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Interpol's "Project Rockers" Helps Disrupt Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs

NCJ Number
175497
Journal
Police Chief Volume: 65 Issue: 9 Dated: September 1998 Pages: 54-56
Author(s)
B W Smith; J T York; P E Forster; W Bjorngaare
Date Published
1998
Length
3 pages
Annotation
This article describes an Interpol project to monitor outlaw motorcycle gangs.
Abstract
In February 1991 Interpol created Project Rockers to identify motorcycle gangs engaged in continuous criminal activities, their membership, modus operandi and specific criminal activity, and to assist member nations in exchanging and correlating information. The United States and 24 other Interpol member countries currently participate in Project Rockers. As the result of Program initiatives: (1) the president of a Dublin, Ireland, outlaw motorcycle gang who was wanted by Irish authorities for firearms violations was apprehended and deported from the United States; (2) 40 percent of the foreign Hell's Angels members attempting to attend the gang's 50th Anniversary and World Run in California were denied entry into the United States based upon extensive criminal records and felony convictions; (3) the DEA and the Belgian police were able to arrest a Norwegian fugitive facing a 60-year drug sentence in the United States; and (4) 18 members of a cocaine-smuggling and money-laundering conspiracy were arrested; the conspiracy involved the Hell's Angels, La Cosa Nostra and Colombian drug cartel members.