.

Laviolette said he knew that Vallee had made that allegation.

“In this particular case, I think Mr. Vallee was treated — from my understanding — appropriately and with extra care,” the Mountie told Justice Janice Dillon.

Vallee is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy in relation to a bloody gang war that raged in 2008 and 2009 between the UN Gang and the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpions associates.  

He is alleged to have murdered Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009 in a Langley parking lot after hunting UN enemies for several months.

The trial began Wednesday with a defence application to exclude conversations Vallee had with an undercover cop placed in a jail cell with him after he was flown back to Canada on Aug. 17, 2014.

Paisana alleges that Vallee’s Charter rights were violated by the “cell plant operation.”

Murder and conspiracy charges were laid against Vallee and several other UN Gang members and associates in January 2011.

But Vallee’s whereabouts were unknown at the time, so police here got Interpol to issue a “Red Notice” for his arrest, Crown prosecutor David Jardine said Wednesday.

Jardine said when Vallee was arrested in Mexico, two RCMP officers flew down to escort him home.

A decision had already been made to use undercover officers posing as two men arrested after returning from the U.S. with $175,000 in undeclared cash.

The three were transported from the airport to the Richmond RCMP detachment, where one of the undercover cops was placed in a cell with Vallee, Jardine said.

Laviolette told Dillon he has worked on the UN murder file since April 2009 and was called in from vacation when Vallee was arrested in Mexico. 

He said he spoke to an American agent with Homeland Security who was on the ground in Guadalajara to confirm Vallee’s identity.

Vallee was arrested with a California driver’s licence and a social security card.

The U.S. agent sent an e-mail with a photo of Vallee’s face and his distinctive back tattoo to Laviolette.

A fingerprint check confirmed the man arrested in Mexico was in fact the accused Canadian killer.

Laviolette agreed with Paisana that he was the “quarterback” tasked with co-ordinating police plans for Vallee upon his return to Canada.

He contacted the “UC shop” to arrange for an undercover team, Laviolette said.

As well, other officers were tasked with interviewing Vallee, whom Laviolette said was offered the chance to speak to a lawyer.

The voir dire – or trial within a trial – on the admissibility of Vallee’s statements to the undercover police, is expected to last several more days.

kbolan@postmedia.com

Blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

Twitter.com/kbolan

He came to Canada from India as a 15-year-old in 1998. He is married and works in the Lower Mainland.

But Hardeep Singh Brar is facing possible deportation to the country of his birth because of a U.S. drug conspiracy conviction.

The Federal Court of Canada has rejected Brar’s bid to avoid a deportation hearing on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

Brar, who had permanent residence status in Canada, ran into trouble after agreeing to drive a rental car into Washington state in April 2009 to be used by drug couriers.

He travelled to an Econolodge hotel in Bellingham, where he met a man who was holding 15 kilograms of cocaine to be transported back to Canada by others.

U.S. court documents say the man in the motel was co-operating with police who were hiding in the bathroom as Brar was told to “check the drugs out and make sure they were all there.”

The B.C. man was arrested and later pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine. In January 2010, he was sentenced to two years in jail.

Federal Court Judge Anne MacTavish noted in her ruling that “Brar expressed remorse for his actions, and he co-operated with U.S. law enforcement during the investigation and prosecution processes.”

He served 21 months of his U.S. sentence, then was deported to India.

“He returned to Canada a month later, admitting to his criminal conviction when he was interviewed by a Canada Border Services Agency officer at the Vancouver International Airport,” said MacTavish’s ruling, released on Thursday.

The CBSA “referred Mr. Brar to an admissibility hearing to determine whether he was inadmissible to Canada for serious criminality, as well as organized criminality and involvement in transnational crime.”

Brar and his lawyer argued that he should not have to appear at an admissibility hearing just because of his U.S. conviction. 

“Among other things, Mr. Brar submitted that even though his offence was serious, it had not involved violence or firearms,” MacTavish said. “Several years had passed since his one criminal offence, and he had not engaged in any further criminal activity.”

She also referred to a psychologist’s report provided by Brar that “indicated that he posed a low risk of re-offending.”

“Mr. Brar also noted that he had come to Canada as a child, that he had lived in Canada for many years, and that he had minimal ties to India. All of Mr. Brar’s immediate family, including his wife, were in Canada, and he was gainfully employed.”

MacTavish rejected Brar’s arguments, saying the CBSA’s decision to send Brar to a hearing before the Immigration and Refugee Board “was entirely reasonable.”

“Consequently, his application for judicial review will be dismissed,” she said.

The IRB has not yet set a date for Brar’s hearing.

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

Another B.C. man is facing possible deportation due to a U.S. drug conspiracy conviction. Hardeep Brar got embroiled in the cross-border case back in 2009. He has no other criminal record. But because he didn’t have his Canadian citizenship, he has now been referred for an admissibility hearing which could lead to his deportation to India.

I’ve covered a a few of these cases lately. Jimi Sandhu, who came as a small child, was ordered deported last December and lost his appeal in February.  UN gangster Barzan Tilli-Choli is still here but has also been ordered deported. Adam Lam was also ordered deported earlier this year. I hope anti-gang programs are highlighting these cases to youth at risk for getting involved in the drug trade who may not be citizens. 

