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1
2
3
4Hell’s
5Angel
6THE LIFE AND TIMES OF
7SONNY BARGER
8AND THE HELL’S ANGELS
9MOTORCYCLE CLUB
10RALPH “SONNY” BARGER
11WITH KEITH AND KENT ZIMMERMAN
12To Sarrah
13CONTENTS
14Acknowledgments v
15Introduction vii
161 Muster to Custer 1
172 Blue-Collar Oakland, Jungle Jim’s, and Ralph the Lumper 9
183 Sleeping in the Snake Pit 19
194 Harleys, Choppers, Full Dressers, and Stolen Wheels 37
205 The Proud, the (Filthy) Few…the Hell’s Angels 53
216 Old Ladies, Main Squeezes, and the Maid of Livermore 73
227 The Sizzling, Acid-Drenched Sixties 89
23103
248 Running Through the Jungle, Porterville, and Shooting
25Pool with an Automatic
269 Let It Bleed: No Sympathy for the Devils of Altamont 119
2710 Murder, Mayhem, Living Outside the Law 129
2811 Locked Up and Low Down—Angels on Ice 143
2912 RICO My Ass—the Law with the Funny Name 157
3013 Rats, Infil-Traitors, and Government 175
3114 Taz Kicks the Big C 183
32189
3315 Oakland in My Rearview Mirror, Informants Carefree
34Highway Through My Windshield
35Afterword: The Rap-Up 195
36About the Authors
37Credits
38Cover
39Copyright
40About the Publisher
41ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
42Thanks to everyone who helped make the club and myself what we
43are today.
44—Sonny
45Thanks to Fritz Clapp, Jim Fitzgerald, Cisco Valderrama, Sharon
46Barger, Bud and Shirley Rogers, Kent Russell, Mouldy Marvin Gilbert,
47Bobby Durt, Big Al Perryman, Guinea Colucci, the Oakland
48Hell’s Angels MC, Paul Slavit, Diane Austin, Bob Blasier, Ben Schafer,
49Paul Bresnick, Ben Myron, Tony Scott, and especially Deborah Zimmerman
50and Gladys Zimmerman and Sonny, Noel, and Sarrah.
51—The Zimmermen
52
53INTRODUCTION
54I knew all along that if I told my story straight up, just as it
55happened and without any apologies, the bike riders and citizens
56who love freedom and the open road would rise up and support
57my book and make it a bestseller. And that’s what happened.
58Within the first few months of the hardcover release, Hell’s Angel
59became a bestseller in the United States, the United Kingdom,
60Canada, and Germany. Translations are on the way in Italy, Norway,
61Sweden, Denmark, Japan, and even Turkey and Estonia. Like my
62Harley Road King, the book really took off.
63People all over the world have visited my website,
64www.sonnybarger.com, and posted their personal messages of
65support. They seem to have understood my central message: freedom
66ain’t cheap, don’t be a rat, and sometimes you have to literally fight
67to be free. And readers finally got the real story of the Hell’s Angels
68after decades of law enforcement garbage they’ve been spoon-fed
69through the media and crappy tell-all books and articles. This was
70a chance to clear up all the lies and distortions.
71Most writers/authors sign books and do press interviews in just
72the big cities like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and maybe
73Denver and San Francisco. That’s about it. Well, I knew that wasn’t
74gonna cut it with my people.
75After the “kick off” release of the book in New York City with a
76signing and a party that included the New York City chapter, the
77Sonny Barger 2000 Route 66 Tour started in Chicago and wound its
78way across the United States to the sunny shores of California. I
79wanted to sign books in real American places like Springfield (both
80Illinois and Missouri), St. Louis, Tulsa, Oklahoma City, Amarillo,
81and so forth. After Amarillo, we hit the West, my territory, spanning
82regions like New Mexico, Arizona, veering off to Vegas and finally,
83California and the West Coast.
84In addition to bookstores, we had signings in bike shops and
85Harley-Davidson dealerships all along the way. The bike shops became
86the answer, the place to really reach the die-hards. I guess they
87felt more comfortable around a grease pit or a showroom full of
88Harleys than a bookstore. If we drew three hundred people at a
89bookstore, a bike shop might draw more like six hundred to eight
90hundred people.
91After the Route 66 Tour, I shot off into all four corners of the
92United States, including Denver, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo,
93Rochester, Portland, Seattle, and lots of towns in the Northeast. I
94signed thousands of books at major motorcycle events such as the
95Black Hills Rally at Sturgis, South Dakota, the Four Corners Rally
96near Durango, Colorado, Biketoberfest in Daytona Beach, the New
97England Bike Spectacular in Boston, the Hollister Independence
98Rally in California, and even the Bulldog Bash in Strafordshire, England
99(my first time over there). The club also got involved, as many
100local Hell’s Angels chapters jumped in and sponsored signings in
101their areas.
102At my “homecoming signing” in Oakland, thirty Oakland Hell’s
103Angels rode with me to the signing at a local Harley dealership. That
104day I signed almost nine hundred books at an annual grand event
105with live music, custom motorcycles on display, and girls in bikinis
106washing bikes. The cops rode up and down the street, jealously
107checking up on us. We were partying. A typical Hell’s Angel signing
108event.
109As of this writing, the last leg of my spring tour includes HAMCsponsored
110signings in Phoenix and Anaheim. Then it’s off to the
111Laughlin River Run in Nevada, followed by a couple more bike shop
112appearances in Washington and Idaho (sponsored by our Washington
113Nomads chapter). After that, I’ll fly to Oslo and Copenhagen,
114then back for more HAMC-sponsored signings in Laconia, New
115Hampshire, Cape Cod, and San Diego.
116You get the picture. I’m on the move and the road doesn’t end,
117and I’m just where I want to be. Ten months after I bought my
118Harley-Davidson Road King, I have put on more than 40,000 miles,
119not counting air travel. Each signing seems to have its own story.
120I brought at least two club members to ride with me at all times.
121While on the Route 66 Tour, from Chicago down through St. Louis
122and Kansas City, there were more than forty club members riding
123with me. It was big fun. I told the publishers not to reserve any fancy
124hotel rooms. All we needed was gasoline and a place to sleep. We
125were packing light and would just pull into a motel (scaring the shit
126out of the clerk), party a little around our bikes (which were usually
127right outside our doors), and catch a little shut-eye before heading
128out the next morning.
129When we pulled into the St. Louis bookstore parking lot, we were
130viii / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
131a little early. The lady from the bookstore glanced at her watch and
132pointed across the street toward a tavern, “Hit the bar across the
133street, Mr. Barger. I’m buying.” With forty thirsty Hell’s Angels from
134Chicago and Minneapolis riding with me, boy, I wondered if she
135knew what she was getting into. We behaved.
136When we pulled into Doc’s Harley-Davidson dealership in St.
137Louis, the manager gave us free T-shirts and, although we were
138originally only scheduled for an hour, we signed more than five
139hundred books. They eventually ran out.
140After getting off my bike in Albuquerque, a Hell’s Angel ran up
141and grabbed me.
142“Hey brother, how are you doin’?”
143I was a little tired, just off the road, but I was okay with him, even
144though I didn’t know the guy. I saw that he was wearing a death
145head patch, but the bottom rocker said “International.” That seemed
146pretty strange. At first I thought it may have been an Australian
147patch, but no, I was mistaken. I became suspicious, so I asked the
148guy, “Hey man, do they let you wear that ‘International’ patch over
149there?”
150He just shrugged his shoulders.
151I told him, “Well, we don’t, and I want to talk to you about it when
152I get done signing.”
153I walked inside the bookstore and there were already about three
154hundred people in line, waiting to get their books signed. I sat down
155and signed two books when this guy with the strange patch walked
156by me again. One of the members tapped me on the shoulder.
157“Hey Sonny, look at that.”
158The guy was wearing a death head copied from the movie poster
159Hell’s Angels Forever. The design on the poster wasn’t a real death
160head; we altered it slightly so it would be just a little bit different
161from an authentic HAMC patch. I jumped up from the table and
162approached the guy wearing the phony death head.
163“Excuse me a minute,” I said, and a member and I took him aside.
164“Who the fuck are you? What’s going on?” I asked him.
165“I live here in Albuquerque,” he said.
166“Give me that patch,” I told him.
167“Why?” he answered back.
168Wrong answer.
169We took the jacket off him, as well as his T-shirt that said “Oakland”
170on it, gave him another shirt to wear, and sent him packing
171Hell’s Angel / ix
172and regretting his stupidity. I assured the people in line (some looked
173a little startled) that things were cool. “Sorry for the delay.
174Everything’s taken care of. Don’t worry.”
175Then I sat down and resumed signing books.
176Also in Albuquerque, my bodyguard, Joby from the Cave Creek
177Hell’s Angels, got arrested for carrying his gun. The signing in Albuquerque
178was in a bookstore that was part of a mall complex that
179had a lot more than just a bookstore. There was also a liquor store
180and a restaurant that served liquor. Well, Albuquerque is sort of like
181Arizona; you can carry a gun out in the open, but you can’t take it
182inside any establishment that sells liquor. (That and a bank.) Anyway,
183bookstore, liquor store, hell, we didn’t know. Joby ended up getting
184arrested for possession of a firearm. We ponied up five hundred
185bucks for a lawyer, and the case was eventually dismissed. The judge
186said, “You can carry a weapon, just don’t carry it in Albuquerque.”
187Man, they love us in Albuquerque.
188During the first few signings, the bookstore people told me they
189would be happy if I signed eighty to one hundred books. The women
190especially, who ran many of the bookshops, were pleased with the
191way things were going, especially when we would sell four or five
192times what they expected us to sign. Publishers Weekly ran a feature
193story about how well organized we were, how unusual the tour was,
194and how surprised bookstore owners were with the success of the
195book. After a while, I’d get into a groove where I could sign about
196120 books an hour, including the time taken to snap a picture, shake
197a hand, or lecture the kids who came with their parents about not
198smoking. A lot of bike riders would bring their kids, so I used the
199opportunity to ask them, “You know why I talk this way?” referring
200to my raspy voice.
201Looking up at the gauze patch covering the hole in my throat,
202they’d usually shake their heads.
203“Because I smoked cigarettes. Promise me you won’t ever smoke
204cigarettes.”
205The parents would smile as the kid and I shook hands on the deal.
206Hopefully I’ve cost the big tobacco companies a few young customers.
207Normally, after about two or three hours of signing books, the
208ladies in these stores would ask me if I needed to take a break. Trying
209not to break my stride, I’d politely decline.
210x / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
211“No ma’am, we have a long line of people here waiting. Let’s take
212care of them all.”
213That prompted one mild-mannered store manager to get into the
214outlaw spirit. “The next time I get a mealy-mouthed writer complaining
215about signing for forty-five minutes,” she said, “I’m gonna tell
216’em, ‘Fuck you!’”
217Atta girl!
218I was signing away at a bookstore in Oklahoma City, when a long,
219tall cowpoke walked into the store to stand in line. He looked cold
220and mean, and I could feel this guy’s stare as he inched closer and
221closer to the front of the line. When he finally got to the front table,
222I noticed that he hadn’t even bought a book. I thought to myself,
223“Oh boy, I knew we’re gonna get into a fight with this motherfucker.”
224He stood on the other side of my signing table as I pushed my chair
225back a little bit. I was ready to jump up, nail him first, and not even
226give him time to make the first move.
227“You know,” he said to me, “I think I finally figured you out.”
228“What have you figured out?” I asked him, ready to kick over the
229table and stomp some ass.
230“You Hell’s Angels are exactly like us cowboys,” he said. “You
231wanna ride your motorcycles without government intrusion, and
232we just want to raise our cattle without the government breathing
233down our necks. Thanks a lot. I read your book twice.”
234He turned around and walked away.
235Sometimes the lines were so long that some of my fans read the
236whole book while they were waiting to get it signed and say hello!
237In Modesto, where my sister Shirley insisted on setting up a book
238signing, the Legends Harley-Davidson Cafe was so packed that the
239local bookstore manager had to go down the long line and beg customers
240not to buy more than one book each so they wouldn’t run
241out too fast. We caught him flat-footed. They should have trusted
242Shirley. She knew the crowds would come.
