The six jailed Bandidos hoped the Supreme Court of Canada would let them appeal their eight murder convictions

BY DAN BROWN
April 7, 2016

It was the bloodiest mass murder in Ontario’s modern history, and the horrific crime in London’s backyard was revealed to the world a decade ago today.

April 8, 2006, has gone down in infamy as the day when the bodies of eight bikers were discovered on a lonely dirt road near Shedden. The slayings would collectively come to be known as the Bandidos Massacre.
And at least one person who studies the behaviour of biker-gang members believes it could all be repeated. “It’ll happen again,” Yves Lavigne, a Toronto author who specializes in tales of organized crime, told The Free Press. “I don’t think any biker has learned anything from it.

“It would be laughable if lives weren’t lost.”

Meanwhile, a veteran London lawyer who represented a former police officer charged with eight counts of first-degree murder said the marathon trial at the London courthouse was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

“The trial was like a PhD in criminal law,” Gord Cudmore said.

Eight members of the Bandidos motorcycle club, the “No Surrender Crew” from Toronto, were murdered at Wayne Kellestine’s Dutton-Dunwich farm. Kellestine and his Winnipeg crew had been instructed to “pull the patches” of the Toronto bikers, effectively kicking them out of the club.

All were shot, their bodies found stuffed in abandoned vehicles dumped a few kilometres away from Kellestine’s address.

Thursday morning, one day before the 10-year anniversary of the discovery of the bodies, the Supreme Court of Canada said it would not hear the appeals of three of the six men convicted of killing their fellow bikers, bringing the long legal saga to a close.

What stands out for Lavigne today is how the slaughter was, for lack of a better term, an amateur act: “Bikers are not the smartest people. Or wannabes.”

Lavigne says, if anything, the ranks of criminal biker clubs have become even more watered-down in the last 10 years.

“It’s like the NHL. They expanded too fast and too much,” he said. “Now they’re just recruiting anyone. How can they call themselves a motorcycle club” when some recruits don’t even know how to ride a motorbike? “You don’t romanticize these people,” Lavigne said.

There are not enough quality recruits for all of the gangs that have a presence in Southwestern Ontario. Lavigne includes among that number the Hells Angels, the Outlaws, the Vagabonds and the Para-Dice Riders.

“These guys were all rejects from other gangs,” he said of both the killed and the killers. “These guys were the class dummies.”

“So the lesson in Shedden is: Don’t try to be something you’re not.”

Cudmore, who represented Michael Sandham, a former police officer in Manitoba, said the trial took more than an emotional toll on him.

“I broke my hip about halfway through the trial,” he recalled. “I fell at the cottage, it was a total freak accident and I ended up in surgery.” The injury left him using a walker, then a cane, without the strength even to walk across the courtroom to question witnesses.

When Cudmore heard about the grisly discovery near Shedden, he didn’t know he would come to be involved in the case that followed. “There were eight murders, which made it unusual. There were a lot of lawyers involved, which means lots of disagreements,” he said.

“Every issue that could come up, did come up,” Cudmore said, including questions of evidence admissibility, self-defence and conspiracy.

“It was a fascinating experience. I’m glad I did it. And I’d never do it again.

SLAIN IN THE MASSACRE

George (Pony) Jessome, 52

George (Crash) Kriarakis, 28

John (Boxer) Muscedere, 48

Luis Manny (Chopper) Raposo, 41

Frank (Bam Bam) Salerno, 43

Paul (Big Paulie) Sinopoli, 30

Jamie (Goldberg) Flanz, 37

Michael (Little Mikey) Trotta, 31

THE VERDICTS

Wayne Kellestine, 65, Frank Mather, 41, Brett Gardiner, 30, Marcelo Aravena, 38, Dwight Mushey, 47, Michael Sandham, 45, convicted on Oct. 29, 2009 after seven-month jury trial in London.

Kellestine, Mushey and Sandham each convicted of eight counts of first-degree murder.

Mather and Aravena found guilty of one count of manslaughter and seven counts of first-degree murder.

Gardiner found guilty of two counts of manslaughter and six counts of first-degree murder.