Here’s my story:

Metro man faces deportation hearing after U.S. drug conviction

He came to Canada from India as a 15-year-old in 1998. He is married and works in the Lower Mainland.

But Hardeep Singh Brar is facing possible deportation to the country of his birth because of a U.S. drug conspiracy conviction.

The Federal Court of Canada has rejected Brar’s bid to avoid a deportation hearing on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

Brar, who had permanent residence status in Canada, ran into trouble after agreeing to drive a rental car into Washington state in April 2009 to be used by drug couriers.

He travelled to an Econolodge hotel in Bellingham, where he met a man who was holding 15 kilograms of cocaine to be transported back to Canada by others.

U.S. court documents say the man in the motel was co-operating with police who were hiding in the bathroom as Brar was told to “check the drugs out and make sure they were all there.”

The B.C. man was arrested and later pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine. In January 2010, he was sentenced to two years in jail.

Federal Court Judge Anne MacTavish noted in her ruling that “Brar expressed remorse for his actions, and he co-operated with U.S. law enforcement during the investigation and prosecution processes.”

He served 21 months of his U.S. sentence, then was deported to India.

“He returned to Canada a month later, admitting to his criminal conviction when he was interviewed by a Canada Border Services Agency officer at the Vancouver International Airport,” said MacTavish’s ruling, released on Thursday.

The CBSA “referred Mr. Brar to an admissibility hearing to determine whether he was inadmissible to Canada for serious criminality, as well as organized criminality and involvement in transnational crime.”

Brar and his lawyer argued that he should not have to appear at an admissibility hearing just because of his U.S. conviction. 

“Among other things, Mr. Brar submitted that even though his offence was serious, it had not involved violence or firearms,” MacTavish said. “Several years had passed since his one criminal offence, and he had not engaged in any further criminal activity.”

She also referred to a psychologist’s report provided by Brar that “indicated that he posed a low risk of re-offending.”

“Mr. Brar also noted that he had come to Canada as a child, that he had lived in Canada for many years, and that he had minimal ties to India. All of Mr. Brar’s immediate family, including his wife, were in Canada, and he was gainfully employed.”

MacTavish rejected Brar’s arguments, saying the CBSA’s decision to send Brar to a hearing before the Immigration and Refugee Board “was entirely reasonable.”

“Consequently, his application for judicial review will be dismissed,” she said.

The IRB has not yet set a date for Brar’s hearing.

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

A man who was severely beaten while being held in the Surrey pretrial jail in 2011 has lost a bid to get records about how Red Scorpion gangsters were managed by prison staff before he was attacked.

Allen Douglas Ogonoski is suing the B.C. government for a traumatic brain injury he suffered on Aug. 15, 2011, alleging he “was intentionally assaulted and battered” by a prisoner with connections to the Red Scorpion gang.

His lawyers applied in B.C. Supreme Court to get documents “relating to the management of the Red Scorpion gang within the Surrey Pretrial Services Centre” that were filed when gang leader Jamie Bacon sued the government in 2009 for being held in solitary confinement for several months.

Ogonoski’s legal team also wanted to use transcripts it had obtained in a separate prison beating lawsuit to aid in his case against the government.

But Supreme Court Master Leslie Muir denied both applications in a written ruling released Thursday.

Muir said the issues raised in Bacon’s lawsuit “are quite different from the matters at issue in this action.”

Government affidavits filed in Bacon’s case “deal with why Mr. Bacon was being kept in segregation,” Muir noted. “They made reference to the dangers the police thought he might post to witnesses to the events that led to his charges and to the fact that there was credible intelligence that several ‘hits’ had been ordered on Mr. Bacon.”

Muir said there was a “peripheral reference to the interactions of rival gang members and the need to segregate them from one another, but it is clearly an aside or casual reference in some of the emails that are directed to the first two issues.”

She said the documents in the other prison beating lawsuit, filed by Independent Soldier gangster Jesse Margison, are not relevant to Ogonoski’s case.

Margison suffered permanent brain damage when his head was stomped on at North Fraser Pretrial jail in 2011.

“The cases are factually distinct. The assaults occurred in different institutions. The attack on Mr. Margison is said to have been a targeted hit, as opposed to an incompatibility,” Muir said.

“I am not satisfied that the plaintiff has made out a case for production of the transcripts from the Margison action, and the application is denied.”

Ogonoski’s civil lawsuit is due to go to trial in January.

His suit says the government was negligent by placing him in a jail cell with Red Scorpion associate Christopher Fulmer, who attacked him.

The government was also negligent for transferring Fulmer from a gang unit to Ogonoski’s floor in Surrey pretrial and for “failing to evaluate and screen Mr. Fulmer for a history of violence, muscling and incompatibility with Mr. Ogonoski knowing that Mr. Ogonoski was incompatible with Red Scorpion Gang members and associates,” his suit alleges.

The government denies any liability for what happened.

“The province says that it had in place and complied in all aspects with the applicable policies, procedures, standards and legislation with respect to inmate safety,” Muir noted.

kbolan@postmedia.com
blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop
twitter.com/kbolan

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There are currently several on-going lawsuits against the B.C. government by inmates who have been beaten while in provincial pretrial jails. I wrote a feature about some of these cases which was published a year ago and which was recently honoured with a Webster award.

