The Notorious Bacon Brothers

by Jerry Langton

  While the Chinese (particularly the Big Circle Boys) and the Hells Angels were undeniably at the top of organized crime in Vancouver, they were hardly the only major operators. In fact, the best known gangsters in Vancouver history before the Bacon Brothers were the leaders of rival multiethnic, but predominantly Indian Canadian, gangs.

  Bhupinder “Bindy” Singh Johal was born in India and moved to Vancouver in the late 1970s when he was still a small child. Even while still very young, he was identified as something of a “problem child” and did not take well to discipline. But, just as with many others like him, Johal's temperament was not something officially reported, teachers had to learn it for themselves. “When he came into Grade 8, it didn't seem like he had any problems,” said Rob Sandhu, who taught him at the same Sir Charles Tupper Secondary School Jim Chu attended. “It seems these kids are not being flagged. But teachers are raising these issues, so why aren't we acting on it?” Johal's character traits grew worse and more dangerous as he grew older, and his sudden bursts of anger and violence earned him a reputation on the streets of Central Vancouver and in the halls of Tupper. On one occasion in 1989, 18-year-old Grade 12 student Johal was called to the school's office. While the vice-principal intended a closed-door discussion on his behavior, Johal took the opportunity to give the man a brutal beating, sending him to a hospital emergency room.

  Caught, Johal did not deny the beating, but in an act that smacked of cold-blooded cynicism, tried to rationalize his behavior by claiming he assaulted the vice-principal in a fit of rage brought on by the discrimination he had endured as a minority (although by no means were people of Indian descent uncommon in his neighborhood or school). Neither the judge nor school board were fooled, and Johal received a 60-day sentence and expulsion from the school.

  After his sentence was completed, Johal moved to nearby Richmond and enrolled in Matthew McNair Secondary School, but was expelled after he was caught smashing the window of a car and charged with possession of a dangerous weapon. Out of school and not prepared for any other work, Johal quickly fell into organized crime.

  As has been true of other immigrant groups like Serbs and Croats, many Indian arrivals brought their biases, rivalries, and bitter feuds over to Canada with them. Particularly divided was the large and generally prosperous Sikh community. A gulf between the hardliners, who supported the establishment of an independent Sikh state, Khalistan, in India's Punjab region (by violence, if necessary), and the moderates, who were more than happy to leave such politics back in India and move ahead as a community in Canada.

  The Sikh community around the world was enraged in June 1984 when Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered the violent takeover of the Harmandir Sahib (Golden Temple) in Amritsar. The violent response came to Canada in June 1985 when an Air India Boeing 747, Flight 182, took off from Montreal's Mirabel Airport with 329 people on board, headed for London and then Delhi. Over the Irish Sea, a bomb in the plane's forward hold exploded and the jumbo jet disintegrated. Less than an hour later, a similar bomb intended for Air India Flight 301 exploded in Tokyo's Narita Airport, killing two baggage handlers. One prominent Canadian Sikh, miner-turned-journalist Tara Singh Hayer, editor-in-chief of the Indo-Canadian Times—North America's oldest and most popular Punjabi-language newspaper—condemned the attacks. In 1988, he was shot in the back by a 17-year-old Sikh extremist. Hayer was paralyzed and wheelchair-bound for the rest of his life.

  It was against this backdrop of violence and suspicion that Johal and his friends—primarily drawn from Vancouver's large Sikh community—sold drugs, broke into cars and committed other petty crimes in a loosely tied group. Many of them attended Tupper and had been involved in a gang with ties to the newly emerging gang that had previously been called “Los Diablos.” Originally mostly Hispanic, Los Diablos became increasingly multiethnic, especially after much of its original leadership had been arrested or deported. At the time Johal arrived on the scene, the gang had become almost entirely Indian, mostly Sikh, and was by then more widely known as the Indo-Canadian Mafia or the Punjabi Mafia.

