Jean-Winsing Barthelus, confidant and right-hand man of the gang leader Gregory Woolley, who was murdered in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu last November, was arrested with firearms on Friday morning.
Posted at 1:22 p.m.
Barthelus, 45, was intercepted by investigators from the Montreal City Police Service's (SPVM) Multisector Team Dedicated to Firearms (EMAF) as he sat in his vehicle in Old Longueuil.
Bloodhounds first found a loaded handgun in his vehicle and later in the day another at his residence on Montreal's south shore.
Jean-Winsing Barthelus appeared on Saturday at the Longueuil courthouse, where he was particularly accused of possessing weapons. Prosecutors refused to release him and he will be back in court in the coming days.
Barthelus, who comes from blue street gangs, was a long-time traveling companion of Gregory Woolley, with whom he was part of a group called the Syndicate in the 1990s, which controlled the drug trade in downtown Montreal on behalf of the Hells Angels.
Even today, Barthelus is still considered a biker relative by the police.
Under ban
Barthelus is already subject to an order that prohibits him from owning a weapon. This was last renewed in March 2019 when Supreme Court Justice Marc David sentenced him to 57 months in prison for gangsterism, conspiracy and cocaine trafficking.
However, minus the time in preventive detention, he only had one day left to serve.
Barthelus and Gregory Woolley were arrested in November 2015 as part of Operation Magot-Mastiff, which enabled the Sûreté du Québec to decapitate a mafia-biker gang alliance that had dominated organized crime in the country since the natural death of former godfather Vito Rizzuto Montreal had led.
A statement of facts filed in court revealed that the head of a drug trafficking network operating in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve district – who appeared as a co-witness for the police – had communicated with Barthelus several times to order kilograms of cocaine.
Barthelus already has a criminal record for drug and weapons possession. In 2006 he was sentenced to 30 months in prison for gangsterism, weapons possession and drug trafficking. In 2010 he was sentenced to a further 17 months for gangsterism and possession of property obtained by crime.
In 2012, he was arrested again with a weapon during an interdiction and sentenced to 30 days in prison.
To contact Daniel Renaud, call 514 285-7000, extension 4918, write to [email protected] or write to La Presse's mailing address.