Now some of these cases are going to trial, like that of plaintiff Allen Ogonoski, who suffered a brain injury five years ago. His lawyers recently lost their bid to get documents filed in Jamie Bacon’s lawsuit against the Surrey Pretrial Centre.

Here’s my story:

Man beaten in jail loses bid to get Jamie Bacon’s records for lawsuit

A man who was severely beaten while being held in the Surrey pretrial jail in 2011 has lost a bid to get records about how Red Scorpion gangsters were managed by prison staff before he was attacked.

Allen Douglas Ogonoski is suing the B.C. government for a traumatic brain injury he suffered on Aug. 15, 2011, alleging he “was intentionally assaulted and battered” by a prisoner with connections to the Red Scorpion gang.

His lawyers applied in B.C. Supreme Court to get documents “relating to the management of the Red Scorpion gang within the Surrey Pretrial Services Centre” that were filed when gang leader Jamie Bacon sued the government in 2009 for being held in solitary confinement for several months.

Ogonoski’s legal team also wanted to use transcripts it had obtained in a separate prison beating lawsuit to aid in his case against the government.

But Supreme Court Master Leslie Muir denied both applications in a written ruling released last Thursday.

Muir said the issues raised in Bacon’s lawsuit “are quite different from the matters at issue in this action.”

Government affidavits filed in Bacon’s case “deal with why Mr. Bacon was being kept in segregation,” Muir noted. “They made reference to the dangers the police thought he might post to witnesses to the events that led to his charges and to the fact that there was credible intelligence that several ‘hits’ had been ordered on Mr. Bacon.”

Muir said there was a “peripheral reference to the interactions of rival gang members and the need to segregate them from one another, but it is clearly an aside or casual reference in some of the emails that are directed to the first two issues.”

She said the documents in the other prison beating lawsuit, filed by Independent Soldier gangster Jesse Margison, are not relevant to Ogonoski’s case.

Margison suffered permanent brain damage when his head was stomped on at North Fraser Pretrial jail in 2011.

“The cases are factually distinct. The assaults occurred in different institutions. The attack on Mr. Margison is said to have been a targeted hit, as opposed to an incompatibility,” Muir said.

“I am not satisfied that the plaintiff has made out a case for production of the transcripts from the Margison action, and the application is denied.”

Ogonoski’s civil lawsuit is due to go to trial in January.

His suit says the government was negligent by placing him in a jail cell with Red Scorpion associate Christopher Fulmer, who attacked him.

The government was also negligent for transferring Fulmer from a gang unit to Ogonoski’s floor in Surrey pretrial and for “failing to evaluate and screen Mr. Fulmer for a history of violence, muscling and incompatibility with Mr. Ogonoski knowing that Mr. Ogonoski was incompatible with Red Scorpion Gang members and associates,” his suit alleges.

The government denies any liability for what happened.

“The province says that it had in place and complied in all aspects with the applicable policies, procedures, standards and legislation with respect to inmate safety,” Muir noted.

kbolan@postmedia.com
blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop
twitter.com/kbolan

The defence application to exclude evidence in the Cory Vallee murder case is continuing in B.C. Supreme Court.

On Monday, we got to hear some of the secretly recorded conversations between Vallee and two undercover cops posing as friends who had been arrested as they returned from a trip to Palm Springs.

Vallee hasn’t made any incriminating statements yet about involvement in the February 2009 murder of Kevin LeClair. But Vallee’s lawyer does want all these conversations excluded from the Crown’s case, arguing that Vallee’s Charter rights were violated by this undercover operation that began when Vallee landed at YVR early on Aug. 17, 2014.

Here’s my latest story:

Bacon associate Kevin LeClair was shot to death on Feb. 6, 2009 in Langley. UN gangster Cory Vallee is charged with first-degree murder.

UN gangster, alleged killer boasted to undercover cops he was B.C.’s most wanted

An alleged United Nations gang killer boasted to two undercover cops that he was B.C.’s most wanted during a secretly recorded conversation in the back of a police vehicle in 2014.

Cory Vallee, who is charged with murder and conspiracy, can be heard on the recording telling the two men that there were so many cops guarding them because he was really high profile.

“Are you f–king America’s Most Wanted or what?” said one of the cops, after Vallee and the two men were placed in the vehicle at Vancouver International Airport to be transported to the Richmond RCMP detachment.

Vallee responded that he was just “B.C.’s” most wanted.

“ I have never seen anything like this before,” said the cop, adding that he expected someone to blow off the door of the police vehicle.

Said Vallee: “It’s for me. I am not joking … Read the newspaper. Google when you get out tomorrow.”

Some of the recordings, made on Aug. 17, 2014 after Vallee was returned to Canada from Mexico, were played in B.C. Supreme Court Monday for Justice Janice Dillon.

Vallee’s lawyer Tony Paisana is challenging the admissibility of the conversations with the cops, who were posing as two friends from Winnipeg arrested after bringing in $175,000 in undeclared cash from the U.S.

The trio was together in the back of the vehicle for several minutes before arriving at their destination. One of the undercover officers was then put in a cell with Vallee.

The identities of both police officers are shielded by a court order.

Vallee admitted that he had been hiding out in Mexico for years.

“I was on the run,” he said, later adding that he believes someone tipped police to his whereabouts.