243The previous week, I signed more than eight hundred books in
244San Diego at the Harley dealership before they ran out. That’s what
245put us over, and we broke on to the New York Times bestseller list.
246Most of the cities on our tour were closely spaced and it was easy
247to do one each day. Generally the ride between sites was only a
248couple hundred miles. Once in a while, my pack of riders would get
249a chance to ride full throttle on the open road. When we finished up
250in Oregon, we rode straight on to Englewood, Colorado, to the
251Columbine Harley-Davidson dealership. That was one of our longest
252Hell’s Angel / xi
253runs. We rode so fast, we got there a day early. Incidentally, the last
254time I’d been in Englewood was in 1988, when the feds first put me
255in prison at their facility in Englewood during my last stretch in the
256joint.
257After the Englewood signing, we had to hightail our bikes down
258to the Four Corners bike rally near Durango, Colorado. This was
259scheduled a little too tight for the distance. We rode eighty to ninety
260miles an hour the whole way. Since we got there a half-day late,
261there were long lines of people waiting to get their books signed. I
262hopped off my bike and started signing, pronto. I never like to disappoint
263anybody.
264We had two Harley shop signings scheduled when we tooled into
265Los Angeles. First was Book Soup, which went well even though
266we were competing with a Lakers play-off game. Over at the Glendale
267Harley the next morning, I started signing earlier than advertised.
268When it was all over with, I had scribbled “Sonny” on almost 700
269books.
270That same afternoon we were scheduled to ride into Universal
271Studios CityWalk, to appear at a Harley boutique. But a problem
272erupted when the security police at the shopping mall where the
273boutique was located proclaimed they wouldn’t let club members
274wear their patches. Fuck that bullshit. Cops intruding, calling
275bookstores and radio stations, and sticking their noses into our
276signings was nothing new. We canceled the Universal signing. Their
277restrictions were unacceptable. The Glendale Harley dealership
278owner who had treated us so well also owned the Universal City
279store. It wasn’t his fault. So after an entire day of signing in Glendale,
280I stayed late and signed extra books so they could sell them to people
281who missed us in Universal City.
282The next day, we visited a fashionable used-clothing shop that
283reportedly had a fake Hell’s Angel patch. Five of us rolled into the
284L.A. shop. As we walked in, the clerk’s face turned white. I asked
285him where he got the bogus patch. I took the jacket with the bogus
286patch off the hanger and brought it to the counter. Then I took out
287my knife and began cutting the patch off the leather jacket.
288“Nobody but a Hell’s Angel is allowed to wear something like
289this. Besides, this patch is a phony.”
290The clerk mentioned something about it being bought by the
291owner who was not there.
292“Hey,” the guy said. “I’m…giving it to you, okay? Since you guys
293are all here, why don’t you just take the jacket too?” Pete from Dago
294xii / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
295slapped a buck on the counter in payment and we left peaceably
296with the bogus patch.
297Our next stop was Venice, California. We had a good time signing
298at a writers’ group called Beyond Baroque. It was different than the
299other signings, a little more…artsy. My two cowriters, Keith and
300Kent Zimmerman, read from the book and then Dennis Hopper
301came out and introduced me as one of his favorite American heroes.
302A couple of bike clubs showed up, including a nice bunch of Viet
303Nam vets on Harleys. Their motorcycles parked on the grass, bikers
304mixed with vets, vets mixed with writers, and all of us surrounded
305by braless chicks. It felt almost like the sixties.
306I knew the local and federal cops would keep sticking their noses
307into things even though I wasn’t always aware of them. In Oregon,
308the police went to a bookstore and told the manager, “You know,
309the Hell’s Angels killed somebody at the last book signing. You gotta
310stop this.” Of course, it was all a lie.
311I did a radio interview at a station in Los Angeles and the cops
312called the radio host before his air shift and asked for a tape. A few
313months later, we were supposed to sign books at another Harley
314dealership. A local Hell’s Angel chapter sponsored the event and
315promoted it, so lots of people were roaring and ready to show up.
316A few days before the signing, the acting chief of police told the
317dealer that if he sponsored a Hell’s Angel event in their town, the
318police would not bring their Harleys in for service at the guy’s
319dealership anymore. He canceled the signing, but we staged it anyway
320at a little bar farther down the road.
321The best cop story on the tour happened in Florida at the Daytona
322Biketoberfest, a huge motorcycle event.
323The gang squads usually kept an eye on us. During a break from
324the signing, I walked around to look for a place to get something to
325eat. We ended up in a 7-Eleven. The parking lot was literally filled
326with a thousand people milling around the area. Tons of bikers. A
327lot of people recognized me from the signing, so I was hanging out,
328shooting the bull with them.
329Up rode three bicycle cops, big kids really, in their twenties with
330short pants and cop uniforms wearing bicycle helmets. They were
331riding around checking out the crowd, maintaining peace. Ha!
332They see me standing there and yell out, “Hey, hey, hey!”
333“You talking to me?” I asked.
334“Yeah.”
335Hell’s Angel / xiii
336“First off, my name isn’t ‘Hey.’” (I learned that line from Lurch
337in prison.)
338“Come on over here,” the cop, a sergeant, on one of the bicycles
339orders me, “I gotta talk to you.”
340Everybody hanging out moved in closer to see and hear what
341might happen. We were all in a big circle as people poked into our
342conversation, trying to figure out what was going on between a
343hungry Hell’s Angel and three roving bicycle cops. “What do you
344think you’re doin’?” the sergeant asked me.
345“I’m going to eat.”
346“No, I mean, what are you doing wearing a patch? Hell’s Angels
347can’t wear patches in this town.”
348“Fuck you,” I muttered.
349“Well, I gotta see some ID. I have to check this out,” said the tallest
350one, the sergeant.
351I was disgusted, hungry, and desperately trying to keep my cool.
352“Look, I’ve already been checked out by your people.”
353“By who?” he asked.
354“How the fuck do I know? Your gang squad, I assume.” From
355town to town, the first cops to question me usually came from the
356local gang squad. When I get pulled over on the highway, I’m usually
357detained until someone from the squad gives the all-clear and lets
358me ride on.
359The cop gets on his walkie-talkie phone, with everybody listening
360in, and calls his command center. This sergeant was acting really
361serious and professional as he barked into the phone receiver that
362was strapped to his shoulder. We could hear the voice on the other
363end of the line.
364“Listen, I’ve got this Hell’s Angel stopped here,” he says, “and
365he’s wearing a patch. He says the gang squad has already checked
366him out. His name is Ralph “Sonny” Barger. Could you check on
367this for me?”
368Long pause. Everybody then heard the squawk as the captain
369back at the command center yells over the young cop’s walkie-talkie:
370“DON’T FUCK WITH THAT GUY!”
371I knew I had a pass. “See ya later, Sarge.” I grabbed a burrito and
372headed back.
373So that is my life now. Riding my bike, meeting old friends and
374new people, signing books, and oops, I almost forgot, writing a new
375xiv / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
376book that should be out in 2002 sometime. I’m on that never-ending,
377winding road…. It may be the same road that runs through your
378town.
379—Sonny Barger
380Hell’s Angel / xv
381
3821
383MUSTERTO
384CUSTER
385A motorcycle run is a get-together, a moving party. It’s a real
386show of power and solidarity when you’re a Hell’s Angel. It’s being
387free and getting away from all the bullshit. Angels don’t go on runs
388looking for trouble; we go to ride our bikes and to have a good time
389together. We are a club.
390Most Hell’s Angels are great riders. A group of Hell’s Angels
391cruising down the road, riding next to each other and traveling at a
392speed of over eighty miles an hour, is a real sight. It’s something
393else, a whole other thing, when you’re in the pack riding. It’s fast
394and dangerous and by God, you better be paying attention. Whatever
395happens to the guy in front of you is going to happen to you. It’s
396different from other vehicles. You gotta be alert. Like Fuzzy, an
397Oakland Angel, once said, “God damn, we do eighty-five or ninety
398in the rain sometimes. I don’t even go that fast in my car!”
399When Hell’s Angels chapters started getting chartered outside
400the state of California in the late sixties, that’s when we first started
401our cross-country rides like the USA and World Runs. We’d meet
402up with the new clubs along the way, and they’d join the run.
403Man,we used to ride from Oakland to New York on those early rigidframe
404bikes, and they bounced around so much that if you drove
405sixty miles in an hour you were making great time. The vibration
406left you tingling and numb for about an hour after you got off your
407bike. If you covered three or four hundred miles in a day you were
408hauling ass. The other big problem then was that we’d have to find
409gas stations every forty miles or so, since those old-style bikes with
410small tanks couldn’t make it past sixty miles. Today, on a Harley
411FXRT, with their rubber-mounted motors and big gas tanks, you
412not only get a smoother ride, you can log five or six hundred miles
413a day on a few tanks of gas without breaking a sweat.
414The big differences between the Hell’s Angels and the rest of the
415motorcycle world are our bikes and the way we ride. This is serious
416business to us. Our bikes are us. We know that. The cops know that,
417and everybody else should know that too. The law and the road are
418one. Even today, if the cops know a large group of Hell’s Angels is
419headed somewhere, they’ll show up in force, alerting neighboring
420police forces along the way. This mutual assistance pact they set up
421has been used against us for as long as I can remember. It’s no different
422today than it was thirty years ago. We keep going and they
423keep coming around with all their surveillance methods and radio
424equipment watching us and keeping tabs. We don’t look for trouble
425or have intentions of starting any, but by God, it always seems to
426be around.
427The reactions of law enforcement can depend on where you are.
428We were on the road tearing through the Texas panhandle and on
429into Oklahoma. As we approached Oklahoma City, ten or twelve
430Oklahoma state troopers pulled onto the freeway and escorted us
431right through the city limits. They didn’t even want us stopping for
432gas.
433In Texas a cop asked me, “Excuse me, partner, but…why do you
434and your friends carry those big knives?”
435I told him, “Because we’re all felons and we can’t carry a big gun
436like you.”
437Another time in Missouri, fifteen of us were sitting by the side of
438the road taking a break when a state trooper pulled up, got out of
439his car, walked up to us, and said, “Mind if I ask a stupid question?”
440“Not if you don’t mind a stupid answer.”
441“What are fifteen Hell’s Angels from California doing sitting on
442the side of the road in Missouri?”
443“We lost four or five of our people and now we can’t figure out
444where they’re at.”
445The trooper thought for a few seconds. “I just might be able to
446help you. I could get on my radio and start checking around and
447help you find them.” He radioed around to a bunch of stations and
448other troopers, and once he located them, he gave us directions on
449how to meet up with our lost brothers.
450On the other side of the coin, there was a cop in Texas who spotted
451us on a highway outside of Amarillo, got scared, or else thought he
452was doing his job, and called for reinforcements. They roadblocked
453the highway in front of us with machine guns. Another time on our
454way to South Carolina we were stopped and each of us was ID’d. It
4552 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
456took over two hours, and all for nothing. Cops can be assholes when
457they want to be.
458The Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club has four or five mandatory
459runs per year and probably fifteen or twenty parties and smaller
460runs. If you multiply that by the forty years the Oakland club has
461been around, that’s a lot of motorcycling. But of all the runs, there
462is one in particular that sticks in my mind, and that was the time we
463descended on the big annual Black Hills motorcycle run in Sturgis,
464South Dakota, in 1982. I’ll try to describe it as best as I can remember
465it, because in my mind it separated the sheep from the goats. We
466code-named that run “Muster to Custer.”
467There was another motorcycle club—whose name I won’t mention
468because it is a big club and we’ve been at odds with them for
469years—who in early 1982 had said publicly that the only reason the
470Hell’s Angels didn’t go to Sturgis was because they went to Sturgis.
471I heard about it from the club guys in New York City, and my first
472response was “Fuck that. I’m going to Sturgis.” Of course, when I
473announced I was going, the entire Oakland chapter discussed it and
474stood up. They were going to Sturgis too. Pretty soon, the word
475spread through the rest of the Hell’s Angels chapters. Their response
476was the same. Everybody was going to Sturgis. The “Muster to
477Custer” was on.
