Blue Angels Motorcycle Club

Blue Angels clubhouse in Erpe.

The Gendarmerie carried out numerous operations against the Blue Angels in 1996. In March 1999, thirty-three members were sentenced to prison, received suspended sentences or were fined for possession of weapons or narcotics, assault and battery, theft, fraud, hostage-taking and criminal conspiracy, while two were acquitted.[17]

In 2003, 19 members of a rival gang were hospitalised in a retaliation attack after two Blue Angels bikers were shot.[9]

In May 2009, Belgium's Federal Police named the Blue Angels as one of four criminal motorcycle gangs operating in the country, along with the Bandidos, Hells Angels and Outlaws.[5]

Two club members were arrested for stealing insulation material from a building site in Erpe-Mere in July 2010. The men allegedly intended to use the stolen material to insulate their clubhouse.[18]

Blue Angels members were questioned by police after a man who was ejected from the Blue Angels clubhouse in Roeselare and later returned armed with an iron bar was hospitalized with a head injury on 7 June 2014.[19] The man was convicted of possessing an illegal weapon[20] and was also the victim of an arson attack at his home on 30 January 2015.[21]

A Blue Angels member was sentenced to four months in prison in November 2015 after being convicted of assaulting his son's teacher during a parents' evening at a school in Aalst. The biker claimed the teacher was bullying his son.[22]

In July 2017, a Blue Angels member from Zonnebeke was sentenced to three years in prison for car theft, drugs and weapons possession, and forgery of a license plate and driving license.[23]

A former Blue Angels member who refused to return his "colours" to the club after he was expelled was left in intensive care after being stabbed in Sint-Katherina-Lombeek on 8 September 2018. Six club members were arrested afterwards, and police found firearms, explosives and narcotics in the subsequent search of the men's homes.[24] A prospective member who was allegedly involved in the stabbing committed suicide at the Blue Angels clubhouse in Sint-Amandsberg a few days later.[25] The remaining five suspects were charged with violent theft, attempted racketeering, gang building, and possession of prohibited weapons.[26]

A number of Blue Angels members were prosecuted following an arson attack on the home of Leeds motorcycle garage owner Paul Malham which took place on 30 April 2006.[27] In July 2007, Malham was shot and wounded with a crossbow at his home in Boston Spa by Paul Miller, who was allegedly contracted by the Blue Angels to kill Malham.[28] Miller was sentenced to sixteen months in prison in March 2008. Paul Moody, the co-owner of the motorcycle shop with Malham, was knocked unconscious in a hammer attack carried out by a group of unidentified men at a bikers' gathering near Scarborough in September 2010.[29]

Four Blue Angels members – David Hansbury, David Torr, Steven Clayton and Martin Booth – pleaded guilty to threatening behavior relating to an incident on 27 July 2018 in which they forced a member of the Mongrel Mob to hand over his "colours" at his home in the Beeston area of Leeds. The victim had previously been a member of the Blue Angels and served as the club's European secretary before being expelled in 2015 and warned against associating with any other motorcycle club in future. In January 2019, Torr, Clayton and Booth were sentenced to community service while Hansbury was made the subject of a two-month electronically tagged curfew order.[30]

A side patch worn by the Tribe, a Blue Angels support club.

In the 1960s, the most senior of Glasgow's gangs began organising protection rackets, shebeens and prostitution rings, and battled for control over such operations.[8] The Blue Angels garnered a "notoriously violent" reputation when the club was involved in fights with mod gangs and various street gangs including the Maryhill Fleet.[9] These conflicts typically involved bar brawls "of John Wayne proportions" which were followed by a series of revenge attacks, including petrol bombings on bars and cafes. In September 1964, a mass brawl involving hundreds of gang members in Glasgow city centre resulted in a Blue Angel being sentenced to life in prison. The gang wars ultimately ended when respective leaders met to organise a truce.[9] Members of the Roadburners and Garthamlock Blackhawks gangs subsequently joined the Blue Angels.[8]

The Blue Angels have alleged links to organised crime.[31] The club became associated with Glasgow crime boss Walter Norval after Norval's daughter Rita married Blue Angels member William Gunn.[32] Gunn was sentenced to five years in prison for threatening a witness in Norval's November 1977 armed robbery trial.[33] Blue Angels bikers served as pallbearers at Norval's funeral in August 2014.[34]

The Blue Angels were reportedly involved in a biker war with the Tayside chapter of the Satans Slaves in 2011.[35]

Actor and musician Charlie Allan was hospitalised after he was allegedly beaten outside a hotel in Stirling in June 2012 by two members of the Blue Angels who accused him of assisting the Outlaws in founding a chapter in Dundee the previous year. The Blue Angels were involved in an effort to stop the Outlaws recruiting in Scotland at the time.[31]

A turf war involving the Blue Angels and the Nomads – a motorcycle club formed in Aberdeen in 1966 – started after the Blue Angels expanded into Aberdeenshire by "patching over" the Road Mutts and Tribe clubs. The biker war reportedly started partially for control over the organisation of lucrative motorcycle festivals.[6] The conflict led to a string of violent attacks.[36] On 28 September 2013, a Blue Angels member refuelling his motorcycle at a petrol station in Aberdeen was beaten with a baseball bat and a metal bar by Nomads members Gavin Blair, Alistair Thomson and Alexander Mackie who then fled the scene in a car. After being chased along the A90 road by approximately thirty to forty Blue Angels members on motorcycles, the Nomads were the victims of an attack at Foveran.[37] Blair, Mackie and Roberts were ordered to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work in April 2014 after pleading guilty to assault.[38]

Around twenty masked Blue Angels members armed with hammers and metal bars allegedly tried to gain entry to the clubhouse of a rival club in the Moredun area of Edinburgh, on 11 August 2018. The clubhouse was destroyed in a petrol bomb attack in the early hours of the following morning. A seriously injured man was rescued from the burning building by firemen.[39][40] Blue Angels biker Adam Andrews, who suffered a broken leg, a broken back and a collapsed lung while carrying out the attack, was imprisoned for three years after being convicted of wilful fire-raising at Glasgow High Court on 23 March 2021.[41][42]

On 8 September 2018, Blue Angels member Ian Ewing used his Vauxhall Insignia to collide with Nomads biker Colin Sutherland, causing Sutherland to fall from his motorcycle on the A98 road near Cullen, Moray. Ewing and a group of unidentified accomplices then attacked Nomads members Colin Sutherland, John Sutherland, Edward Forrest and Nicky Syratt with a claw hammer, a tyre iron and a baseball bat.[43] The attack was allegedly carried out in retaliation for members of the Blue Angels being assaulted earlier that day.[36] Ewing was arrested shortly afterwards in possession of a hammer and an item of clothing bearing the slogan: ""Blue Angels North East".[44] On 3 February 2020, he was convicted at the High Court in Edinburgh of attempting to murder Colin Sutherland, assaulting John Sutherland to his severe injury and permanent disfigurement, and assaulting Forrest and Syratt to their severe injury and the danger of their lives.[45] Co-accused Patrick Noble was acquitted on the same charges after the jury returned not proven verdicts, while charges were dropped against Kyle Urquhart and Ian Yeomans.[46] Ewing was sentenced to seven years in prison on 15 April 2020.[47]