  The Indo-Canadian Mafia split into factions when one of its regional leaders, Jimsher “Jimmy” Singh Dosanjh, was charged with the October 14, 1991, murder of Colombian cocaine trafficker Teodoro Salcedo. Jimmy was eventually acquitted due to a lack of people willing to testify against him, but while he was behind bars, Johal assumed leadership of his men. Johal and his friends made money not just by drug trafficking, but also by exporting stolen car parts and selling goods, mostly electronics, stolen from transport trucks, often with the cooperation of the trucks' drivers. A CBC documentary at the time estimated that Johal was making about $4 million a year. He was as flamboyant as he was temperamental, and his regular appearances on local media angered many in the Lotus Gang, who had a history of cooperation with Jimmy Dosanjh and Los Diablos, but were not impressed by the mercurial Johal.

  One of Johal's friends, a 21-year-old named Parminder Chana, was driving home at about nine o'clock on the evening of October 11, 1991, when he received a call from a mutual non-Sikh friend, Faisel (also reported as Faizal) Ali Dean. Dean told him to meet him at the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia's salvage yard in New Westminster right away. Chana worked there as a night security guard and frequently used it as a spot to meet with friends and make deals.

  When he arrived, he saw Dean and another old friend, Rajinder “Little Raj” Benji. Chana was surprised to see Benji, as the two had experienced something of a falling out since Chana had started dating Benji's 17-year-old sister Kulwinder (better known as “Jassy”). As soon as he was close enough, Dean wrestled Chana to the ground and held him down. Police said Benji loomed over Chana, then produced a knife. Law enforcement officials allege that Benji began berating Chana for going out with his sister, then repeatedly slashed and stabbed him, eventually cutting off all of his fingers before slashing his throat. The two men then carried the body to a nearby drainage ditch and threw him in the water. He had been cut 54 times.

  Four days later, Jassy leapt to her death into the Fraser River from the Pattullo Bridge that connects New Westminster and Surrey. She left behind a note that read “When Parmar died, I died.”

  Benji was quickly arrested for Chana's murder, and so was Dean after someone overheard him bragging about holding the victim down while Chana was sliced up. At the trial, it was determined that the Benjis had been a law-abiding family in northern British Columbia until the father died, an older sister ran away from home never to be heard from again, and the family moved to Vancouver. Soon “Little Raj” and his older brother—also named Rajinder, and known as “Big Raj”—were both involved with the Indo-Canadian Mafia, selling drugs and committing other small-time crimes. Little Raj admitted at a trial for another matter that he not only sold cocaine, but also had a network of dealers and drivers in the area—and that Dean was one of them. It was also revealed that Little Raj had three previous convictions for armed robbery in which he had threatened to kill his victims (one of them a 5-year-old boy) if they went to police.

  In December 1991, the body of Sanjay Narain—a 21-year-old who many believe witnessed the Chana murder—was found at the bottom of North Vancouver's Cleveland Dam. After that, no witnesses dared testify against Jimmy, and he was acquitted. Dean, however, had already implicated himself and was found guilty of second-degree murder.

  When Jimmy Dosanjh was released from jail, he was disturbed to learn that his men now answered to Johal. He was so upset, in fact, that he hired a man to kill Johal. But the assassin instead went to Johal, told him of Jimmy's plan, and cut a deal with Johal. For a little more money, they agreed, the assassin would kill Jimmy instead. On February 25, 1994, the double-crossing assassin told Jimmy that he had some stolen electronics he wanted to sell him, lured him into an Eastside alley, and shot him dead.

  Jimmy's brother, Ranjit “Ron” Dosanjh swore revenge—on camera. Highly political, Ron had been president of the Vancouver Chapter of the Internati
onal Sikh Youth Federation, and as a strong supporter of an independent Khalistan, he was suspected of ordering the assassination attempt on prominent Sikh Bakhar Singh Dhillon for speaking out against political violence. Years of experience had made him something of a slick operator. So it came as a surprise to many when he told a television reporter that if Johal came to his house, he would “shoot him between the eyes.” Johal fired back, also in front of TV cameras, saying, “Basically, I just want these guys to know you got another thing coming, bitch. I'm still here.”

  In a strange twist, the “thing coming” was a bullet between the eyes. During the afternoon rush hour on April 19, 1994, Ron Dosanjh was sitting in his customized red pickup waiting at a stoplight on the Kingsway when a car pulled up beside him. The passenger in the car pulled out an AK-47 and shot him in the face. Dead, Ron Dosanjh's foot fell from the brake pedal, and the pickup lurched into oncoming traffic. As other drivers screeched to avoid it, the truck kept rolling up onto the sidewalk until it collided with a tree.