478We had a West Coast club run to Frisco, Colorado, already
479planned. We decided that after we partied for a few days there,
480everybody would hop on their bikes and ride straight on to Sturgis.
481All of the Hell’s Angels—from the East Coast to the West
482Coast—needed to meet at a certain spot, so we could stage the mass
483ride into Sturgis without interference from the police or the rival
484club.
485How did we all meet together without anybody else knowing?
486Mouldy Marvin and some of his East Coast club friends had this
487old saying, HAMCOE—Hell’s Angels Muster to Custer or Else!
488Knowing that many of the Hell’s Angels’ phones were tapped,
489Marvin telephoned the East Coast Angels and said, “H-A-M-C-OE.
490Get it? Noon, Friday.” The word spread quickly: the East Coast
491would meet in Custer, South Dakota, and hook up with the West
492Coast chapters there and then an entire group of Hell’s Angels would
493motorcycle into Sturgis together.
494The run from Oakland to Frisco, Colorado, to Custer began as
495Hell’s Angel / 3
496usual. We all gathered at our Oakland clubhouse on the last Sunday
497of July 1982. We were scheduled to leave at nine o’clock that morning
498with about thirty of us riding out.
499Each member is responsible for his own machine. He has to make
500sure his bike is in good enough condition to make it there and back
501on a long run. Before the Saturday run to Colorado, a bunch of us
502met at my place on Friday night for a garage fest. If you need to
503wrench up your bike, check the muffler, put in a new set of plugs,
504change the oil, or replace a tire, every member pitches in. If somebody
505needs a new primary chain and you have an extra one, you
506jump in and spot that brother for it until he can get you a replacement
507when we all get back.
508I’m kind of hyper on preparation, so I’ll go around checking bikes
509a little before we leave. Sort of like inspection during my Army days.
510A lot of guys would get kinda pissed off at me for it, but fuck it,
511that’s what I liked to do.
512There’s no serendipity when it comes to the way we ride. You
513can’t believe the rush you feel in your gut when everybody is kickstarting
514their bikes and we’re ready to go. We have a strict formation
515in the front part of the pack. I always rode front left, and the rest of
516the officers rode in the front of the pack. Usually the vice president
517rides front right, because he’s the most “legal” person of our group.
518He carries the bail money. From that point back, it’s a motherfucking
519free-for-all drag race, jockeying for position. Guys like Deacon and
520Fuzzy would be banging their handlebars, neither one giving an
521inch. After the first ten spots are taken, the rest fall back in from
522there. Mouldy Marvin is a big tough dude (with an IQ of 180, I’m
523told) that a lot of guys liked to ride behind. Why? Because if he saw
524some obstacle or something on the road, he’d warn those behind
525him. And he’d do it with hand signals, without looking back either.
526At night, he’d shine his flashlight on the road signs too. That’s why
527Marvin rides near the front.
528But there were others like Fu Griffin whom you didn’t want to
529ride behind. He always had a pair of tennis shoes dangling by the
530laces hanging off the back of his bike. You never knew when one
531might fall off, bounce off the road, and hit you in the face. At eighty
532miles per hour, that would hurt even a Hell’s Angel.
533There’s an art to leading a motorcycle pack, because you have to
534be able to anticipate things like lane changes in traffic, shithead
535drivers, gas stops, and stopovers on the open road. The Oakland
536club has a long-ass pack that maybe goes on for half a mile. I can’t
5374 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
538just think about whether I can make a lane change myself; I’m responsible
539for the safety of the rest of the riders. Speed limit is a big
540thing too. We know we can do eighty-five to ninety on an open
541freeway, but in some regions if you don’t stay closer to the speed
542limit, you’re gonna really get jacked. Finally, you need to know exactly
543where you’re going and how many miles you can go, knowing
544what kind of gas tanks the others have. After going about a hundred
545miles, it’s up to me to decide when everyone can gas up. Before we
546leave a gas station, one guy is in charge of counting up all the bikes.
547We don’t want anybody left behind or stranded.
548After leaving Oakland, it took us a few days to get to Frisco,
549Colorado, right outside of Denver. We slept outside and the weather
550was good. At night we had the usual fucking around, partying and
551all, and a big fire. We also had the usual gawkers who came to see
552what we were all about. That leg of the trip passed without incident.
553When the West Coast members got to Custer, South Dakota, we
554met a couple hundred more, which gave us a total of about four
555hundred ready-to-go Hell’s Angels. Man, this was a fucking army
556now, and together we were going to ride as one gigantic Hell’s Angels
557pack into Sturgis. We were gonna be together on the road,
558brothers, till the wind stopped blowin’, the grass stopped growin’,
559and the river stopped flowin’.
560After another night of partying, the next morning we proceeded
561from Custer up to Rapid City up onto Highway 90. It was about
562twenty-five miles from there to Sturgis on a nice flat highway that
563passed through little towns like Black Hawk and Tilford. You could
564see for miles and miles across the rolling plains, but the highway,
565hell, it was filled side to side with Hell’s Angels. The general roar
566of our Harleys filled the landscape. Cisco, president of the Oakland
567chapter, remembers the numbers. “We were like the Crusaders and
568Genghis Khan and the Jesse James gang all rolled into one. This was
569the same territory where Crazy Horse led his Sioux warriors in 1876
570against General George Armstrong Custer.”
571I was riding at the front of the entire pack and felt as if no power
572could stop us. It was like I became Chief Crazy Horse leading the
573charge with hundreds and hundreds of motorcycles all going eighty
574miles per hour. People in the towns heard the roar of our bikes way
575before they even saw us. The local police just looked the other way;
576“Closed” signs flipped over on the merchants’ windows as they
577Hell’s Angel / 5
578locked their doors; mothers grabbed their babies from their yards
579and ran into their houses. Cars swerved over to the side of the road.
580But others, like the farmers, took off their caps and put them to their
581hearts and chests, and the local fire departments saluted us.
582Members who weren’t felons were heavily strapped. South Dakota
583law said we could have guns, so we wore ’em. Cisco wore his vest
584cut in a way so that the two Model 59 Smith & Wesson pistols he
585carried stuck out of his pockets. We weren’t legally required to wear
586any headgear either, but Deacon wore his medieval meshed battle
587helmet. It went well with the sword he was carrying on his back.
588We pulled into Sturgis, got off our bikes, and walked through the
589town, strapped and tall. There were over fifty thousand bike riders
590in town that day, and the mood was dark and brooding. People
591sensed the Hell’s Angels were there for a purpose. The crowd was
592quiet, and as we walked down the street it opened up like the Red
593Sea. Some bike riders who thought we were out to get them tore off
594their colors or patches, threw them on the ground, and ran and hid
595in the bars. Others just stood their ground and didn’t move. Everybody
596kept their distance from the Hell’s Angels. A line of state
597troopers took pictures of us, so we pulled out our cameras and took
598pictures of them. Newspaper reporters took pictures of the cops
599taking pictures of us taking pictures of them. It was a circus.
600We stuck around for about four hours, just to make sure there
601was no doubt we were in town. The word was out, “Let’s get it on.”
602But nobody showed up.
603Before leaving, we swept through the whole town once more,
604looking inside the open bars and down side streets. Short of the U.S.
605Army, nobody was going to keep us from doing what we wanted,
606what we needed to do. Fifty thousand bike riders weren’t about to
607mess with four hundred Hell’s Angels.
608As we left town, thousands of people lined the streets. But it was
609absolutely quiet. Other bikers gave us clenched-fisted salutes to
610show us their support.
611Those tough guys from the unmentionable club were nowhere to
612be found that day in Sturgis. If they were, they certainly didn’t make
613themselves visible either as individuals or as a group. When nothing
614broke loose, we all took the attitude “Who gives a fuck what happens,
615let’s have a good time, today is a good day.” We left Sturgis and
616went to party.
617We might have died that afternoon if trouble had erupted, but at
6186 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
619least we would have done it with style and dignity, because we believed
620in our brotherhood and the backs of our jackets.
621Why this 1982 Sturgis Run, the Muster to Custer, was impor-tant
622and significant to me was that it had proved again, as had been
623proved so many times over the years, that I belonged right where I
624was, with my club. I didn’t have millions of dollars and wasn’t on
625the cover of Time magazine either, but what I did have was respect.
626Respect from those who counted on me. After all, I said to myself,
627I was Sonny Barger. I was a Hell’s Angel.
628Hell’s Angel / 7
629
6302
631BLUE-COLLAR
632OAKLAND,
633JUNGLE JIM’S,
634AND RALPH
635THE LUMPER
636The Barger clan split their time between Modesto in Central
637California and Oakland, sixty miles to the north. When I was born,
638my old man, Ralph Hubert Barger, Sr., worked in the Central Valley
639laying down pavement on the old Highway 99—way before there
640was any such thing as a main freeway running the whole length of
641the state. My father slept in motor court shacks near the roadwork
642sites in little shit towns like Galt or Tracy across Highway 99. Because
643his work kept him away from the family for weeks at a time, my
644mother, Kathryn Carmella Barger, my older sister, Shirley Marie,
645and I traveled like gypsies to and fro, back and forth, north and
646south, between Oakland and Modesto. In Oakland, the three of us
647used to stay with my grandma on my dad’s side. While my father
648shoveled his way through the dust storms and asphalt fumes,
649Kathryn Carmella jockeyed us between a battered rental in Modesto
650and my grandma Barger’s modest flat in Oakland. To get around,
651the three of us traveled on a Continental Trailways bus.
652Leave it to my mother. When I was four months old, she ran off
653with the Trailways bus driver. My mother left me with a baby-sitter
654in Modesto the day she split and never came back. When she didn’t
655show, the sitter called the cops to come get me. Here I was, a baby,
656and I was already downtown, booked into social services. My father
657and Shirley came home to find I was gone. After a few calls, they
658bused down to the county office to claim me. One of Shirley’s earliest
659childhood memories was looking up at the high counter while a
660county social worker handed me back to my father.
661Suffering from respiratory problems and a breathing disorder,
662Kathryn Barger moved south to a drier, hotter climate, to a little
663town called Twenty-nine Palms, leaving us to fend for ourselves. I
664didn’t know at the time whether my mother was dead or alive. As
665far as my father was concerned, she was gone and buried.
666Ralph Sr. was a piece of work: a hardworking, hard-drinking
667functioning alcoholic. While he liked to work, he loved to drink even
668more. He was a simple man. A walking contradiction. A teamster
669who rarely drove a car and didn’t even have a legal driver’s license.
670He could drive, but he hated to, so he took the bus everywhere he
671went, or else somebody drove him. Or else he just walked.
672My father was about my height—five feet nine inches—but built
673stronger and a little stockier. He held lots of jobs. After his stint on
674Highway 99, he worked for a meat-packing company, then a freight
675company. But for most of his life, he registered at the union hall as
676a lumper. He’d go down to the hall—Local 70—each morning and
677sign in, and they’d ship him out, loading and unloading trucks or
678ships on the docks in Oakland. Because he always drank on Saturdays
679and Sundays, my father never worked Mondays, which is
680why he worked so many different jobs. Most places needed you for
681a full week’s work. Not Ralph Sr.
682During World War II, my father hoisted freight at a loading dock
683facility, where he also read blueprints and worked with the shipbuilders
684at the Oakland piers. After World War II, he retreated back
685to a more basic job of being a teamster and a drinker.
686After my mother split, Nora Barger, my grandmother, a widow
687in her sixties, took us back to Oakland to live permanently. My
688father found us all a rented house on Oakland’s East Side, on East
68917th Street.
690We didn’t lock our doors. Our front door opened right onto the
691street, but we never worried. It was a far different America in the
6921940s. You read about Depression-era criminals like John Dillinger
693who robbed stores and banks, but they rarely burglarized the houses
694of working white or black families, at least not in working-class
695Oakland. Few blacks lived in East Oakland; the majority of black
696folks lived in the western end of the city.
697Every Sunday, Grandma Barger took Shirley and me to the
698Pentecostal church, which was scary and filled with tongue-yammering
699Holy Rollers. Across the street was the Catholic church, St. Anthony’s.