While living in Guadalajara, he made sure not to have either drugs or firearms in his home, Vallee said.

That way he wouldn’t face any Mexican charges if arrested down there.

Instead he was placed in the custody of immigration officials, he said.

“In Mexico, they had four federales and three custom guys with me all the times,” Vallee said.

One of the cops asked if they were being driven to downtown Vancouver. 

Vallee replied that they were headed to the Richmond RCMP detachment.

“You are like the f—king tour guide of the f—king jails,” one of the cops said.

Replied Vallee: “Hey man, I know the jails.”

The first undercover officer testified Monday that he first learned details of his assignment after arriving at the airport after 11 p.m. on Aug, 16, 2014 before Vallee’s flight from Mexico had landed.

He said details of the fake scenario were provided to him by the officer overseeing the undercover operation and that he read a document containing details of Vallee’s charges.

He and the other officer were placed in handcuffs and led to a holding room at the airport where Vallee was brought about two hours later before all three were placed in the van.

The second undercover officer, who was placed in the cell with Vallee, is expected to testify later this week.

Vallee is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy in relation to a bloody gang war that raged on the Lower Mainland in 2008 and 2009 between the UN Gang and the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpions associates.

He is alleged to have murdered Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009 in a Langley parking lot after hunting the UN’s enemies for several months.

The judge-alone trial is expected to last several months.

kbolan@postmedia.com

Blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

Twitter.com/kbolan

An alleged United Nations gang killer boasted to two undercover cops that he was B.C.’s most wanted during a secretly recorded conversation in the back of a police vehicle in 2014.

Cory Vallee, who is charged with murder and conspiracy, can be heard on the recording telling the two men that there were so many cops guarding them because he was really high profile.

“Are you f–king America’s Most Wanted or what?” said one of the cops, after Vallee and the two men were placed in the vehicle at Vancouver International Airport to be transported to the Richmond RCMP detachment.

Vallee responded that he was just “B.C.’s” most wanted.

“ I have never seen anything like this before,” said the cop, adding that he expected someone to blow off the door of the police vehicle.

Said Vallee: “It’s for me. I am not joking … Read the newspaper. Google when you get out tomorrow.”

Some of the recordings, made on Aug. 17, 2014 after Vallee was returned to Canada from Mexico, were played in B.C. Supreme Court Monday for Justice Janice Dillon.

Vallee’s lawyer Tony Paisana is challenging the admissibility of the conversations with the cops, who were posing as two friends from Winnipeg arrested after bringing in $175,000 in undeclared cash from the U.S.

Cory Vallee.

The trio was together in the back of the vehicle for several minutes before arriving at their destination. One of the undercover officers was then put in a cell with Vallee.

The identities of both police officers are shielded by a court order.

Vallee admitted that he had been hiding out in Mexico for years.

“I was on the run,” he said, later adding that he believes someone tipped police to his whereabouts.

While living in Guadalajara, he made sure not to have either drugs or firearms in his home, Vallee said.

That way he wouldn’t face any Mexican charges if arrested down there.

Instead he was placed in the custody of immigration officials, he said.

“In Mexico, they had four federales and three custom guys with me all the times,” Vallee said.

One of the cops asked if they were being driven to downtown Vancouver. 

Vallee replied that they were headed to the Richmond RCMP detachment.

“You are like the f—king tour guide of the f—king jails,” one of the cops said.

Replied Vallee: “Hey man, I know the jails.”

The first undercover officer testified Monday that he first learned details of his assignment after arriving at the airport after 11 p.m. on Aug, 16, 2014 before Vallee’s flight from Mexico had landed.

He said details of the fake scenario were provided to him by the officer overseeing the undercover operation and that he read a document containing details of Vallee’s charges.

He and the other officer were placed in handcuffs and led to a holding room at the airport where Vallee was brought about two hours later before all three were placed in the van.

The second undercover officer, who was placed in the cell with Vallee, is expected to testify later this week.

Vallee is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy in relation to a bloody gang war that raged on the Lower Mainland in 2008 and 2009 between the UN Gang and the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpions associates.

He is alleged to have murdered Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009 in a Langley parking lot after hunting the UN’s enemies for several months.

The judge-alone trial is expected to last several months.

kbolan@postmedia.com

Blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

Twitter.com/kbolan

Related

• B.C. trial of alleged UN Gang killer kicks off with Mexican move
• UN gangster pleads guilty to fatal Burnaby hit and run
• Judge freezes Hell Angels Vancouver and Kelowna clubhouses pending civil trial

Cory Vallee, a United Nations gang member and accused killer, had a dream he was going to be arrested the day before Mexican police raided his Guadalajara house and took him into custody.

Vallee described the dream to an undercover cop posing as a criminal and planted in the accused killer’s cell at the Richmond RCMP detachment on Aug. 17, 2014.

A secretly recorded video of the conversation was played for B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon at Vallee’s murder trial Tuesday.

“I started packing the day before I got arrested because I had a dream that I got arrested. I swear to God,” Vallee said to the cop, whose identity is shielded by a court order.

“I had a dream that someone was coming in my house and I woke up and thought I saw a shadow and they were trying to arrest me. It was like a nightmare.”

Cory Vallee is on trial for murder.

