No offence to my current colleagues, but 10 years ago when I was a reporter with the Chilliwack Times, I laughed out loud when I saw a Christmas community story in The Progress.
The headline was simply “Community Christmas dinner for Chilliwack.” The deck (subhead) for the story said “‘Christmas is all about giving,’ said Alexandria Di Battista, owner of Smoking Deals Auto.”
Smoking Deals!? Ha!
“We did pretty good this past year, and we want to give back to the community,” Di Battista said in the story. “Feeding people is filling a basic need.”
In 2013, with the retirement of Robert Freeman, I guess no one at The Progress knew who was behind Smoking Deals. Covering crime and courts as I did, I knew that one of the biggest drug dealers in the Fraser Valley, Clayton Eheler, was behind the used car dealership. He was in the photo with Di Battista along with Tyler McInnes. The three sort of mocking the general public, in hindsight.
This was about 11 months before Eheler was caught processing a mountain of cocaine in an apartment not far from Smoking Deals, a crime for which he is still going through the court process and has just pleaded guilty to.
Did you notorious know Colombian cocaine drug lord and killer Pablo Escobar built schools, helped churches and even spent his own money on affordable housing?
The Mafia in New York City and in Sicily have been known to take care of families struggling to buy groceries.
All this is to say that very, very bad people sometimes do good things. And sometimes, really, really nice people hang around with very bad people who do all kinds of things.
Enter Wayne Williams, the Chilliwack school district’s manager of transportation. Williams is by all accounts a great guy, a nice guy, and riding with his military veteran motorcycle club the Commandos, he is involved with helping former soldiers in many ways.
But he’s also a supporter of the Hells Angels, a notorious biker gang deemed a criminal organization by just about every law enforcement agency, level of government, and many countries around the world. The Angels are international drug traffickers who have committed gruesome murders, kidnappings, extortions, and have a global history of prostitution.
Mr. Williams was photographed on April 8 by a Vancouver Sun photojournalist with two Hells Angels after an annual ride to the location.
READ MORE: Chilliwack school district senior staff member photographed with Hells Angels
Asked about the photo and if it was indeed him, Williams told me it was, and he answered some questions.
School district superintendent Rohan Arul-pragasm told me that he talked to Williams and that he decided to step away from the club “to ensure he can emulate the district’s values.”
Williams also told me over the phone that “I need to respect the school district’s core values and if there is a conflict with that, then I respect that.
“I got nothing to hide. That’s why I didn’t think nothing of it. I’m just a veteran that enjoys supporting our own veterans and I’m just trying to be respectful of anybody. I try and represent myself well and have a good character.”
But what somewhat surprised me after we reported on the story, which was meant to clarify and get ahead of comments spreading on social media about his attendance with the Angels, was the onslaught of support for not only Williams but the Hells Angels, and even anger that anyone would question what anyone does with their spare time.
As if hanging around with Hells Angels is innocuous behaviour.
But what I have learned since is more damning.
The Commandos aren’t just a support club of the Hells Angels, the RCMP’s gang unit, the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit (CFSEU-BC), has listed them as a puppet club of the Angels.
And this is not the first time this has come up with Williams. Some district staff have previously reported there are other pictures floating around showing Williams hanging with the Hells Angels, according to an email from an anonymous source.
“He also has a Hells Angels sticker on his Harley, this would not be allowed if he wasn’t affiliated.”
This is true. I’ve seen a photo from June 2020 showing Williams’s motorcycle, which he rode to work. On it are stickers saying, among other clubs, “Support Your Local Hells Angels Nanaimo.”
This isn’t about motorcycles and weekend hobbies.
As CFSEU-BC spokesperson Staff Sgt. Lindsay Houghton has said, many Hells Angels face criminal charges from conspiracy to kill to cocaine importation so the puppet clubs are useful.
“Often in the support clubs, these are people who some consider quote unquote regular people with regular jobs,” Houghton is quoted as saying in a Vancouver Sun story by Kim Bolan.
“They work in various industries. They work in government. They may have access to information.”
What is shocking to me is the cognitive dissonance from those who vehemently defend the man who oversees getting thousands of children to Chilliwack schools every morning and who hangs out on weekends with gangsters who murder and deal drugs.
What am I missing?
RELATED: Commandos Motorcycle Club steps up to help veterans in Port Alberni
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