700Each Christmas, we’d find two gift-wrapped boxes marked
701“boy” and “girl” lodged in the screen door of the house, courtesy
70210 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
703of St. Anthony’s. Thanksgiving dinner consisted of a turkey carcass
704my father brought home from one of the bars or restaurants boiled
705the next day into soup. Happy holidays Barger-style.
706We never went hungry. We always ate, even if it was only one
707meal a day. Sometimes Grandma made spaghetti, but there was
708never a salad or vegetable to go with it. That would be considered
709a whole different meal. We didn’t even have a refrigerator, only an
710icebox with no ice.
711Ralph Sr. kept the family going—barely—with the help of
712Grandma Barger. We Bargers came from a typical mixture of immigrant
713stock. Mother was Italian, father a mixture of German and
714Dutch. One of our cousins was actually semifamous. Dean Davenport
715was one of Jimmy Doolittle’s raiders in World War II. He was a
716navigator on the Ruptured Duck and broke his collarbone bailing out
717over China during the war. He was portrayed by an actor named
718Tim Murdock in the 1944 movie Thirty Seconds over Tokyo.
719My father liked to take me to the bars with him in Jack London
720Square, not far from the ports where he humped cargo. We went to
721joints like the First and Last Chance Saloon. It wasn’t unusual for
722kids then to sit inside barrooms and taverns with their folks. I’d sit
723on a barstool next to my father, stealing pretzels and hard-boiled
724eggs. Within two blocks of our house there were seven bars and
725taverns, action on nearly every corner. Dad never had to stagger too
726far to get home. His favorite neighborhood spot was a dive called
727Jungle Jim’s.
728Jungle Jim’s was dark and decorated in a pirate motif. The bartender
729kept a long, colorful row of live parrots sitting on their perches
730and squawking in their cages. After a Jungle Jim’s regular taught
731one of the birds how to cuss, some of the earliest dirty words I heard
732came out of the beaks of parrots and not from the mouths of sailors
733on liberty from the nearby Alameda shipyards.
734Pop didn’t drink hard liquor until much later in his life. He was
735a beer man. It was nothing for him to toddle home from work and
736down a couple of six-packs of beer before dinner—Budweiser in the
737bottle—then another sixer afterward.
738My family has always called me Sonny. If there’s one thing—and
739one thing only—I can thank my mother for, it is the shred of Italian
740upbringing she left behind. I was Ralph Hubert Barger, Jr., but it
741was a long-standing tradition for Italians to call their first-born son
742Sonny. I didn’t care. It sure beat being called Junior—not to mention
743Ralph or Hubert—all my life.
744Hell’s Angel / 11
745Grandma Barger died in 1946. I was eight years old, and it was a
746tricky time for Shirley and me, since my dad always needed someone
747to look after him, cook his meals, and clean his clothes. The whole
748neighborhood knew Shirley and I lived with a drunk. The guys at
749the Standard gas station across the street used to look out for us.
750They’d pay Shirley and me a quarter per book to stamp the pages
751of their charge books with the company stamp. After my father got
752drunk at Jungle Jim’s, he’d usually cut across the gas station on his
753way back home, so the guys would call Shirley and me to come and
754get Dad. We’d drag him home and dump him into his bed.
755Even though my father was fairly tough, he wasn’t much of a
756fighter. During the war he was the neighborhood air raid warden.
757He avoided confrontation at all costs, and as a result was beaten up
758a few times. One time he grew a mustache and some guys thought
759he looked like Hitler, so they beat him up and stole his money.
760There were always friends coming by the house. On Sundays, a
761man named Erland used to drive Shirley and me somewhere special.
762Riding in a car always got me car sick, but we’d go fishing in the
763Carquinez River and go to battleship christenings and air shows.
764Since he was a pilot, Erland even flew us in an airplane. His being
765around helped Shirley and me through the tough times, although
766we never considered ourselves that bad off. The way I saw it, we
767always had food in our bellies, clothes on our backs, and a radio.
768I was kind of dragged through Oakland’s public schools, first
769Bella Vista Grammar School, then Roosevelt Junior High School,
770and finally on to Oakland High. I was considered a fuckup. I didn’t
771take to authority. As long as I can remember—maybe because my
772father treated me more like a pal than a son—I never liked being
773told what to do.
774Whenever I’d get into trouble, it was usually up to Shirley to fetch
775me at school. I was generally shy, but I had a horrendous temper. I
776was kicked out of the fifth grade for a while after the teacher gave
777me a bad time. I jumped off a ledge onto his back and wouldn’t let
778go, hanging on like a pissed-off monkey. I was suspended again
779from grammar school after an incident during a lunchtime softball
780game. There was my team, which never lost, playing the team that
781never won a single game. The teacher on duty decided it was fair
782to hand the underdogs five runs right off the top. We scored four
783runs, while they scored zero. When the teacher pronounced them
784the winners, I got so pissed off I whacked him on the leg with a
785baseball bat. Dad had to come down to the school to get me and I
78612 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
787got suspended for two weeks. Even today, the unfairness of that
788game still bugs me.
789My father got remarried to a woman named Sylvia. Grandma and
790Sylvia’s mother were friends, and when Sylvia came west to visit
791Oakland from Council Bluffs, Iowa, she never went back. She took
792up with my father. Sylvia wasn’t exactly our first choice for a
793mother, but Ralph Sr. seemed to want a woman around the house
794again. I couldn’t stand the bitch, nor could I stomach her parents,
795either. They were hicks. When Sylvia married my father, her parents
796moved out from Iowa and bought a food market in Hayward.
797Sylvia’s parents hated my father, because he liked to drink and have
798a good time. Sylvia got pregnant pretty quick and one daughter,
799Virginia Lee Barger, was born out of the marriage.
800Those years with Sylvia around were fucked up. I’ll give you a
801small example. We were walking to church once when she suddenly
802remembered she’d forgotten to put on her lipstick, so we had to
803walk all the way back home.
804Sylvia was hardly mother material when we squawked or screwed
805up. We learned real fast what a switch was for.
806In the 1940s there was really only one kind of bicycle made, a
807twenty-six-inch Schwinn one-speed with coaster brakes. I had a red
808one and I got into a really big fight with my stepmother’s parents
809over it. They didn’t think I should own a bicycle. To them it was always
810“Can’t go here, can’t do this, can’t do that.” I thought, man,
811my life is none of your damned business. They argued I was too
812young to be riding around on my own, so independent. My father
813felt otherwise, so he let me have the bike.
814During the summer and on weekends, I’d pedal down to the ferry
815building in Oakland and take the boat across the bay to San Francisco.
816To me, San Francisco was the big city. When you went to San
817Francisco, you were going to “the city.” Compared to San Francisco,
818Oakland was a hick town. San Francisco was shrimp cocktail and
819oysters; Oakland was beer and peanuts.
820On those rides—the earliest Frisco runs—my next-door neighbors,
821Billy and Dale, and I would bike around Frisco just for the fun of it
822and see how the rich folks lived. It was simple—all you needed was
823a quarter to catch the ferry. When you’re that young, twenty-five
824cents could be your whole week’s take.
825You knew the difference between Oakland and Frisco the minute
826you rode off the ferryboat, past the piers, and onto the streets. Billy,
827Dale, and I never journeyed too far. We stuck around the port area
828Hell’s Angel / 13
829and ventured up to Market Street. They didn’t have bike lanes or
830restricted areas back then. We rode on the sidewalks and on the
831streets, weaving and darting around all the men in their business
832suits or couples visiting as tourists.
833I saw so many tall buildings sprouted up along both sides of
834Market Street. The luxury hotels, like the Sheraton Palace and the
835St. Francis Hotel, had well-dressed families waiting out front for
836shiny taxicabs. Women wore fur coats and it wasn’t even cold outside.
837Back home, Oakland didn’t have many tall buildings downtown,
838only the old Tribune clock tower.
839I never asked my father if it was okay to go. I just went. We would
840spend a few hours in San Francisco and take the ferry back before
841sundown. The only time my family would go near San Francisco
842was when we went over to Daly City, to visit my cousin Karen. I
843didn’t realize it until I was much older, but San Francisco to me is
844an East Coast city on the West Coast while Oakland is a Midwest
845city on the West Coast.
846After my father and Sylvia married, I was diagnosed with a blood
847disorder. I had to have two shots at a time each week. They’d take
848me to the doctor and inject me in the butt, where I had the most
849flesh. The way it went was my stepmother would promise to take
850me downtown to buy me something, but then it always turned out
851to be those damned shots. This must have started my hatred of
852needles.
853I came home one afternoon from Bella Vista Grammar School to
854find Sylvia had walked out on my father, taking my stepsister, Virginia
855Lee, with her. When she left, she took everything—what little
856we had—including our encyclopedia and radio; everything we
857owned except for our beds and dishes. She cleaned us out, even
858filching our piddling school bank accounts. She didn’t get far—to
859San Leandro, just a few miles down the road. Not really knowing if
860he would ever see them again, my father made a lame, drunken attempt
861at suicide. Sylvia and my father had been together for about
862four years. I have not seen her or my stepsister since the day they
863walked out.
864At fifteen, my sister, Shirley, took back control of the household.
865She cooked, cleaned, and baby-sat, while I contributed by working
866odd jobs, stashing the money I’d earn with a neighbor down the
867street named Mrs. Long. She held on to our dough for us, because
86814 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
869if Dad got it, man, I knew where it would go. Shirley and I used the
870money to buy our school clothes and stuff. Rent was only sixteen
871dollars a month, but we were still one year behind. And yet we were
872never on welfare. The school felt sorry for Shirley, so she didn’t have
873to be there until after home room, giving her time to send my father
874off to work and me off to school with a sack lunch.
875As I got to be a teenager, I was already bored with school. What
876else is new? That’s when I began working at the corner grocery store.
877The owner, Archie, and his wife hired me for two dollars each Saturday,
878pretty good dough for a thirteen-year-old. Putting in even
879more hours after school, I was soon bringing home close to seven
880bucks a week. Almost thirty bucks a month was a friggin’ fortune
881for a kid.
882Shirley turned sixteen and ran away with an older guy from the
883neighborhood. I felt betrayed, though she and her lover boy made
884it only as far as San Diego, leaving a trail of bad checks that Shirley
885had signed without really knowing what she was doing. She was
886caught and hauled back. My father made her stay in Juvey until the
887dishes were stacked so high, hell—someone had to come back home
888to clean the house.
889I never considered myself a loner at school. I always enjoyed being
890around people. I wasn’t interested in athletics at all. I played “left
891out.” I ran with a rough-and-tumble crowd, the more rebellious the
892better. Once when I was fourteen, after my father passed out on the
893couch one night, I sneaked out of the house and met up with four
894of my buddies. We all hitched a ride to take a friend home in nearby
895El Cerrito. We stuck out our thumbs, and since the guy who picked
896us up seemed to be twenty-one, we convinced him to buy us a case
897of beer. Driving around all night guzzling beer, he ran a red light
898and hit a car broadside, knocking it into another car. Everyone was
899hurt bad. I crawled out with a broken arm. The police called my
900father and he stumbled down to the hospital to pick me up. The next
901day our wreck made the front pages of the Oakland newspaper.
902The Pix Theater was the main neighborhood hangout for kids to
903get together. It wasn’t a scene divided up between jocks, rich kids,
904and greasers. The Pix was a place where the regular kids from school
905would meet up. Across the street was a park. That’s where we would
906take the “easy” girls after the movie. Right around the corner was
907the Circle Drive-In, a place where you could drive up and order a
908Hell’s Angel / 15
909burger and fries or go inside and sit at a table and listen to doo-wop
910on the jukebox.
911My friends and I would drive up and down the street even though
912none of us had driver’s licenses, and the cops never really bothered
913to check. Sometimes an older friend would drive us around in his
914parents’ car, and we’d chip in and find somebody to “buy up” for
915us, and we’d pass a six-pack around inside the car. Not much of a
916drinker, I rarely finished a bottle. But when the cops caught us with
917alcohol, I went down to the station too.