He said he started packing all his clothes, books and DVDs the same day.

So when police arrived and shouted his name the following day, “everything was in boxes.”

Replied the undercover cop: “That is f—king trippy.”

The jail cell conversation took place about 2:40 a.m. after Vallee had been escorted back to Canada by two other RCMP officers.

Vallee met the undercover cops at Vancouver airport when they were all placed in the same Canada Border Services Agency holding cell early on Aug. 17.

He also said that going to jail won’t be so bad, since he had already cut off all contact with family and friends years earlier when he went on the run.

Vallee said he doesn’t drink or do drugs, has no girlfriend or pets, so won’t feel a sense of loss when he’s locked up.

“I watch TV and I do pushups, so there is nothing to be taken away,” he told the undercover cop as both lay on cement beds in the tiny grey cell with a stainless steel toilet.

Vallee also commented that he didn’t like the photo the police released when an Interpol warrant was issued fore his arrest in 2011.

“My picture is in the papers were really bad,” Vallee said. “If they are going to take pictures of me and shit like that, this time I am going to look better.”

Bacon associate Kevin LeClair was shot to death on Feb. 6, 2009 in Langley. UN gangster Cory Vallee is charged with first-degree murder.

He said he got his teeth fixed, finished his tattoos and lost about 50 pounds while a fugitive for three years in Mexico.

Earlier Tuesday, his lawyer Tony Paisana grilled the other undercover cop involved in the Vallee operation that day.

Paisana suggested the cops were playing to Vallee’s ego by commenting on the number of police doing security for the transport of the trio from the airport to Richmond RCMP.

“You say ‘seriously dude, there is f—king cops at the front and cops at the back,'” Paisana said.

He pointed to another comment by the first cop: “I have been in and out of the f — king can, but I have never seen anything like this before.”

“I suggest to you that this is an effort by you to inflate Mr. Vallee’s ego,” Paisana said.

But the undercover cop said he was simply making natural conversation for the circumstances.

“I wasn’t aware that Mr. Vallee had an ego,” he said. “It was very impressive prisoner transport. It was something out of a movie is where I was going with that comment.”

Jamie Bacon (left) and Kevin LeClair in an undated photo.

The two cops were posing as members of a fictitious crime group from Winnipeg who were arrested after returning from Palm Springs with $175,000 in undeclared cash. 

Paisana is challenging the admissibility of the conversations with the cops, alleging Vallee’s Charter rights were violated.

Vallee is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy in the bloody gang war that raged on the Lower Mainland in 2008 and 2009 between the UN Gang and the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpions associates.

He is alleged to have murdered Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009, in a Langley parking lot, after hunting the UN’s enemies for several months.

The trial continues.

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: Vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

There was some fascinating video shown Tuesday afternoon in B.C. Supreme Court at the murder trial of Cory Vallee. Crown David Jardine began playing the tape of Vallee in a holding cell at Richmond RCMP, along with an undercover cop.

Even though the recording is made at almost 3 a.m. on Aug. 17, 2014, Vallee seems really chatty and offers the cop a lot of details about his life in Mexico where he had been a fugitive for three years.

Justice Janice Dillon only saw the first 40 minutes or so of the tape, which is several hours long. 

Vallee’s lawyer is trying to get it ruled inadmissible.

Here’s my story

Accused UN killer tells undercover cop he dreamed about being arrested

 Cory Vallee, a United Nations gang member and accused killer, had a dream he was going to be arrested the day before Mexican police raided his Guadalajara house and took him into custody.

Vallee described the dream to an undercover cop posing as a criminal and planted in the accused killer’s cell at the Richmond RCMP detachment on Aug. 17, 2014.

A secretly recorded video of the conversation was played for B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon at Vallee’s murder trial Tuesday.

“I started packing the day before I got arrested because I had a dream that I got arrested. I swear to God,” Vallee said to the cop, whose identity is shielded by a court order.

“I had a dream that someone was coming in my house and I woke up and thought I saw a shadow and they were trying to arrest me. It was like a nightmare.”

Cory Vallee.

He said he started packing all his clothes, books and DVDs the same day.

So when police arrived and shouted his name the following day, “everything was in boxes.”

Replied the undercover cop: “That is f—king trippy.”

The jail cell conversation took place about 2:40 a.m. after Vallee had been escorted back to Canada by two other RCMP officers.

Vallee met the undercover cops at Vancouver airport when they were all placed in the same Canada Border Services Agency holding cell early on Aug. 17.

He also said that going to jail won’t be so bad, since he had already cut off all contact with family and friends years earlier when he went on the run.

Vallee said he doesn’t drink or do drugs, has no girlfriend or pets, so won’t feel a sense of loss when he’s locked up.

“I watch TV and I do pushups, so there is nothing to be taken away,” he told the undercover cop as both lay on cement beds in the tiny grey cell with a stainless steel toilet.

Vallee also commented that he didn’t like the photo the police released when an Interpol warrant was issued fore his arrest in 2011.

“My picture is in the papers were really bad,” Vallee said. “If they are going to take pictures of me and shit like that, this time I am going to look better.”

He said he got his teeth fixed, finished his tattoos and lost about 50 pounds while a fugitive for three years in Mexico.

Earlier Tuesday, his lawyer Tony Paisana grilled the other undercover cop involved in the Vallee operation that day.

