Rocker war in Scandinavia
The rocker war in Scandinavia was a conflict in the Scandinavian rocker scene from 1994 to 1997, which played out mainly between the Hells Angels and the Bandidos . However, the Outlaws MC and a few smaller supporter clubs were also involved. The main locations were Copenhagen in Denmark , Helsinki in Finland , Oslo in Norway , as well as Helsingborg and Malmö in Sweden. In the Scandinavian countries, the conflict is often referred to as the "Great Nordic Rocker War " based on the Great Northern War .
prehistory
New Year 1980 Jørn "Jønke" Nielsen founded a charter for the Hells Angels in Copenhagen, Denmark. The club fought the Bullshit MC from 1980 to 1987 and finally prevailed against it. Various other motorcycle clubs expanded in Scandinavia by 1990 ; In 1984 the Morticians MC was founded. In 1992 a conflict escalated between the Hells Angels and the Morticians MC, who had been on friendly terms until then. The Morticians gave themselves the new name Undertakers MC and became allies of the international club Bandidos, which had only been represented in Europe in Marseille , France, but was interested in expanding. In 1993 the Undertakers finally became Bandidos MC Denmark. In 1994 the Hells Angels tried to prevent the Morbids MC from developing into a big club and thus a rival in Sweden. The Morbids then turned to the Bandidos like the Undertakers before and became allies. In Norway, in turn, the Outlaws MC allied with the Bandidos. The disputes eventually escalated into a violent conflict over control of the drug market in Scandinavia, particularly in Copenhagen and the local free city of Christiania .
The confrontation
The first known incident was a shooting on January 26, 1994 in the clubhouse of the Morbids MC in Helsingborg, Sweden, in which no one was injured. In February there was also a shooting between Hells Angels and Bandidos in Helsingborg, in which the Hells Angel Joakim Boman was killed. Just a few days later, Angels Place was hit by an anti-tank missile . On June 22, 1994, the president of Klan MCs, an ally of the Bandidos in Finland, was shot dead by Hells Angels. At the beginning of 1995 the conflict reached Oslo, where on February 19 there was a shooting between the Hells Angels and the Bandidos. A rocker was injured.
Michael "Joe" Ljunggren , President of Bandidos MC Sweden, was murdered on July 17, 1995. The Bandidos retaliated nine days later with several anti-tank missiles that were fired at clubhouses of various clubs in Helsinki and Helsingborg. Two bandidos were later convicted for these acts: Kai Tapio Blom received six years and Antti Tauno Tapani four years imprisonment. When the Finnish President of the Bandidos wanted to attend the trial, he was attacked by several Hells Angels. In retaliation, a Hells Angel's tattoo shop was destroyed.
At Christmas 1995 two Hells Angels were beaten up by several bandidos in a nightclub in Copenhagen. The dispute reached Denmark. In January 1996, several bomb attacks were carried out on clubhouses of the Hells Angels in Oslo and the prospect club Screwdrivers MCs in Hamar . In Helsinki, a Hells Angels pub was also the target of a bomb attack. On March 1, 1996, Hells Angels attacked a Bandidos clubhouse in Helsinki, killing two Bandidos members, including Finnish Vice President Jarkko Kokko, sustaining gunshot wounds. The latter died 16 days later from his injuries. The Hells Angels prospects Ilkka Ukkonen and Jussi Penttinen, who were sentenced to twelve and a half and six years' imprisonment, were later charged.
On March 16, 1996, Bandidos were attacked at airports in Denmark and Norway. At Oslo Airport Fornebu several Bandidos were injured, at Kastrup a Bandido was shot dead and three others were injured. The Bandidos just got back from a weekend in Helsinki. Six Hells Angels and their allies were later sentenced to a total of 53 years. One of them received life sentence. In April and May 1996, further bombings were carried out on clubhouses of the Hells Angels and their supporters in Helsingborg and in southern Denmark.
Jan "Face" Krogh Jensen , a member of the Bandidos, was shot dead on July 15, 1996 in Drammen , Norway. Six days later, a Hells Angels prospect was shot dead in Oslo. In the same month, two Hells Angels were injured in Malmö , Sweden, and in Jyderup prison in Denmark. On August 28, an assassination attempt was made on the vice-president of the Hells Angels in Sweden. This was injured.