918What I really liked to do at school was fight. I fought at least once
919a week in junior high school. For me, fighting was always a contest.
920There was always somebody to test, and a fight was a fight. I wasn’t
921a bully; bullies beat up people just because they can. I fought
922everybody, younger, older, tougher, whatever. When a new kid
923came to school, we fought to see who was the toughest. This was
924part of growing up in East Oakland. We even fought our friends.
925There was usually a crowd of kids eager to watch a fight after school
926every day. If I got into a fight and lost, I couldn’t ever go home crying.
927Crying after a fight was never an option.
928I was expelled for two weeks in junior high school when the
929principal caught me fighting after class. He tried to hit me with a
930leather strap. When I refused to be strapped and fought back instead,
931I was suspended. Then a teacher told a girlfriend of mine that I was
932a bum and that she shouldn’t hang out with me, so I slapped him,
933and guess what—I was suspended again.
934By high school, I couldn’t give a shit about schoolwork. I was too
935busy reading all of Zane Grey’s books and other Wild West novels
936by writers like Louis L’Amour. I flunked nearly every class, if I
937showed up at all. At least I wasn’t out robbing and stealing. I was
938working at another grocery store, making thirty dollars a month.
939I organized a small street corner club in 1954 when I was still at
940Oakland High. We called ourselves the Earth Angels, after the hit
941song by the Penguins. It was a small club, eight of us, with some of
942the other guys at school. We wore our jackets with the collars up
943and had “Earth Angels” embroidered on the back. The Earth Angels
944never did anything special. We didn’t stand for anything. It was just
945something to belong to. In high school you belonged to a club like
946the Earth Angels. Then you just belonged to the Army. It was all
947about belonging to a group of people just like you.
948At fourteen, I had already smoked my first reefer, real forbidden
949underground stuff then. One matchbox of pot for five bucks, and
95016 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
951man, you were really holding; you had a lot of marijuana! We used
952to roll them in brown paper, three or four of us smoking these stogies
953as we made our way down the street.
954I kept thinking there had to be something better. I just didn’t know
955what. I knew I was going nowhere and needed to do something
956quick. Joining the military seemed to be the smartest and quickest
957thing to do. Shirley was now married, so my father didn’t see a need
958to keep a house. He moved to a hotel in downtown Oakland. Unless
959I moved in with Shirley, I didn’t have a place to live. I needed to do
960something. I decided to join the Army. Only one problem: I was too
961young.
962Well, I figured it out. I forged my birth certificate and showed up
963at the recruiting office. The recruiting sergeant called me when the
964paperwork came back with a problem. “There must be some mistake,”
965I told him. He nodded, changing my age and date of birth
966with the flick of a pen. I was in the Army, sworn in on July 14, 1955.
967I was sixteen years old.
968The Korean War was over and the Twenty-fifth Division roared
969back home, and lots of veterans made it their job to teach younger
970guys like me how to have a good time. Vets were happy- go-lucky
971fighters, somewhere between happy to be back and lucky to be alive.
972And they were more than a little restless. Some rode motorcycles
973and had tattoos. War was over, no more combat, but something
974stuck in their craws. These were the guys who created a deep impression
975on me. I finally saw a reason for regimentation, so I went with
976the flow. This was a different kind of authority. The Army taught
977me how to survive.
978Basic training was it. The screaming drill sergeants made grown
979men cry, which made me laugh all the harder. Some doggies—both
980draftees and enlisted men—frequently jumped the fence and went
981AWOL, wondering why on earth they ever joined up in the first
982place. In basic, we were constantly exhausted, up for hours and
983hours on end. Physical training was followed by long hours of
984classroom time, when we’d fall asleep at our desks. But I dug the
985forty bucks a month, and, of course, the Army fed and clothed you
986and gave you a bed. Not a half-bad deal.
987I was stationed at Honolulu, a strange place for a young enlistee.
988The locals looked down on us military personnel. I’d sneak into the
989bars with the older GIs and sometimes we would roundhouse with
990the civilians in the bars. I did everything they asked of me, and in
991exchange they taught me things I found interesting. Easy as that. I
992Hell’s Angel / 17
993learned how to take weapons apart, how to get along with a bunch
994of guys, and how to survive in a group as well as on my own. Best
995of all, they made me a machine gunner. Later on, training like that
996would come in handy.
997When they discovered I was under eighteen, they called me into
998battalion headquarters and ordered me out. I had served for fourteen
999months. Prior to my enlisting, if you were caught underage you received
1000a dishonorable discharge. They had just changed the regulation,
1001so I scored an honorable discharge. Shipped back to Oakland,
1002I escaped two years further active duty. Here I was, seventeen years
1003old, holding an honorable discharge, making me undraftable in the
1004future.
1005When I got back home, I kept my clothes starched and my boots
1006polished, neat as a pin. After leaving the Army, I just couldn’t face
1007getting a boring, fucked-up job. I even considered reenlisting, but
1008they wouldn’t have me back. Instead, they sent me to a psychiatrist,
1009who, after seeing the tattoos I got in Hawaii, felt I was too aggressive
1010and nonconformist.
1011I went to work as a night janitor, but I hated working nights. I
1012wanted to be out all night with my friends, so I took a job at the
1013Chevrolet plant polishing the hoods and front ends of cars as they
1014rolled off the paint shop assembly line. We’d “slick them” by
1015squirting polish, then hit them with a buffer. Eventually I quit that
1016job too.
1017Next I worked for Granny Goose Potato Chips on their assembly
1018line. We ate the chips straight out of the broilers. Talk about tasty.
1019I’d put them into fifty-five-gallon cardboard drums, then stack them
1020high. Then I got another job cutting and threading pipe at a place
1021called NACO, making overhead fire prevention sprinkler systems.
1022In my mind, I couldn’t get a grip on this nine-to-five working
1023stuff. I knew this much, though. I had real trouble with bullshit authority,
1024and that’s what I had to put up with at most of these jobs. I
1025was as “itchy” coming back from the Army as I felt going in. Something
1026had to happen, and it was just about to.
102718 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
10283
1029SLEEPING
1030IN THE
1031SNAKE PIT
1032I was nine years old when the original 1947 Hollister motorcycle
1033fracas went down. What started out as a sanctioned American Motorcyclist
1034Association racing competition quickly got out of hand
1035when riders from early outlaw clubs like the Pissed Off Bastards
1036and the BoozeFighters got drunk and rowdy, racing through town
1037streets, running traffic lights. This was supposed to be your typical
1038annual AMA national gathering, just like the dozens they’d staged
1039before. But it all went wrong as hell. Raucous bike riders were getting
1040busted for lewd behavior, public drunkenness, and indecent exposure.
1041To hear some of my older friends, you’d think the Hollister incident
1042was America’s first taste of hell on wheels. Looking back, it
1043probably was.
1044The Wild One, starring Marlon Brando and Lee Marvin, hit the
1045screen in ’54, while I was still in high school. The movie was a big
1046hit, based on what took place in Hollister, California, July 4, 1947.
1047An article written by Frank Rooney in Harper’s Magazine in 1951 inspired
1048it. The impact the movie made was apparently so strong, the
1049BoozeFighters disbanded after it became a hit, claiming that, thanks
1050to the movie, bike riders now had irreparably bad reputations.
1051When I saw The Wild One, Lee Marvin instantly became my hero.
1052Lee’s character, Chino, was my man. Marlon Brando as Johnny was
1053the bully. His boys rode Triumphs and BSAs and wore uniforms.
1054Lee’s attitude was “If you fuck with me, I’ll hit back.” Lee and his
1055boys were riding fucked-up Harleys and Indians. I certainly saw
1056more of Chino in me than Johnny. I still do.
1057I joined the Army a boy and came back a man. To become a real
1058man, though, you need to join the Army first, and then do some time
1059in jail. Serving time in the barracks and the slammer teaches you
1060discipline and survival. Jail teaches you to be on time: when those
1061doors open and close each day, you’d better be set. After doing the
1062Army and jail, you’re ready for anything.
1063After I reported for boot camp, a lot of my school friends went on
1064to become drug addicts. I guess I was lucky to have left when I did.
1065Because I can’t stand needles, I don’t think I would have made much
1066of a junkie. The Oakland drug scene in the fifties was marijuana on
1067one side, heroin on the other, with pep pills floating somewhere in
1068between. There were a lot of whites and bennies—Dexedrine and
1069Benzedrine—around. I didn’t particularly enjoy speed, because even
1070the smallest amount wired me up for days. I’ve always had enough
1071energy to keep me going naturally.
1072With my dad living on his own in a single room of a residential
1073hotel when I got out of the service, I decided to stay with Shirley.
1074I’d watch Shirley’s kids for her—she says I was a great baby-sitter—
1075but pretty soon the noise of all my friends’ bikes coming and
1076going got her kicked out of her pad.
1077As a street tough, I looked the part. I wore my Levi’s jeans with
1078one-inch-wide cuffs at the bottom, smoked Camels (as opposed to
1079Lucky Strikes, my dad’s brand), had the attitude, and rode a motorcycle.
1080My friends and I wore V-neck T-shirts with a cigarette pack
1081rolled up in the sleeve. We bought black engineer boots (with a silver
1082buckle) at the Red Wing shoe store, the same place Oakland
1083working grunts bought their work boots. If you had the cash, a black
1084leather jacket only made sense if you rode motorcycles.
1085I joined my first bike club, the Oakland Panthers, in 1956. It didn’t
1086last too long. We were a bunch of local bike riders who liked to hang
1087out. Freewheeling clubs were just starting up then. After a couple
1088of weeks I knew we weren’t cutting it. We seemed pretty pointless;
1089we weren’t like a real club. We were just a bunch of kids. Some of
1090us didn’t know each other’s names. I needed a close-knit club of
1091men who could jump on their bikes, ride cross-country if they wanted
1092to, and not abide by rules or clocks. We could run off to places as
1093far away as Massachusetts or New York on a day’s notice or buy
1094you a couple of rounds of beers one night and fistfight with you the
1095next. I needed more than a couple of weekender rides. I needed a
1096second family. I wanted a group less interested in a wife and two
1097point five kids in a crackerbox house in Daly City or San Jose and
1098more interested in riding, drag racing, and raising hell.
1099I’d hoped the Oakland Panthers were going to be that kind of
1100club, but no go. I quit the club as quickly as I started it. Sure, they’d
110120 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1102party, but when the shit came down, they didn’t stick together. I felt
1103no brotherhood. When the cops busted someone, he was on his own.
1104It was like “Fuck him, I’m outta here.” What I needed was more
1105solidarity and less cover your own ass.
1106There were dozens of motorcycle clubs around town, like the
1107Oakland Motorcycle Club—family clubs you could join to go picnic
1108with your wife and kids. That certainly wasn’t me. Another group
1109of bike riders around Oakland called themselves the Pisano Boys.
1110A lot of them were ex-GIs who served in the Korean War and WWII.
1111During both world wars, bomber squadrons and divisions of
1112military men formed their own tight circles. Bands of young draftees
1113and enlistees would think up a name and design a cool-looking logo
1114to show how tough and deadly they were as fighters. Patches were
1115sewn on government-issue leather bomber jackets and the brass
1116seemed okay with it. Shapely chicks and sinister mas-cots were
1117painted on the snouts of airplanes. A World War II Air Force bomber
1118unit in the Philippines might call themselves the Bomber Barons,
1119sporting a deathly logo, a skeleton wearing an Air Force flight jacket
1120and a pair of cool aviator sunglasses.
1121The term “Hell’s Angels” had been bouncing around the military
1122as far back as World War I, when a fighter squadron first took on
1123the name. During the twenties in Detroit, a motorcycle club affiliated
1124with the American Motorcyclist Association named themselves
1125Hell’s Angels. Howard Hughes’s 1930 two-toned aviation film, Hell’s
1126Angels, made Jean Harlow a big star. A group of mercenary war pilots
1127called the Flying Tigers flew for the Chinese, and one of their
1128squadrons called themselves Hell’s Angels. WWII had a few groups
1129called Hell’s Angels, including an American Air Force bomber
1130company stationed in England, the 358th Bomber Squadron, another
1131Navy torpedo squadron—I think it was the 109th—and the 188th
1132Airborne, para-troopers during the Korean War.