Paisana suggested the cops were playing to Vallee’s ego by commenting on the number of police doing security for the transport of the trio from the airport to Richmond RCMP.

“You say ‘seriously dude, there is f—king cops at the front and cops at the back,’” Paisana said.

He pointed to another comment by the first cop: “I have been in and out of the f — king can, but I have never seen anything like this before.”

“I suggest to you that this is an effort by you to inflate Mr. Vallee’s ego,” Paisana said.

But the undercover cop said he was simply making natural conversation for the circumstances.

“I wasn’t aware that Mr. Vallee had an ego,” he said. “It was very impressive prisoner transport. It was something out of a movie is where I was going with that comment.”

Paisana is challenging the admissibility of the conversations with the cops, alleging Vallee’s Charter rights were violated.

Vallee is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy in the bloody gang war that raged on the Lower Mainland in 2008 and 2009 between the UN Gang and the Bacon brothers and their Red Scorpions associates.

He is alleged to have murdered Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009, in a Langley parking lot, after hunting the UN’s enemies for several months.

The trial continues.

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: Vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

It was another interesting day at the Vancouver Law Courts watching the video made of Cory Vallee and an undercover cop on Aug. 17, 2014.

Vallee talked incessantly during the conversation, which took place in a holding cell at Richmond RCMP.

He talks sports with the undercover cop – NFL, NHL and soccer. He gives the cop, who’s purporting to be a criminal arrested at Vancouver Airport, advice on how to encrypt his emails and texts to evade police and others.

And he proclaims his innocence on all the charges he’s facing. And he mentions a serious falling out with a co-accused, which has to be a reference to Conor D’Monte. 

Here’s my story:

Accused UN gang killer tells undercover cop he’s innocent

Accused United Nations gang killer Cory Vallee proclaimed to an undercover cop planted in his jail cell in 2014 that he is innocent of all the charges he faces.

The secretly recorded conversation occurred on Aug. 17, 2014 — the same day Vallee was escorted back to Canada from Mexico.

In it, Vallee tells the cop — whose identify is shielded by a publication ban — that he has been charged with two murders, as well as attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

“And on the form it says I’m being investigating for three more,” Vallee explained.

The cop expressed shock: “No f—king way. Seriously?”

“Yep,” Vallee said. “When they read out the charges, I said, ‘That’s it?’”

He said the police officers then “looked at me and they laughed.”

But Vallee also told the cop, who was posing as a criminal arrested at Vancouver Airport, that he was not guilty of any of the charges.

“I am innocent. I didn’t do them,” he said. “I don’t have anything to worry about.”

He said he held a regular job his whole adult life before taking off to Mexico, fearing police were about to arrest him.

“Not many people who get charged with gang stuff have a job and go to work every day,” Vallee said. “I used to work for the city. I used to drive a garbage truck.”

The recorded conversation, which lasts several hours, is being played on video for B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon at Vallee’s murder trial.

Vallee’s lawyer Tony Paisana is challenging the admissibility of the conversation, alleging that his client’s Charter rights were violated.

Vallee told the undercover cop that several others were originally charged with murder in the same case, but made “deals” and the murder count was dropped.

In fact, several other members and associates of the UN gang pleaded guilty to conspiracy to kill the Bacon brothers and were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.

The murder charges some of them initially faced were later stayed.

Vallee was originally charged with the May 2008 murder of stereo installer Jonathan Barber, the attempted murder of Barber’s girlfriend, conspiracy to kill the Bacons, as well as the February 2009 murder of Bacon associate Kevin LeClair.

Both the Barber murder charge and the attempted murder charge were recently dropped by the Crown.

Vallee also hinted to the undercover cop that he had a falling out with UN gang leader Conor D’Monte.

While he didn’t name D’Monte, he referred to having a co-accused who was “on the run too… He’s on the same charges.”

Interpol warrants were issued for both Vallee and D’Monte on the same day.   

Conor D’Monte still wanted for murder

Vallee told the undercover cop that he doesn’t talk to the other accused nor had they fled Canada together.

“You don’t put all your eggs in one basket because if you catch one, you catch the other,” he said. “I have disagreements with him.”

When the cop asked about the dispute, Vallee said it was a “disagreement about money.”

“I need money…he doesn’t want to pay it,” Vallee said, referring to his co-accused as a “f—king asshole.”

Vallee said he left Canada before he was charged in January 2011.

“I used to get followed everywhere by the police so I knew I was going to get charged so I left before the charges,” he said.

Once the charges were laid, he worried about how his family would react to the news.

“When you first hear you are on the front page of the paper charged with a whole bunch of shit, it’s stressful because I wasn’t in the city then,” he told the cop as both lay on cement beds inside the small holding cell at the Richmond RCMP detachment.

“I was pretty depressed because when your family sees that it makes you look like a real f–king asshole.”

Vallee said it was the job of police “to make me look bad.”

“It’s not like they are going to put in, oh, he’s a nice guy, he volunteered for meals on wheels. I didn’t, but they are not going to put that stuff in anyway. It’s just the way it is,” he said. “Their job is to make me look bad. It’s my lawyer’s job to show that I’m not.”

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

Accused United Nations gang killer Cory Vallee told an undercover cop planted in his jail cell in 2014 that he was innocent of all the charges he faced.