  Johal was questioned by police and released. On April 24, 1994, a neighbor of Johal's, Yukon native Greg Olson, agreed to walk his landlord's dog in a nearby park. While with the dog, Olson was shot and killed. It was later revealed that the gunmen mistook him for Johal, who was about the same size and age, and wore similar clothing.

  The next day, during Ron Dosanjh's cremation service, police announced that Johal was under arrest for Jimmy's murder. Also charged were Preet “Peter” Sarbjit Gill, Rajinder “Big Raj” Benji, Sun News Lal, Michael Kim Budai and Ho-Sik “Phil” Kim, who was alleged to be the triggerman.

  At the trial, the Crown alleged that Johal had paid Kim $30,000 to kill Ron Dosanjh because Johal had heard that Ron Dosanjh was going to kill him to avenge his brother Jimmy. Despite what was then the longest criminal trial in Canadian history, the accused were all acquitted, much to the surprise of many in the media.

  A few months after the verdict, a Vancouver police officer who had been involved in the case saw Gill dancing at a nightclub with one of the jurors, Gillian Guess. Suspicious, the police initiated surveillance on Guess and recorded phone conversations in which she admitted having a romantic affair with Gill while sitting on the jury of his murder trial.

  Guess was charged with obstruction of justice—in fact, it was the first time in North American history that a juror had been caught sleeping with an accused murderer on trial—while Gill, Budai and Kim were ordered to be retried. Guess went out of her way to engage the media and public, and even set up a website for her fans, but was found guilty and received an 18-month prison term. Gill was not retried for murder but was sentenced to six years for his role in the obstruction scandal.

  While in jail awaiting trial, Johal met and befriended a man named Bal Buttar. Johal assessed the 150-pound Buttar and started feeding him steroids and encouraging him to work out. Soon, Buttar was a 250-pound monster, able and willing to knock out just about anyone. The two became so close, in fact, that Johal offered Buttar a leadership role in the Indo-Canadian Mafia. Buttar recalled to a reporter, “When I was in jail with Bindy, Bindy told me, ‘You are going to be the one underneath me. You listen to me. If you take care of things at your end, I'll be happy with you, brother. If you fuck me over, I'll kill you. Right?’” He then told Buttar about a crew he had assembled called the Elite. They were five Indo-Canadian Mafia members whose job it was to assassinate Johal's enemies.

  After both Johal and Buttar were released, they went to work. They started with extortion and debt collection before getting back into trafficking. On October 26, 1996, Johal's close friend, Roman “Danny” Mann, was buying two kilos of cocaine from Randy Chan. After he sampled it, he declared it impotent, watered down with baby powder or some other adulterant. Angered by the perceived attempt to swindle him, Mann forced Chan outside and into his car. Perhaps suddenly aware he had made a big mistake—Randy was younger brother of Lotus Gang member Raymond Chan and well connected—Mann drove his hostage to Johal's house. Undaunted, Johal quickly came up with a plan. He called Raymond Chan and went into negotiations. Raymond played tough—Randy was in their hands for 56 hours in total—but when Johal shoved his little brother into the trunk of his car and drove him around Vancouver while negotiating over the phone, Raymond relented. It was finally decided that Randy's life was worth five kilos of coke.

  After that, Johal started settling some old scores. The first to die was Amarjit Singh Dheil. As he left the Marpole-Oakridge Community Centre after a floor hockey game with friends on January 19, 1997, Dheil was gunned down. Johal believed he had been in cahoots with the Dosanjh brothers.

  Buttar began to notice that Johal used the Elite for his own purposes, almost at his whims, and not always for the overall strategic plan. On October 21, 1997, Gorinder Singh Khun Khun was shot and killed as he was exiting his home. Khun Khun had been an old friend of Johal's, dating back to the Tupper days, but Johal was convinced he was involved in the blundered assassination attempt that had killed Olson. On July 1, 1998, Johal ordered Buttar to arrange for the Elite to kill another old friend, Vinuse News MacKenzie, saying that he had been holding out from the organization. Buttar went ahead but had a sneaking suspicion that the real reason MacKenzie died was because a certain girl Johal fancied actually preferred MacKenzie.