1133Motorcycles played a big role during the first five decades of war
1134in the twentieth century. Just like police departments and highway
1135patrols who found it easier to outrun criminals in automobiles with
1136motorcycles, General John J. Pershing chased the famous bandit
1137Pancho Villa and his horsemen along the Mexican-American border
1138with a squad of Harleys delivered to him on a flatbed railway car.
1139As far back as 1917, during World War I, both the German and
1140American infantries successfully used bike riders as couriers, scouts,
1141and communication dispatchers. In response, the Harley-Davidson
1142Motorcycle Company won big government contracts manufacturing
1143Hell’s Angel / 21
1144bikes for the American war machine in Europe, delivering up to
1145twenty thousand cycles. During the 1930s and 1940s, Hitler’s Nazi
1146war machine trained motorcyclists into more active combat roles,
1147using higher-tech BMWs. Hitler’s panzer divisions in occupied Poland
1148and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s Afrika Korps in North
1149Africa relied heavily on skilled motorcycle soldiers. Instead of being
1150scouts and messengers, motorcyclists mounted machine guns on
1151their bikes, rode on reconnaissance missions, scouted ambushes,
1152occupied bridges and landmarks, rode through land-mined fields,
1153and escorted tanks into battle.
1154As a result, aggressive, restless, roaming daredevil riders evolved
1155by the end of WWII, unafraid to ride full-throttle and kick ass. Some
1156cite returning wartime bike riders as the beginning of “outlaw motorcycle
1157types” dating from 1948 to the early 1950s. Before World
1158War II, motorcycle clubs were like gentlemen’s clubs—riders actually
1159wore coats and ties. After WWII, clubs like the BoozeFighters retained
1160both the aggressive spirit of war and combat and the
1161look—leather bomber jackets, flight goggles, and long scarves. One
1162of their credos was “Jesus Died So We Could Ride.”
1163Clubless and bored, I rode around the Oakland streets with a new
1164wild bunch. We talked about starting up another club. One of the
1165bike riders, Boots, Don Reeves, wore a modified Air Force–like patch
1166he’d found in Sacramento, a small skull wearing an aviator cap set
1167inside a set of wings. I thought it was cool as hell. The bottom rocker
1168read “Sacto.” (The bottom rocker is an embroidered strip below the
1169patch that identifies the name of the city in which a club’s chapter
1170is based.) We later found out that Boots’s patch came from a defunct
1171motorcycle club in North Sacramento. Boots’s idea was to name our
1172new club after the patch, the Hell’s Angels. We all liked the name,
1173so we hit a local trophy shop in Hayward and made up a set of
1174patches based on the design (later called the death head) in April of
11751957, not really knowing that there were other Hell’s Angels motorcycle
1176clubs around the state of California. For almost the first year
1177of our existence we didn’t even use “Oakland” as a bottom rocker.
1178Instead, we were “Nomad” Hell’s Angels. Yeah, that sounded like
1179us.
1180During the late summer of 1957, wearing our trophy-shop patches,
1181Ernie Brown and I rode down to Gardena in Southern California.
1182Once we got to SoCal, my transmission went south too. Ernie and I
1183had a couple of girls (“packing double”), and here I was stuck with
118422 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1185a dead bike six hundred miles from home. What the fuck. At least
1186we had girls with us.
1187But shit does happen. Out of nowhere a guy on a motorcycle
1188roared up alongside my bike to see what was wrong. To my surprise
1189he too was wearing a Hell’s Angels patch! His name was Vic
1190Bettencourt, and Gardena was home to an early SoCal chapter of
1191the Hell’s Angels. Vic took Ernie and me to their clubhouse, gave
1192us the spare parts we needed—Bettencourt’s brother owned a Harley
1193shop in Massachusetts—and helped me fix my transmission.
1194Then they fed us and put us up for a couple of days. Vic told me
1195there were Hell’s Angels in the San Gabriel Valley, Fresno, Berdoo
1196(San Bernardino), and Frisco. According to Vic, the first Hell’s Angels
1197motorcycle club was formed around 1948 in Berdoo, an off-shoot
1198from a renegade group called the Pissed Off Bastards out of Fontana,
1199California. It was right after the Hollister incident. WWII vets from
1200Berdoo—who belonged to the Pissed Off Bastards—used to roar by
1201on their bikes. People would look up and say, “There goes one of
1202those Hell’s Angels.”
1203The Hell’s Angels in San Francisco—just across the Bay
1204Bridge—must have been a pretty small outfit. We never saw any of
1205them anywhere on the streets of Oakland. They came from a club
1206called the Market Street Commandos, who later merged with the
1207Fontana Hell’s Angels to become the second-ever Hell’s Angels
1208Motorcycle Club. Frank Sadilek was an early Frisco president who
1209rode a Triumph and changed to a Harley Sportster by the late fifties.
1210Vic hipped me about what a motorcycle club should and should
1211not be. He had a mind for organization, how things should be done
1212and carried out, and what procedures needed to be followed. We
1213talked about meetings, dues, rules and regs—that kind of stuff—and
1214it all kind of reminded me of the Army. It set my mind to thinking
1215about what needed to be done to create our first Oakland chapter
1216as Ernie and I rode back home. A couple of SoCal Hell’s Angels came
1217up to Oakland to visit us later. A few years after we met, Vic was
1218riding out on an interstate highway and was run over by a car and
1219killed.
1220Hell’s Angels in SoCal, San Francisco, and—before they became
1221defunct—North Sacramento were only loosely affiliated. Technically,
1222if we went by the rules of today, the Oakland chapter would be
1223considered illegal. We were never actually voted in by the other existing
1224chapters. When we rode back down to SoCal to visit the other
1225HAMC chapters, we soon decided let’s get our club up and running,
1226Hell’s Angel / 23
1227make up some Oakland bottom rockers, and stake out our turf. We
1228would be the only Hell’s Angels outpost in the East Bay, and nobody
1229would dare mess with us.
1230Compared to the other Angels chapters, we were a much younger
1231group. Most of us in Oakland were eighteen to twenty-one, while
1232the average Hell’s Angels prospect in the SoCal chapters was closer
1233to twenty-six. An Oakland member we nicknamed Barf was twentynine
1234and we thought he was ancient. One thing we could wrap our
1235heads around was kicking ass. That we could do, and that we did.
1236Most of us were young high school dropouts in our early twenties
1237who didn’t have two nickels to rub together. We lived in friends’
1238garages and all we owned was the clothes on our backs and the bikes
1239between our legs. If you had two pairs of pants, you wore them
1240during the wintertime. I remember when one of the guys walked
1241into a shoe store and stole a bunch of boots for the club. When he
1242got them home, they were all right boots. The point is we risked
1243everything and we shared everything.
1244We ran the very first Oakland club meetings using the informal
1245kind of parliamentary procedure that Vic laid out for us. Boots became
1246our very first president. The original members included myself,
1247Boots, Cody, Junior Gonsalves, Ernie Brown, Al Jayne, who rode a
1248BSA, and a tattoo artist named Big Red, who gave me my first club
1249tattoo. Both Cody and Al eventually left the club to become Oakland
1250and Alameda cops. A few months after Boots was elected president,
1251he left to pursue a career as a country-western singer in the Midwest.
1252Then in 1958 I took over as president with big plans of my own.
1253Club rules and discipline made good sense to me. In the beginning
1254members couldn’t fight or swear at meetings. If you swore, you had
1255to put money in a jar. Early on, we decided that if we were all going
1256to wear the same patch, we were all going to function under the
1257same rules. To shore up our territory fast, we made up tactical rules
1258early on. Example: there couldn’t be one charter within fifty miles
1259of another, except for Oakland and Frisco, which were less than ten
1260miles apart. When more Hell’s Angels chapters popped up in places
1261like San Jose, Sonoma, Daly City, and Vallejo, we eliminated the
1262proximity rule in Northern California. The clubs in SoCal kept it in
1263force longer, which, looking back, really hurt because of the number
1264of small cities under fifty miles apart. With the influence of the
1265Oakland boys, soon all the Hell’s Angels became more focused and
1266centered, rather than a bunch of chapters who just happened to just
126724 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1268wear the same patch. The chapters each have their own identity, but
1269they share the same core values.
1270Some Hell’s Angels work regular jobs, some don’t. We’ve never
1271needed much money. In the early days, if you had five bucks, you
1272were rich. We’d ride over to someone’s old lady’s house, everybody
1273would throw in fifty cents, and she’d buy hamburger and noodles
1274and make spaghetti. It fed everybody. After about a year we rented
1275a clubhouse and moved in.
1276We called our clubhouse the Snake Pit. It was a large old Victorian
1277house right around the corner from a bar we drank at called the 400
1278Club. Members who crashed at the Snake Pit chipped in on the rent.
1279On some nights, bodies lay everywhere, even on the garage floor.
1280The Snake Pit was an on-and-off home to Angels like Skip Workman,
1281Johnny Dum Dum, Ray Flint, and a lot of others. It was a good-time
1282place; we used to party around the clock, put on dances and runs,
1283and we held our Hell’s Angels officers’ meetings, or OMs as we call
1284them, there.
1285When we first started the Oakland chapter, the death head patch
1286everybody wore on the backs of their jackets was significantly
1287smaller than our current one. The Oakland chapter debuted its larger
1288death head patch at a Halloween party in San Francisco in 1959.
1289When the guys from the Oakland chapter walked in with our new
1290death heads the other chapters from Sacramento and Richmond
1291really dug them. But the older chapters—Berdoo, SoCal, and San
1292Francisco—wanted no part of them, choosing to stay with the
1293smaller original patch. As membership in the Northern California
1294chapters grew, more and more Hell’s Angels in NoCal went for the
1295larger patches. Soon the “Barger Larger” became the rule rather than
1296the exception.
1297As the number of California charters grew, we changed from
1298bottom rockers that spelled out individual cities to one that read
1299“California.” Everybody but Berdoo changed over to the California
1300bottom rocker, and we had a bit of a hassle with some of the more
1301gung-ho Berdoo members. Oakland members fought on the streets
1302over the patch design with some of the Berdoo guys. I scrapped with
1303SoCal members myself, after they disrespected our patch. Believe
1304me, we’d have more than a few scrapes and wars between different
1305chapters, particularly Frisco.
1306But mostly we’d fuck with the other clubs. One in particular, the
1307Gypsy Jokers. During the sixties, the Jokers were originally based
1308in San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose. The problem was the Frisco
1309Hell’s Angel / 25
1310Angels and the Gypsy Jokers were buddies, so whenever Oakland
1311would square off against them, Frisco would turn around and make
1312friends with them again. To the Oakland brothers, that shit was out
1313of line, against Angel philosophy. After one blowout in Oakland
1314when someone’s old lady got manhandled, we cut up a mob of
1315Gypsy Jokers real bad. In retaliation, a whole bunch of Jokers grabbed
1316two Daly City Angels in Golden Gate Park and beat the crap out of
1317them with baseball bats. We warned Frisco to stop screwing around,
1318then we ran the Jokers out of California. Until just recently, we
1319wouldn’t even let them ride in California with their patches. They’re
1320no longer in California.
1321By 1966, the Hell’s Angels grew past the state of California, accepting
1322clubs that admired our reputation and wanted to affiliate.
1323Omaha, Nebraska, was the first out-of-stater. In 1967 I was in
1324Massachusetts, checking out another “prospect” charter in Lowell.
1325We even had a charter in Australia, which we used to call “the forgotten
1326charter.” The early Frisco club granted them a charter, but
1327nobody had ever heard back from them since they joined. Our first
1328European charter granted while I was president of Oakland went
1329to Switzerland, and from then on we’ve been expanding like wildfire.
1330When we award charters in new states, it’s always done by national
1331vote. When a prospective club lets us know they want to become
1332Hell’s Angels, we’ll check them out to see if they’re stand-up people.
1333We’ll send officers out to meet with them, and in return they’ll send
1334guys out to meet with us. We might invite them to a run or two, and
1335likewise we’ll send some of our guys to party with them. At some
1336point—time varies—we’ll vote on whether they can become prospects.
