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| Yvon Belzil |
| Yvon Belzil was born in Trois-Pistoles and moved to Montreal in his late teens or early twenties. He was known for carrying a loaded gun at all times. He also wasn't afraid to use it. Belzil met Claude Dubois in the 1960s and the two became fast friends. They soon set up a successful fencing operation together, a racket that made them each $300-400 a week. The Dubois brothers and Belzil would rise to the top of Montreal's underworld during the next ten years. When Adrien Dubois, Claude's brother, was having a turf dispute with Bryce Richardson, a gang leader in the west end, Belzil stepped in. He saw Richardson at the Harlem Paradise one night, a saloon owned by Adrien Dubois and Boxer Di Francesco, and shot him three times. Richardson was hit in the back and paralyzed. |
In 1966, Belzil and Claude Dubois opened the Clé d'Or strip club together. During one of many raids, police found more than 50 tissues filled with sperm. When the government shut down the bar four years later, Belzil and Dubois lost a major money maker. They were each making about $800 a week from the club. The two, along with Claude Jodoin, opened that La Grande, a gay night club on Saint-Catherine street, in May, 1972. Belzil made about $500 a week from the club until it was closed in 1981. Around this time, Richard Désormiers, Frank Cotroni's brother-in-law, began making trouble in Dubois Gang controlled bars. After a year of this, Claude Dubois had enough and decided to have Désormiers murdered. The contact was given to Belzil, Claude Dubeau, and Donald Lavoie. On July 22, 1973, Lavoie and Dubeau walked into the Mon Pays bar and shot Désormiers and Jacques-André Bourassa, the manager, several times. As this went on inside, Belzil stole Désormiers Cadillac from the parking lot. After Belzil appeared before the Commission d'Enquete sur le Crime Organisé (CECO), he, his girlfriend, Claude Dubois and his wife, and Claude Jodoin took a two week vacation to Haiti. They liked the island so much that Belzil and Dubois decided to return and buy a hotel there. But, before they could do that, they were deported on a request from Montreal police. According to Claude Jodoin, a gang member who later turned informant, Belzil began plotting to eliminate Claude Dubois and replacing in the late 70s. After he unsuccessfully tried to turn Adrien and Jean-Paul Dubois against their brother, Belzil opened an escort service in close proximity to an agency controlled by Claude Dubois. He even hired Raymond Duclos, a criminal who testified against Dubois for the CECO, to work in the establishment. This was a veritable slap in the face to Dubois. The Dubois brothers ordered Belzil to close his escort agency's doors. Belzil was furious and, one afternoon in a gang hangout, he jumped a gang member known as "Petit Louis" and pummelled him helplessly. Claude and Jean-Paul Dubois quickly broke up the fight and Claude flinged Belzil against a wall and levelled him with a powerful uppercut. Belzil got up and left, threatening get even with the brothers. A meeting was arranged for the next day to try to iron things but, because of increased police pressure, Belzil panicked and left Montreal that night for his home town, Trois-Pistoles. From there, he and associate Raymond Duclos went to Abitibi, where they lived on a farm while they waited for the heat to die down back in the city. Belzil returned to Montreal in October, 1980, and asked Claude Jodoin to set up a meeting with Claude Dubois. The two met and agreed to put their differences aside. He began to run his rackets from an office at 1851 Sherbrooke street East. Business was great and Belzil was selling more 30 pounds of hashish a week, which was being supplied to him by Adrien Dubois. Belzil's drug dealers, couriers, and enforcers would gather inside the building from 4 to 7pm, three times a week, for instructions. One time, when his supply dried up, Bezil went to Claude Dubois for help. Dubois approached Robert "Bob" Foley, an influential West End Gang member based out of Laval, who sold Belzil 50 pounds of hashish. When Donald Lavoie turned police informant, Belzil came up with several plots to silence him. One idea was to blow him and his police escorts up with a bazooka as they arrived at the court house. Belzil also suggested that his wife and children be kidnapped and, if despite this, Lavoie still agreed to take the stand against them, they would be tortured and murdered. Belzil was a prime suspect in the murder of Gérald Durocher, a Duboig Gang member who was found dead in the trunk of his car on December 16, 1981. Jodoin told police that Belzil once boasted to him that he had organized the murder. Lavoie's incriminating information came back to haunt Belzil on April 8, 1982. Police officers raided his Saint-Leonard house and arrested him. Claude Dubois was also picked at his home in Écho Lake. They were charged with the murders of Richard Désormiers and Jacques-André Bourassa. Claude Dubeau, who was already behind bars, was also charged with the murders. Lavoie and Claude Jodoin testified against their former associates. The three were found guilty on November 12, 1983 and were sentenced to life imprisonment. The Quebec Court of Appeals reduced their sentences to ten years 1989 because, they decided, Jacques-André Bourassa's murder had not been premeditated. Belzil was released from prison in the early 1990s and has since kept a very low profile. |