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Armed with a handgun and the knowledge he was a marked man, Bandidos member Francesco "Cisco" Lenti fired five shots at the four Hells Angels surrounding him before stepping over a felled man and firing a fatal bullet.
Lenti took responsibility yesterday for the chilling snapshot of violence that erupted at a Vaughan strip club in 2006.
The 60-year-old pleaded guilty to manslaughter for the shooting of Hells Angels sergeant-at-arms David (White Dread) Buchanan and the aggravated assault of then Hells Angels prospect Carlos Verrelli (now a full member) and full-patch member Dana Carnegie. Lenti will be sentenced May 12. Court heard a detailed account of the fatal shooting and the biker politics that fuelled it as Assistant Crown Attorney David Moull read an agreed statement of facts into the record. Lenti was working his job at Club Pro in Vaughan the night of the shooting. Working at the strip club for 20 years, his role was to keep drugs out of the business and to act as a peacekeeper. When Lenti came downstairs Dec. 2, 2006, at 12:53 a.m., he saw four Hells Angels members sitting in the club who quickly surrounded him and began arguing, the statement said. The Hells Angels objected to Lenti's Bandidos loyalties and the fact he was trying to establish the gang in Ontario. "Lenti said he felt threatened and that something was about to happen," the statement said. "He said he saw the butt of a gun in Mr. Verrelli's jacket." He moved to the front lobby of the club where two security cameras captured the escalating argument. Buchanan advanced on Lenti, punching him in the face and giving him a black eye. Lenti shoved Buchanan back, pulled out a 9-mm handgun from his waistband and shot Buchanan, Carnegie and Verrelli. A fourth biker took cover in a utility closet when he saw the gun. Carnegie fled the club as Buchanan and Verrelli collapsed on the lobby floor.
Lenti turned his attention to Buchanan who was still alive but bleeding and trying to pull himself off the floor. "At that point Mr. Lenti shot Mr. Buchanan through his left cheek, killing him," the statement said. As Lenti made his way to the door, he fired one final shot at Verrelli. Seven shots were fired within six seconds. "At no time during the incident were any of the Hells Angels seen to be in possession of or to produce a firearm," the statement said. Lenti turned himself in the same day but his gun was never recovered. He was originally charged with second-degree murder. The statement of facts also detailed how a member of the Oshawa chapter of the Hell Angels serving as a civilian police agent came across a plot to kill Lenti for refusing to be recruited from the Bandidos in June 2006. Two Hells Angels were assigned the job of killing Lenti to stop him from expanding the Bandidos. The third biker recruited for the murder was a paid police informant. "It was proposed the agent kill Lenti and leave him in the middle of the highway in his colours," said the statement. "Lenti couldn't just disappear; he had to be found to prove a point."
When police warned Lenti about the murder plot, he began carrying the gun and assured the officer delivering the message that he was keeping a low profile and watching his back. "He felt he was a target because he was trying to get the Bandidos Motorcycle Club 'off the ground,' " the statement said. The court heard Lenti had faced danger before. In August 1995, the 35-year veteran of outlaw motorcycle gangs was aligned with Satan's Choice and starting a new club called the Diablos when he was the victim of a car bombing in his driveway. The bomb put him in hospital for several months with life-threatening injuries.
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