1337Eventually we’ll vote on their membership status. The same
1338process that lets in individuals applies to entire new chapters as
1339well.
1340Up until the mid-sixties, when we were only in California, the
1341Berdoo Hell’s Angels oversaw new Southern California chapters
1342while Northern California expansion was watched over by the
1343Oakland chapter. Berdoo and Oakland kept in close touch about
1344any new members voted into the club. When the Hell’s Angels grew
1345nationwide, we assigned East and West Coast contacts. If a brandnew
1346charter wanted to start up in, say, Colorado, they could contact
1347California because of the closer proximity to the West Coast. However,
1348since there is no charter in the state of Colorado, the entire
1349United States membership would have to vote them in.
1350By the middle sixties, we began to grow quickly. Once we sanc-
135126 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1352tioned each official Hell’s Angels charter, it became their responsibility
1353to keep anybody from starting up an illegal charter in their part
1354of the country. Some bike riders in Lowell, Massachusetts, started
1355an illegal charter and contacted us about how to go about making
1356themselves legit. Before going back to meet them and collecting their
1357old patches, we were contacted by another club called the Disciples
1358who wanted to become Hell’s Angels, too. Okay, we said, go get
1359Lowell’s patches if you’re so damn tough. The Disciples tried to take
1360away the illegal Lowell club’s patches, but they couldn’t get the job
1361done. So the original renegade Lowell club became Hell’s Angels
1362and the Disciples became Outlaws.
1363There was a time when rules were lax and you could show up to
1364whichever chapter you wanted to transfer to with a letter from your
1365former chapter saying you were cool and a member in good standing.
1366Then you were voted on. But because of rats and infiltrators, we’ve
1367had to tighten up membership transfers. Today you have to be in
1368the chapter you’re transferring from for at least one year. That came
1369about when Red Bryant became an informant. Red started in Frisco,
1370then he switched over to Santa Rosa, and the Nomads, all in a very
1371short time. When he turned, a lot of guys were in deep shit. The cops
1372like to say we okay charters based on the membership’s skill with
1373drugs, burglary, robbery, and explosives. That’s all bullshit designed
1374to sell books by informants.
1375Here’s who the government calls the Big Four: Hell’s Angels,
1376Bandidos, Outlaws, and Pagans. The Hell’s Angels is the biggest of
1377the four, and the first to go worldwide. The other three major clubs
1378have all been around since the 1950s and 1960s, and were influenced
1379by the Hell’s Angels.
1380The federal government calls the Hell’s Angels the largest outlaw
1381motorcycle club. There are thousands of us all over the world and
1382over a hundred active chapters, about a third of which are in the
1383United States. Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Corporation owns the
1384famous trademarks and licenses them to the chapters of the club.
1385The apostrophe is used in the name of the club and the corporation,
1386but not on the patch. There are HAMC chapters in Denmark, Australia,
1387Germany, Canada, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Brazil,
1388South Africa, and several other countries.
1389The Outlaws Motorcycle Club is the second-largest club. They
1390started in Joliet, Illinois, in 1959, running around the central and
1391southeastern United States and Ontario, Canada. They have at least
1392forty-three chapters—thirty chapters in the States, eight chapters in
1393Hell’s Angel / 27
1394Canada, four chapters in Australia, and one in France. While they
1395don’t have any chapters in California, in 1994 the Outlaws did put
1396up a chapter in Brockton, Massachusetts, near our Lowell club. To
1397balance things out, we put up Hell’s Angels charters in Chicago,
1398South Bend, and Rockford. We don’t like them being in Massachusetts
1399any more than they like us being in the Midwest.
1400Texas is Bandidos country. The third-largest club also has chapters
1401in Mississippi, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming,
1402and the state of Washington. The Bandidos formed in 1966 in
1403Galveston County, Texas, and may have about twenty-eight chapters
1404worldwide, including Australia, Denmark, and Marseilles, France.
1405They’re also trying to expand into Eastern Europe.
1406The Pagans Motorcycle Club, number four of the Big Four, are
1407based on the East Coast with strongholds in New York, New Jersey,
1408Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, and West Virginia. They
1409also have Southern chapters in North and South Carolina and Florida.
1410The Pagans were formed in Prince Georges County, Maryland,
1411in 1959.
1412Aside from the Big Four, there are hundreds of other motorcycle
1413clubs all over the United States. For instance, the Hessians are one
1414of many clubs located in the South and in Southern California. Any
1415former member of a Big Four club is not welcome as a Hell’s Angel.
1416Members seldom change from one major club to another, particularly
1417the Hell’s Angels. That’s what starts trouble. Allowing a former Big
1418Four member inside our club is bad news, and that’s a lesson we
1419later learned the hard way.
1420As our membership grew we began to look more and more like
1421an army. Because we lacked our own club pins or buckles, I inadvertently
1422started the association of Nazi regalia with the club. It all
1423started rather innocently. In the late 1950s, Ernie Brown, our vice
1424president, also had a younger brother in the Hell’s Angels, and his
1425three brothers worked with me at the NACO plant. One day we
1426were all hanging out when I mentioned I needed to buy myself a
1427belt. One of Ernie’s younger brothers said, “Hold on, Sonny, I’ve
1428got one my dad brought home from the war. I’ll give it to you.”
1429It was a beautiful German WWII military belt buckle, an eagle
1430perched on a swastika with a German inscription, “God’s with Us.”
1431I started wearing it and people would ask about it all the time. I
1432wasn’t making a political statement. It all started out as a free belt.
1433After that it seems the fuse was lit.
1434The Oakland Tribune published pictures of the Snake Pit when J.
143528 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1436J. Thomas and his gang of Oakland cops raided us. One picture
1437showed the cops holding up a big Nazi flag, which we had hung on
1438the clubhouse wall to piss people off. To this day, the feds regularly
1439raid our clubhouse, usually bringing a group of reporters and a
1440television camera crew in order to make the nightly news more exciting.
1441Raids became more and more commonplace. But now, instead
1442of guns and drugs, they grab our computer hard drives and file
1443cabinets.
1444The Nazi thing got so out of hand, members who would see my
1445belt buckle would go out and get something with a swastika or an
1446Iron Cross. At the time it was fairly easy to find authentic captured
1447Nazi war gear at flea markets and gun shops. Plus, it did piss people
1448off big-time, which is what we were all about anyway, so we figured,
1449why not? Soon we were wearing helmets, medals, tattoos, and
1450armbands, and one famous photograph printed in a national
1451magazine was a close-up face shot of Skip from Richmond wearing
1452a chromed Nazi helmet.
1453George Lincoln Rockwell approached me from the American Nazi
1454Party. He completely missed the point when he asked me to organize
1455a Nazi motorcycle corps for him. Man, the stuff we wore was bikeriding
1456gear, it wasn’t our philosophy. I told Rockwell no, I wasn’t
1457interested, but he came to Oakland anyway, all the way from Virginia,
1458and after we met, he told me he genuinely dug us and still wanted
1459a motorcycle corps for his group. Rockwell was eventually assassinated
1460by someone inside his own organization, someone who was
1461kicked out, let back in, and allowed to rise to second in command,
1462a big mistake on Rockwell’s part. Guys like Malcolm X made the
1463same mistake.
1464Because of our German charters, we no longer wear anything
1465sporting a swastika or SS lightning bolts, since that’s totally illegal
1466in Germany. After a vote in 1997, we took the lightning bolts off our
1467Filthy Few patches too. I do have them tattooed on my back, and
1468I’m not about to have them removed.
1469The Filthy Few patch signifies “the first to the party, and the last
1470to leave,” after somebody once said, “Man, by the time the last of
1471you leave, you’re fucking filthy,” so we came up with the name, the
1472Filthy Few. At one time, the Filthy Few were an Oakland exclusive,
1473and supposedly everybody in it had a murder beef pending. Then
1474the cops claimed that if you were a Hell’s Angel and you wore the
1475Filthy Few patch, you were the killer elite hit men, that you actually
1476killed somebody for the club.
1477Hell’s Angel / 29
1478You still have to be invited into the Filthy Few by a member. By
1479the seventies, the Filthy Few moved on to the other charters. There
1480was another intraclub thing called the Wrecking Crew. Some guys
1481also wear “Dequelo,” which means roughly “No quarter” or “No
1482mercy” in Spanish. If you study the police books, they still claim the
1483Wrecking Crew and Dequelo are the guys who beat up cops. More
1484law enforcement crap.
1485“One on all, all on one” means that when you fight with one Hell’s
1486Angel, you fight us all. We all know what we have to do if somebody
1487gets out of line, which happens. Assholes get drunk and think they’re
1488tough, and there are a whole lot of people out there who like to try
1489to whip a Hell’s Angel. If we stood up and fought everybody oneon-
1490one, shit, we’d be fighting nonstop. Instead, it’s easier to beat the
1491hell out of the one guy so the next ten guys don’t dare try anything.
1492When we do get down and somebody gets rat-packed, people
1493think that’s not fair. We stick up for our own, right or wrong. Think
1494about it. If your own brother is getting his ass kicked, do you give
1495a damn if he’s in the wrong or not? Fuck it if he’s wrong, fuck it if
1496he’s right; you’re going to jump in for him. If he’s kicking ass, cool;
1497but as soon as he gets hit, then fuck all fair fight. That’s the easiest
1498way to relate to a Hell’s Angel. If your brother’s busted for stealing
1499a car, would you use your house to bail him out of jail, even if he
1500was wrong? We do.
1501Looking down on the fighting Hell’s Angels was the American
1502Motorcyclist Association’s way of covering their asses and trying to
1503clean up the reputation of bike riders in general. In 1948, after the
1504Hollister incident cut deep into their cred, they labeled rowdy, outlaw
1505motorcyclists the “one-percenters.” According to AMA propaganda,
1506one percent of motorcycle riders were the outlaw clubs giving
1507bike riding a bad name while the other ninety-nine percent were
1508good old-fashioned ass-kissing, law-abiding citizens.
1509One particular incident occurred less than a year after I took over
1510the Oakland club. We were down in the small town of Angels Camp,
1511California, to visit an AMA gypsy tour road rally. While over 3,700
1512riders joined in this AMA-sanctioned event, we were considered a
1513disruption. During the gypsy tour, two Sacramento Hell’s Angels
1514raced out of town at speeds of over one hundred miles per hour. As
1515they crested on top of a hill, their bikes sailed in the air, crashing
1516down on a pack of riders coming up the hill. Both Sacto members
1517were killed, and the accident scene was pretty ugly.
1518The AMA wore a big black eye after the papers wrote about it,
151930 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1520and they decided to shitcan any such future events. Oddly enough,
1521while the AMA looked bad, the publicity sparked even more enmity
1522toward the Hell’s Angels from the straight world.
1523Since then, we made it our mission to be a thorn in the AMA’s
1524ass. We held a big meeting in San Francisco and all the clubs from
1525Southern California got together with all the Bay Area clubs, and it
1526wasn’t just Hell’s Angels either. There were representatives from
1527other bike clubs in the state, like the Executioners and the Galloping
1528Gooses. That’s when we proudly adopted the name that the AMA
1529shoved on us, the One-Percenters. We sketched a One-Percenter
1530design, a triangle with a “1%” symbol. After drawing it up, George
1531Wethern and I went out and got our tattoos that night. Later we
1532even had patches made. But the harmony soon ceased. When all the
1533other clubs wanted to be treated as equals, the Hell’s Angels ended
1534up leaving the One-Percenters. We didn’t feel they were equal, and
1535no matter what, we weren’t ever going to treat other clubs the same
1536way we treated ourselves. While the rules were you couldn’t steal
1537a One-Percenter’s bike, and you couldn’t rat-pack a One-Percenter,
1538we didn’t feel the other clubs deserved to be treated like Hell’s Angels
1539by other Hell’s Angels. One-Percenters started out as anybody
1540who didn’t belong to the AMA. One group, one club. The hitch was,
1541we’re not One-Percenters—we’re Hell’s Angels first and foremost.