In October 1996 there were three attacks on Hells Angels clubhouses. On October 3, 12 bystanders were injured in an explosion in Malmö. Three days later, during a Hells Angels party, the clubhouse in Copenhagen was shot at with a rocket launcher. A Hells Angel and a guest were killed. The Bandidos prospect Niels Poulsen was later convicted of the act and sentenced to life imprisonment. On October 30, a car bomb exploded outside a clubhouse in Oslo. In late 1996 there were also two shootings in Horsens and Aalborg, Denmark.
In the beginning of 1997 the Hells Angel Kim Thrysoe Svendsen was murdered. Thore "Henki" Holm, the president of the Outlaws MC, and a French rocker were shot soon after by a member of the Untouchables MC. Several Bandidos were wounded in Amager and Køge in Denmark. In retaliation, Hells Angels were shot at in Frederiksberg .
On June 4, 1997, a car bomb exploded outside a Bandidos clubhouse in Drammen, Norway. Irene Astrid Bækkevold, who was not involved, was killed in the explosion. She was driving past in a car. In 2002 a member of the Hells Angels was convicted of the attack. On June 7, 1997 Björn Gudmandsen were killed and three other Bandidos were injured in a shooting in Liseleje, Denmark. The Hells Angel Vagn Smith later received life sentence for it . The last known incident occurred on June 11, 1997 when the Bandidos Clubhouse in Dalby , Denmark, was found mined.
The war officially ended on September 25, 1997 when “Big” Jim Tinndahn , the European President of the Bandidos, and his Hells Angels counterpart Bent “Blondie” Nielsen shook hands on Danish television. Then both clubs went out together.
aftermath
A total of eleven murders, 74 attempted murders and 96 injured caused the dispute in total. Both clubs signed a kind of peace treaty that prohibited the formation of chapters in Scandinavia until the end of the 1990s. However, this was not observed. The state of Denmark also banned motorcycle clubs from buying and owning land. However, the law did not last because it was against the constitution. In an interview with Danish magazine Faklen , the two clubs later claimed that the conflict had originally only existed between a few members and that it was the police and the media that eventually escalated the conflict and prevented a solution for years.
The dispute not only strained relations between the two clubs around the world, it also damaged the reputation of the two clubs in other countries, which have since been associated with organized crime more than before. In Germany, a similar peace agreement as in Scandinavia was made in 2010 between the Hells Angel Frank Hanebuth and Bandidos Vice President Peter Maczollek under the supervision of lawyer Götz von Fromberg .
Individual evidence
- ^ Angels of Death: Inside the Bikers' Empire of Crime. (No longer available online.) Randomhouse.ca, archived from the original on July 6, 2011 ; Retrieved October 5, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ Angels go global. (No longer available online.) History.ca, archived from the original on September 29, 2011 ; Retrieved October 5, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ The Danish Biker Wars. (No longer available online.) Dinosmc.com, archived from the original on October 7, 2011 ; Retrieved October 5, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Airport Attack Leaves One Biker Dead. Findarticles.com, accessed October 5, 2011 .
- ^ Biker Sentenced To Life For Grenade Attack. (No longer available online.) Highbeam.com, archived from the original on October 25, 2012 ; Retrieved October 5, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Danish Bikers Call Truce In Deadly Feud. Independent.co.uk, September 26, 1997, accessed October 5, 2011 .
- ↑ Biker Wars In the Land of 'The Little Mermaid'. In: New York Times. May 6, 1996, accessed October 5, 2011 .
- ^ Peace treaty in Denmark. Translation of the interview into: All about Rocker 2 - The laws, the history, the machines, Huber Verlag, 2004, ISBN 978-392789-611-6 . Pp. 106-117.
- ↑ Jörg Diehl: Bandidos and Hells Angels: Peace of the cuddly rockers. In: Spiegel Online . May 26, 2010, accessed June 21, 2012 .
Web links
- The Scandinavian rocker war . bike-time.ch ( Memento from January 12, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
- Timeline of the Conflict (Swedish) ( Memento from July 21, 2011 on the Internet Archive )
- Article in Independent (English)