The secretly recorded conversation occurred on Aug. 17, 2014 – the same day Vallee was escorted back to Canada from Mexico.

In it, Vallee tells the cop – whose identify is shielded by a publication ban – that he had been charged with two murders, as well as attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

“And on the form it says I’m being investigating for three more,” Vallee explained.

The cop expressed shock: “No f—king way. Seriously?”

“Yep,” Vallee said. “When they read out the charges, I said, ‘That’s it?’”

He said the police officers then “looked at me and they laughed.”

But Vallee also told the cop, who was posing as a criminal arrested at Vancouver airport, that he was not guilty of any of the charges.

“I am innocent. I didn’t do them,” he said. “I don’t have anything to worry about.”

He said he held a regular job his whole adult life before taking off to Mexico, fearing police were about to arrest him.

“Not many people who get charged with gang stuff have a job and go to work every day,” Vallee said. “I used to work for the city. I used to drive a garbage truck.”

The recorded conversation, which lasted several hours, is being played on video for B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon at Vallee’s murder trial.

Vallee’s lawyer Tony Paisana is challenging the admissibility of the conversation, alleging that his client’s Charter rights were violated.

Vallee told the undercover cop that several others were originally charged with murder in the same case, but made “deals” and the murder count was dropped.

In fact, several other members and associates of the UN gang pleaded guilty to conspiracy to kill the Bacon brothers and were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.

The murder charges some of them initially faced were later stayed.

Vallee was originally charged with the May 2008 murder of stereo installer Jonathan Barber, the attempted murder of Barber’s girlfriend, conspiracy to kill the Bacons, as well as the February 2009 murder of Bacon associate Kevin LeClair.

Both the Barber murder charge and the attempted murder charge were recently dropped by the Crown.

Vallee also hinted to the undercover cop that he had a falling out with UN gang leader Conor D’Monte.

While he didn’t name D’Monte, he referred to having a co-accused who was “on the run too … He’s on the same charges.”

Interpol warrants were issued for Vallee and D’Monte on the same day.  

Vallee told the undercover cop that he doesn’t talk to the other accused, nor had they fled Canada together.

“You don’t put all your eggs in one basket because if you catch one, you catch the other,” he said. “I have disagreements with him.”

When the cop asked about the dispute, Vallee said it was a “disagreement about money.”

“I need money … he doesn’t want to pay it,” Vallee said, referring to his co-accused as a “f—king asshole.”

Vallee said he left Canada before he was charged in January 2011.

“I used to get followed everywhere by the police so I knew I was going to get charged so I left before the charges,” he said.

Once the charges were laid, he worried about how his family would react to the news.

“When you first hear you are on the front page of the paper charged with a whole bunch of shit, it’s stressful because I wasn’t in the city then,” he told the cop as both lay on cement beds inside the small holding cell at the Richmond RCMP detachment.

“I was pretty depressed because when your family sees that it makes you look like a real f–king asshole.”

Vallee said it was the job of police “to make me look bad.”

“It’s not like they are going to put in, oh, he’s a nice guy, he volunteered for meals on wheels. I didn’t, but they are not going to put that stuff in anyway. It’s just the way it is,” he said. “Their job is to make me look bad. It’s my lawyer’s job to show that I’m not.”

Related

• B.C. trial of alleged UN Gang killer kicks off with Mexican move
• UN gangster, alleged killer boasted to undercover cops he was B.C.'s most wanted
• Accused UN killer tells undercover cop he dreamed about being arrested

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouversun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

CLICK HERE to report a typo.

Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com.

He couldn’t go to the beach in Puerto Vallarta because there were just too many Canadians who might recognize him.

And he always had to wear long sleeves and pants to hide his tattoos even in the most stifling Mexican heat.

United Nations gang member and accused killer Cory Vallee described how tough his life was on the run, in a secretly recorded conversation with an undercover cop in 2014.

“The way you have to live in order to not get caught — the things you have to do, the things you have to sacrifice in order to live like that … it is a lot of stress man. It is a lot of stress,” Vallee complained.

Crown prosecutor David Jardine wants to use the video in evidence at Vallee’s B.C. Supreme Court trial on charges of first-degree murder and conspiracy.

But Vallee’s lawyer Tony Paisana has applied to have the conversations ruled inadmissible, arguing the undercover cops broke the rules by prompting certain responses from Vallee.

Justice Janice Dillon watched the tape for several hours this week as Vallee’s trial for allegedly slaying a Red Scorpion gang rival continued.

On it, Vallee complained about how he was always looking over his shoulder while hiding out in Guadalajara, Mexico, for three years before his 2014 arrest.

“If I lived near the beach, it would have been a little bit more normal. But if I lived near the beach, I would have to worry about seeing people from Canada,” Vallee told the undercover cop planted in his cell at the Richmond RCMP detachment.

“There are always a lot of people from Vancouver who go to Mexico. All it takes is one person to say ‘hey that’s the guy from the front page of the newspaper before.’”

He kept his circle small, talking only to “normal people” and not those involved in criminality, Vallee said.

When he went out shopping or to a restaurant, he would try to go at different times of the day so as not to attract police attention.

Related

• Accused UN gang killer tells undercover cop he's innocent
• Accused UN killer tells undercover cop he dreamed about being arrested

“But you can only go at so many different times over three years.”

