Tony Thompson - Outlaws: Inside the Violent World of Biker Gangs

Tony Thompson is the bestselling author of Gangland Britain and Gangs , and is widely regarded as one of Britains top true-crime writers. He has twice been nominated for the prestigious Crime Writers Association Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction, winning the coveted title in 2001 for his book The Infiltrators . He is the former crime correspondent for the Observer and appears regularly on both television and radio as an expert on matters of crime.

This is a true story. However, in order to protect sources, many of who remain active members of the one percenter world, some names and identifying details have been changed.

God Forgives, Outlaws Dont

A one percenter is the one of a hundred of us who has given up on society and the politicians one-way law. This is why we look repulsive. We are saying we dont want to be like you or look like you, so stay out of our face .

Look at your brother standing next to you and ask yourself if you would give him half of what you have in your pocket or half of what you have to eat. If a citizen hits your brother will you be on him without asking him why? There is no why. Your brother isnt always right but he is always your brother! Its one in all in. If you dont think this way then walk away because you are a citizen and dont belong with us .

We are Outlaws and members will follow the Outlaws way or get out. All members are your brothers and your family. You will not steal your brothers possessions, money, woman, class or his humour. If you do, your brother will do you .

In early April 2009, Daniel Snake Dog Boone broke the code of silence he had honoured since his late teens and agreed to talk to me about his life in an outlaw motorcycle club.

To most people, such clubs are nothing more than an anachronistic throwback to the sixties, populated by paunchy, ageing men with cottony beards and grungy leather jackets, who love to ride their motorcycles and enjoy a good party. The code of silence says different, and members are left in little doubt about the penalties for breaching it. Three can keep a secret if two are dead, is a common saying among the Hells Angels, while their rivals, the Outlaws, simply state: Snitches are a dying breed.

Eager to keep the general public in the dark about what really goes on, the major international clubs the Angels, the Outlaws and the Bandidos spend an extraordinary amount of time and energy cultivating a positive public image. They deliver toys to children at Christmas, raise money for worthy charities and complain that the police endlessly persecute them, simply because of their nonconformist lifestyle. Such harassment is, they insist, wholly undeserved.

Boone knew better. In the course of twenty-three years, he had seen the small back patch club he joined in Leamington Spa at the age of nineteen evolve into something utterly unrecognisable. Slowly but surely, his club turned into a gang becoming part of an international biker brand steeped in criminality, that put him on the front line of a vicious global conflict that has cost hundreds of lives in dozens of countries.

I had written about motorcycle clubs many times over the years and had always considered myself something of an expert. As Boone began to relate his story, it struck me that, in reality, I knew almost nothing. The sheer scale of his activities, the high level of complexity and rigid hierarchy of the networks involved, the depths of depravity and the backdrop of extraordinary violence around which his life revolved took my breath away.

I knew the bikers had started out as idealistic rebels, gotten involved in low-level drug dealing and prostitution and then expanded into mainstream criminality. I also knew that the pursuit of profit had ultimately led the clubs to declare war on one another, first in America then with new battlefronts in Canada, Australia, Scandinavia, Germany, Ireland, Spain and Turkey not to mention much of central Europe. One thing I hadnt grasped was just how much those wars had changed everything.

In his early days with the club, Boone had loved to ride his motorcycle purely for the freedom of it, heading off whenever and wherever the mood took him. By the time he came to leave, it was simply too dangerous for him to ride anywhere unless he was part of a much larger group escorted by security cars at the front and rear.

Under orders to remain armed at all times his black 9mm semi-automatic pistol was rarely out of reach Boone increasingly felt as though he were living in a military compound. Even if he was just popping out for cigarettes, he could never leave his fortified clubhouse without checking the CCTV cameras to make sure there was no ambush waiting or that his vehicle hadnt been booby-trapped.

Depending on the alert status issued by the clubs high command, there were times when he was unable to contact his family for days or even weeks at a time. Regardless of the security situation, he was forbidden to speak to them about any of his club activities or duties, all of which had to take preference over family birthdays, anniversaries and other special occasions. Virtually every aspect of Boones life was governed by a code of conduct and a series of rules, the most crucial of which were printed in a compact booklet that commanded as much respect as the Holy Bible . Aside from a few minor variations, every club in the world operates under a similar set of rules.

For a long time, it was a life Boone would not have traded for anything. He snorted his way through a mountain of drugs and sank endless gallons of beer. He indulged in threesomes and foursomes and gangbangs by the score. He was shot, stabbed twice and came under fire more times than he could remember. He evaded numerous car bombs and snipers and samurai sword-wielding assassins and somehow lived to tell the tale.

What I liked most was that, throughout his time with the club, Boone seemed to have an extraordinary knack for getting to the heart of the action. Whether he was inadvertently setting off the Great Nordic Biker War during a visit to Denmark, under siege in Canada in the company of a gang enforcer with multiple murders to his name, visiting the site of Australias most notorious massacre or nearly being shot at point-blank range in a Florida clubhouse after unwittingly insulting the clubs international president, Boone had seen it all.