  Those killings disturbed Buttar, but the one that really turned him around was that of Derek Chand Shankar. Buttar sincerely liked Shankar, a good kid and a solid earner, and when they went out clubbing on September 19, 1998, they called Johal to come and join them. But the boss begged off, saying he was too tired. Shankar, already drunk, called Johal an “idiot” and a “baby,” and mocked him for not being willing to have a few drinks with his crew. Johal snapped, reminding Shankar who he was talking to. A few hours later, Johal showed up at the nightclub with his old pal Mann and asked where Shankar was. Buttar told him he was sleeping in his truck. Johal suggested they go for a drive. Buttar could not gather the courage to oppose him. The men drove under New Westminster's Queensborough Bridge, a few yards from the salvage yard where the Chana murder took place. Throughout the trip Buttar kept telling Johal that Shankar was just a drunk kid and that he didn't mean any harm. They stopped under the bridge. Johal shot the barely conscious Shankar. Buttar briefly considered killing Johal then and there, but instead helped him throw Shankar's corpse into the cold Fraser River.

  But Johal was hardly the only source of violence in the Indian Canadian community. A friend of his, Vikash Chand, was told he could get a free stolen car to chop up for parts if he met some guys he knew at Rags to Riches Motorcars in Burnaby on the afternoon of October 7, 1998. When he arrived, a meticulously planned assassination was put into effect that resulted in Shane Shoemaker (who was paid $7,000) shooting and killing Chand while he was screwing a stolen license plate onto the car he had been promised. As planned and rehearsed, Shoemaker then ran to a minivan driven by his friend Haddi Binhamad, who spirited the shooter away to what they thought was safety.

  They would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for a sharp-eyed witness who reported the license plate number of the minivan, which belonged to Binhamad's mom. Caught, Binhamad traded testimony for immunity. He confessed he had tried to kill Chand a couple of times before but had failed, and had been given the gun by George Wafsi, the mastermind behind the assassination. Binhamad later gave the gun to Shoemaker. Chand was a drug dealer supplied by Wafsi and had run up some major debts with him.

  On November 29, one of Johal's oldest friends, Mann, told him he wanted out of the gang. It was just too dangerous, he said. Johal punched him in the face, cutting his lip. Later, Mann's body, with a single bullet wound to the back of the head, was found in a vacant industrial lot in Burnaby not far from the Queensborough Bridge. When Buttar asked about what had happened and what he was going to do about it, Johal told him, “Blame it on the HA [Hells Angels].” Then he asked Buttar if he wanted to go out clubbing that night.

  A few weeks later, the p
air did go out. They were headed down Scott Road in Delta to a club in Surrey when Johal pulled a surprise 180-degree turn. A cop saw them and turned on his lights. As the police car approached, Johal showed Buttar a gun, which surprised Buttar because he knew the boss rarely carried a weapon. Buttar convinced Johal to hide the gun, but the cop saw it and called for backup. Johal told Buttar to say it was his gun, to take the blame and the jail time. Buttar agreed, but not out of loyalty. He realized that Johal had to go. Johal had lost it. He was killing innocent kids like Shankar, and even his best friends like Mann. Buttar knew he could persuade the Elite to kill the boss, and he knew that being behind bars would be the perfect alibi. He rationalized the order to himself by the belief that if he did not kill Johal, Johal would soon kill him.

  Johal was partying at the Palladium nightclub at 4:30 in the morning of December 20, 1998. A lone gunman approached him on the dance floor and shot him in the back of the head at extremely close range. Despite the presence of about 350 revelers in the club at the time, not a single person came forward to describe the assailant.

  The death of Bindy Johal did not end the violence in Vancouver's Indian community. In fact, bloodshed increased as the gangsters underwent a Balkanization process, as the Indo-Canadian Mafia splintered into bitter factions.

  And that was the Vancouver the Bacon Brothers grew up in. It was a place with spectacular wealth just blocks from ridiculous poverty. It was a place with almost unprecedented diversity that had self-segregated itself into a set of insular, paranoid communities. It was a place with plenty of idealists and entrepreneurs—and lots of people who were prepared to take advantage of them. It was also a place in which organized crime was based on ethnicity. But that was about to change.