He was arrested on Aug. 14, 2014 at a mall in Guadalajara and flown back to Vancouver in the early morning hours of Aug. 17.

Two undercover officers posing as criminals arrested at the airport were transported with Vallee to the Richmond detachment. One was placed in a cell with him. The identities of both cops are protected by a publication ban.

Vallee said he had to be careful that no one he encountered could see his distinctive tattoos.

“Do you know how shitty it is to wear a jacket in 40-degree heat with a long sleeve shirt?”

Vallee said he had to be disciplined. He stayed away from nightclubs and strip joints.

And he changed his appearance — both physical and by dropping “flashy clothes” from his wardrobe.

“You have to lose all the weight and try to blend in and make it look like you’re a nerdy person.”

His luck ran out when he ran into a former criminal associate about six months after moving away and cutting off ties with the man. He thinks that person tipped off Mexican police after getting arrested for selling drugs.

Vallee is charged with conspiracy to kill the Bacon brothers for several months in 2008 and 2009, and with murdering Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009.

He also told the undercover cop, who pretended to be from Winnipeg, how bloody the Lower Mainland gang war was years earlier, before he fled.

“That was back when like there was a lot of violence,” he said. “It was when there was a big gang war up here.”

He said a lot of younger guys — “kids” — get caught up in gang life without realizing what can happen.

“You can’t hang out with bad people and not expect bad things to happen to you,” he said. “I think now being older, I am more aware of that.”

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouveresun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan

CLICK HERE to report a typo.

Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com.

The contentious secret video-tapaed conversation between accused killer Cory Vallee and an undercover cop in 2014 has now been completely played in B.C. Supreme Court. His lawyer is fighting its admission, while the Crown wants to use the video as part of its evidence in the murder trial.

Justice Janice Dillon hasn’t yet ruled on its admissibility. I have filed a new story on some of the other things Vallee said on the video.

Here it is:

Accused UN gang killer laments life on the run, poor choices of his youth

He couldn’t go to the beach in Puerto Vallarta because there were just too many Canadians who might recognize him.

And he always had to wear long sleeves and pants to hide his tattoos even in the most stifling Mexican heat.

United Nations gang member and accused killer Cory Vallee described how tough his life was on the run, in a secretly recorded conversation with an undercover cop in 2014.

“The way you have to live in order to not get caught — the things you have to do, the things you have to sacrifice in order to live like that … it is a lot of stress man. It is a lot of stress,” Vallee complained.

Crown prosecutor David Jardine wants to use the video in evidence at Vallee’s B.C. Supreme Court trial on charges of first-degree murder and conspiracy.

But Vallee’s lawyer Tony Paisana has applied to have the conversations ruled inadmissible, arguing the undercover cops broke the rules by prompting certain responses from Vallee.

Justice Janice Dillon watched the tape for several hours this week as Vallee’s trial for allegedly slaying a Red Scorpion gang rival continued.

On it, Vallee complained about how he was always looking over his shoulder while hiding out in Guadalajara, Mexico, for three years before his 2014 arrest.

“If I lived near the beach, it would have been a little bit more normal. But if I lived near the beach, I would have to worry about seeing people from Canada,” Vallee told the undercover cop planted in his cell at the Richmond RCMP detachment.

“There are always a lot of people from Vancouver who go to Mexico. All it takes is one person to say ‘hey that’s the guy from the front page of the newspaper before.’”

He kept his circle small, talking only to “normal people” and not those involved in criminality, Vallee said.

When he went out shopping or to a restaurant, he would try to go at different times of the day so as not to attract police attention.

“But you can only go at so many different times over three years.”

He was arrested on Aug. 14, 2014 at a mall in Guadalajara and flown back to Vancouver in the early morning hours of Aug. 17.

Two undercover officers posing as criminals arrested at the airport were transported with Vallee to the Richmond detachment. One was placed in a cell with him. The identities of both cops are protected by a publication ban.

Vallee said he had to be careful that no one he encountered could see his distinctive tattoos.

“Do you know how shitty it is to wear a jacket in 40-degree heat with a long sleeve shirt?”

Vallee said he had to be disciplined. He stayed away from nightclubs and strip joints.

And he changed his appearance — both physical and by dropping “flashy clothes” from his wardrobe.

“You have to lose all the weight and try to blend in and make it look like you’re a nerdy person.”

His luck ran out when he ran into a former criminal associate about six months after moving away and cutting off ties with the man. He thinks that person tipped off Mexican police after getting arrested for selling drugs.

Vallee is charged with conspiracy to kill the Bacon brothers for several months in 2008 and 2009, and with murdering Bacon associate Kevin LeClair on Feb. 6, 2009.

He also told the undercover cop, who pretended to be from Winnipeg, how bloody the Lower Mainland gang war was years earlier, before he fled.

“That was back when like there was a lot of violence,” he said. “It was when there was a big gang war up here.”

He said a lot of younger guys — “kids” — get caught up in gang life without realizing what can happen.

“You can’t hang out with bad people and not expect bad things to happen to you,” he said. “I think now being older, I am more aware of that.”

kbolan@postmedia.com

blog: vancouveresun.com/tag/real-scoop

twitter.com/kbolan