The West End Gang is one of Canada's most influential organized crime groups. Active since the early 1900s, their rise to notoriety did not begin until the 1960s when they were known simply as the "Irish gang". Their criminal activities were focused on, but not restricted to, the west side of Montreal. Most of the gang's earnings in the early days were derived from truck hijackings, home invasions, kidnapping, protection racket, drug trafficking, extortion and armed robbery.
The gang, which is dominated by -- but not exclusively limited to -- members of Irish descent, began to move into the drug trade in the 1970s. They began to import hashish and cocaine and developed important contacts in the United States, South America and Europe with some members working out of Florida.
Since that time, the gang has formulated ties to the Montreal Mafia, the Cosa Nostra and the Hells Angels. These three organizations make up the "Consortium" (similar to New York City's "Commission") and, together, the three groups' leaders fix the price of drugs for the wholesale and retail markets. The majority of the drugs smuggled through Montreal are ultimately retailed in the United States, with the small remainder being distributed across Canada.
Police estimate that over a 15 year span from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, the gang trafficked more than 40 tons of cocaine and 300 tons of hashish, with an estimated street value of $150 billion.
Over the years many members have been murdered or convicted of murder, most notably the 1984 assassination of one time mob boss Frank "Dunie" Ryan. Subsequent revenge killings weeks later are believed to be organized by replacement leader Allan "The Weasel" Ross.
Montreal police estimate that the West End Gang currently consists of approximately 125 to 150 members and associates. The group often collaborates with the Montreal Mafia and the Hells Angels in enormous drug shipments and remains one of the most powerful and profitable criminal organizations in the country.
It is now speculated by law enforcement that the gang is now being led by Richard Matticks until Gerald Matticks is released from prison. In 2003 onetime gang associate Peter McAllister wrote a novel called Dexter based on real stories from the gang.
Famous quotes containing the words west and/or gang:
“O native country, repossessed by thee!
For, rather than I’ll to the West return,
I’ll beg of thee first here to have mine urn.
Weak I am grown, and must in short time fall;
Give thou my sacred relics burial.”
—Robert Herrick (1591–1674)
“What lies behind facts like these: that so recently one could not have said Scott was not perfect without earning at least sorrowful disapproval; that a year after the Gang of Four were perfect, they were villains; that in the fifties in the United States a nothing-man called McCarthy was able to intimidate and terrorise sane and sensible people, but that in the sixties young people summoned before similar committees simply laughed.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)