The Crown will contest a request made by a former Hells Angel who killed for the gang during Quebec’s biker war and is now seeking a chance at being released earlier on parole while he serves a life sentence for murder.
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Dayle Fredette, 54, a former member of the Hells Angels’ Quebec City chapter, filed a request in court last year seeking a hearing before a jury where he can ask that his period of parole ineligibility be reduced. On Feb. 16, 2012, he pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree murder and automatically received a life sentence with no chance at full parole until he has served 25 years behind bars.
He pleaded guilty to the murder, as well as a conspiracy charge, days after he signed a contract to become a witness for the prosecution in Operation SharQc, the investigation led by the Sûreté du Québec that produced the roundup of almost every member of the Hells Angels based in Quebec in 2009. The Crown’s theory in the investigation was that almost all of the Hells Angels in the province voted in favour of taking part in a conflict between the gang’s Montreal chapter and several other criminal organizations, including the Rock Machine.
The conflict came to be known as Quebec’s biker gang war, a conflict over drug trafficking turf that stretched from 1994 to 2002 and resulted in more than 160 homicides, including several innocent victims.
When Fredette entered his guilty plea in 2012, he admitted that he was responsible for killing one of the innocent victims. In a case of mistaken identity on April 17, 2000, a man named Dany Beaudin was shot outside a drug rehab centre in St. Frédéric in the Beauce region.
In exchange for his guilty plea and what was expected to be his testimony in a trial involving several Hells Angels, Fredette was immune from prosecution in five other murders in which he played a role. That included the killing of Robert (ToutTout) Léger in Ste. Catherine de Hatley on Aug. 12, 2001. Léger was a leader among members of the Bandidos in Quebec, the gang that the Rock Machine jumped to in the latter part of the war.
Fredette’s contract called for him to be paid $50 a month while he serves the life sentence, plus another $300 annually during his time in prison. He is also expected to be paid $500 a week for the first two years after he is granted parole. The contract also called for his two children to receive monthly payments of $150 until they became adults, plus a maximum of $3,500 toward their post-secondary education.
Fredette ended up not testifying in court as most of the Hells Angels arrested in SharQc pleaded guilty to being part of a general conspiracy to commit murder.
Fredette filed his request for a faint hope hearing last year in May.
On Wednesday during a hearing before Quebec Superior Court Justice Lyne Décarie, prosecutor Audrey Simard said the Crown will challenge Fredette’s request in the first phase in the faint hope process, which requires a written application demonstrating his application has a “reasonable prospect of success” as called for in the Criminal Code.
“I am able to say that there will be a contestation, but I am not able to say whether it will be long and voluminous,” Simard told the judge on Wednesday while explaining why she couldn’t estimate how much court time should be set aside for the challenge.
Décarie agreed to set Feb. 5 as the next date in the case, and the judge said she expects to have an estimate then.