1542I get asked a lot about initiations, and there sure have been some
1543wild speculations in this area. I’ll give you one example: to become
1544a Hell’s Angel, you have to kill someone. To become a Hell’s Angel,
1545there never has been any initiation rite outside of serving as a prospect.
1546As a prospect, you’re basically a gopher for the club; you’re
1547there before meetings to make sure the clubhouse is set up with the
1548tables and chairs, make sure there’s coffee and food at the OMs.
1549When events are over, you clean up the clubhouse, a role that continues
1550until you’re no longer the newest member. But prospects can
1551also be the rowdiest of the bunch, like at Altamont: first in, last out,
1552with the most to prove. They also seem to have the most fun.
1553The Hell’s Angels is a club that tries to exist with as few rules as
1554possible. Still, the Special California Rules was a set of early regs
1555printed up during the late sixties. After a California meeting, the
1556rules were passed out. I don’t know what happened, but somebody
1557lost their set on the way home, and they got printed in the San
1558Francisco Chronicle the next day!
1559Here are a few of the rules that got printed. There are others, but
1560they’re our rules and no one sees them but us.
1561Hell’s Angel / 31
1562“There are meetings once a week at a predetermined time and
1563place.”
1564Our first meetings were at Junior Gonsalves’s house, in his basement.
1565“There will be a two-dollar fine for missing a meeting without
1566a valid reason.”
1567I’m surprised it was that high, a lot for back then. It’s probably
1568close to fifty or a hundred bucks now.
1569“Girls will not sit in on meetings unless it is a special occasion.”
1570Self-explanatory.
1571“There will be a fifteen-dollar initiation fee for all new members.
1572Club will furnish patch, which remains club property.”
1573Patches do not belong to members; they belong to the club (now
1574a corporation). We’ve had a lot of problems with that distinction
1575when informants and rats give over their patches to the cops. When
1576informants turn over, we’ll sue to get the patch back. According to
1577our bylaws, a patch remains club property, but we generally don’t
1578get patches back from rats.
1579Our patch is our symbol, which is why our people fight to the
1580death for them. If you lose one, it’s a big-time dishonor, which is
1581why the cops love to grab them. They also love getting warrants to
1582take away club paraphernalia. We’ve even had our bikes confiscated
1583because of our insignias painted on them.
1584When Rudolph Giuliani was a U.S. attorney in New York City,
1585for a publicity stunt he wore one of our patches that he got out of
1586an evidence locker, from a Hell’s Angel named Bill. Giuliani, wearing
1587a white shirt and slacks, wore our patch out on the street while a
1588film crew shot him and former senator Alfonse D’Amato of New
1589York making a drug buy. To this day he says it was one of the sorriest
1590things he ever did. In my opinion, he should have lost his job for
1591tampering with evidence. I’ve seen Giuliani in a dress, and if you
1592ask me, he’s a much better drag queen than biker.
1593“There will be no fighting among club members. A fine of five
1594dollars will result for each party involved.”
1595It’s still five dollars today, hardly a deterrent.
1596“New members must be voted in. Two ‘no’ votes equal a rejection.
1597One ‘no’ vote must be explained.”
1598If several members vote yes, while one member votes no, that one
1599no could keep a new member out. However, the one dissenting voter
1600has to explain his vote in case there’s something the rest of us don’t
1601know. Or maybe we know something the one no-voter doesn’t know.
160232 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1603A case is made and either we persuade him to vote yes, or else the
1604person up for membership is shit out of luck. Two no votes require
1605no explanation whatsoever.
1606“All new members must have their own motorcycles.”
1607And there’s no rule that says it has to be a Harley.
1608“Members who have extra parts will lend them to members.
1609They must be replaced or paid for.”
1610It’s a matter of brothers looking out for each other.
1611“There will be no stealing among members. Anyone caught will
1612be kicked out of the club.”
1613Stealing is like lying, it’s dishonest, high on the list of messing up,
1614and it’s not tolerated.
1615“Members cannot belong to any other clubs.”
1616Of course, nobody belongs to any other motorcycle club, but
1617during the early bylaws, we didn’t let members belong to the AMA.
1618“New members must come to three meetings on their motorcycles.
1619They will be voted on at a fourth meeting. Votes will be
1620by paper ballot.”
1621Membership now could take anywhere from four years to a minimum
1622of one year to get voted in. We wait until we think a guy is
1623ready before we vote. Rather than vote on him and his not making
1624it, we run him a little while longer, because once you lose a vote,
1625you have to go away for six months before you can reapply.
1626“Any persons coming up for a vote are subject to club rules.”
1627This rule relates to prospects; even if you’re not in the club, you’re
1628subject to all the rules.
1629“To be eligible to come up for a vote in the club, prospective
1630members must be brought up for a vote at the meeting by a
1631member.”
1632If you’re brought up, you have to be brought up by a member in
1633good standing. You’re voted on to become a prospect. Whoever
1634brings you up as a prospect, that member is your sponsor all the
1635way through the process, and they maintain that relationship all the
1636way until a prospect is voted on. Personally, I haven’t sponsored
1637anyone in years, except that I sponsored Joby in the Cave Creek
1638charter since moving to Arizona.
1639“Anyone kicked out of the club cannot get back in.”
1640That rule has since changed. You can get back in, though it’s rare.
1641“When packing double, a member can let a girl wear the patch.”
1642In the beginning we wanted the patch to be seen, so our old ladies
1643wore our patches. Not the case anymore. Nobody but a member can
1644Hell’s Angel / 33
1645wear a Hell’s Angel patch. Trying on a member’s patch is a good
1646way to get beat up.
1647“Anyone who loses his patch, or if the patch is picked up by an
1648officer, the member will pay a fifteen-dollar fine before he gets
1649the patch back.”
1650If we were out in public and I laid my patch somewhere, and if a
1651Hell’s Angel officer picked it up and I didn’t see him, that means
1652anybody could have picked it up and I’m fined.
1653“On California runs, weapons will be shot only between 0600
1654and 1600 hours.”
1655That’s in reference to our gun runs—like at Squaw Rock—out in
1656the country where we’re permitted to shoot guns inside a designated
1657area. At Squaw Rock, that area was over the beach and into the
1658hillside. While a lot of people were on the beach, if you shot your
1659gun during any other time, there was a big fine.
1660“No spiking the club’s booze with dope.”
1661Terry the Tramp did that once. Anytime there’s a rule, it usually
1662means someone did something to necessitate it. Some people don’t
1663like to get loaded when they don’t expect it, especially members
1664who are on probation or parole and might get drug-tested.
1665“No throwing live ammunition into bonfires on runs.”
1666Guys used to throw bullets into the fire. We now include anything
1667that explodes, including unopened Coke and beer cans.
1668“No messing with another member’s wife.”
1669Big-time rule. Wife, girlfriend, old lady, whoever she is, if she’s
1670yours, she’s yours. If you fuck with someone else’s old lady, you’re
1671out of the club. There are fifty million women in the world, which
1672leaves only a few thousand Hell’s Angels old ladies you can’t fuck
1673with.
1674“You can’t pull the patch off of another chapter’s member.”
1675Taking somebody’s patch is a dangerous symbolic gesture. It
1676represents capitulation, defeat. Say somebody in San Jose gets pissed
1677at a Nomad and gets into a fight and beats him up. He can’t take his
1678patch. Any serious offense has to go to an officers’ meeting and go
1679through the proper channels. Just because a guy can beat me up
1680doesn’t entitle him to take my patch. If somebody beats me up and
1681takes my patch, I might kill him, even if he’s a member.
1682“No using dope during a meeting.”
1683You can’t smoke cigarettes at Oakland meetings either.
1684“At least two officers from each chapter must attend a California
1685meeting every two months.”
168634 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1687Because there are so many officers, we’ve cut that down to one.
1688The presidents’ meetings are once every six months.
1689And last, but certainly not least, the worst fucking rule we ever made:
1690“No drug burns.”
1691The cops have used this one against us a lot. We made that rule
1692after two members joined the Nomads in California. They were good
1693guys, but small-time gangsters. They would score some shit from
1694somebody, like a kilo of weed. When the guy gave them the pot,
1695they wouldn’t give him the money, and if the guy didn’t like it,
1696they’d fuck him up good. That was their business, rip-off artists.
1697At first, we didn’t care; it was no club thing. But then people didn’t
1698look at it as just these two members. On account of the patch, it became
1699the Hell’s Angels ripping people off. So another Angel might
1700be putting down the highway and—boom!—they’d get shot off their
1701bike. Then we’d have to find out who did it, go after the motherfuckers
1702so they wouldn’t get away with it. Big hassle. We made the rule
1703not because we sanctioned or disapproved of drug dealing by club
1704members. Essentially we were saying if you make a deal, go through
1705with it, just do what you say. But the cops and district attorneys
1706played up the rule in court, and it caused us a hell of a lot of problems.
1707When we get arrested today, they still use it against us. While
1708it seems funny now, it’s no longer a rule.
1709Actually, we should have originally expanded the rule to include
1710no motorcycle burns, because individual club members stole a shitload
1711more motorcycles on their own than they ever did dope. And
1712motorcycles, believe me, are the be-all end-all of what this club is
1713all about.
1714Hell’s Angel / 35
1715
17164
1717HARLEYS,
1718CHOPPERS,
1719FULL DRESSERS,
1720AND STOLEN
1721WHEELS
1722If anybody deserves anything in this whole bike-riding
1723world, it’s Sonny. He led the way. You see people wearing
1724their fucking patches, ‘Ride to live, Live to ride.’ Yeah,
1725right. As soon as the shit comes down, their bike is the
1726first thing they sell. Sonny is the one who pushed the bikeriding
1727lifestyle. There wasn’t an outlaw type of lifestyle
1728as there is today until he created it.
1729—Oakland Hell’s Angels president Cisco Valderrama
1730I’ve always been crazy about motorcycles. When I was a kid, the
1731Oakland motorcycle cops used to park in front of my house, waiting
1732to catch drivers rolling the stop sign on the corner. Oakland Police
1733Department cops rode Harleys and Indians, the latter a V-twin flathead.
1734Man, I was in awe of their bikes. Even though I really didn’t
1735like cops, I’d walk up and talk with them just as an excuse to look
1736at their bikes. Once, one of the motorcycle cops was kick-starting
1737his bike and my dog King freaked out and bit him. Figuring they
1738would throw King in the pet slammer, I grabbed him and ran off.
1739Later that night the police knocked on our door. Luckily my father
1740smoothed things out, and they allowed us to keep King if we
1741promised not to let him leave the house until his rabies quarantine
1742expired.
1743Motorcycles became the thing to ride in California after World
1744War II. A lot of the GIs coming home from the Pacific who didn’t
1745want to return to some boring life in Indiana or Kentucky chose to
1746stick around California. A motorcycle was a cheap mode of transportation,
1747kind of dangerous and perfect for racing and hanging
1748out. Plus they could ride together, just like they were back in the
1749service again. California and its sunshine became the center of motorcycle
1750culture, and for years there were more motorcycles registered
1751in the state of California than in all the other states combined.
1752I bought my first motor scooter, a Cushman, when I was thirteen.
1753Cushmans had small wheels and the motor mounted on a tin
1754scooter-type frame. An oval box on top of the frame served as the
1755seat. After you kick-started them, little gearshifts and a two-speed
1756shifter made them go. We could throttle those suckers up to forty
1757miles per hour. Mustangs looked like miniature motorcycles with a
1758Briggs & Stratton motor and a fairly small gas tank. During the early
1759fifties when Cushmans and Mustangs were really popular, a brandnew
1760Mustang cost a few hundred bucks, but a used Cushman went
1761for around twenty dollars. So we rode Cushmans.
1762I was bored stiff with school. I wanted to ride. A guy named Joe
1763Maceo drove demolition derby hardtops for a Signal gas station
1764around the corner from where I lived. Joe was twenty-one (old and
1765wise to a fourteen-year-old like me). They called the cars hardtops.
1766They were those neat little ’32 Fords. We’d weld a roll bar over the
1767top of these Fords and nobody cared if they got wrecked or not. Joe
1768and his buddy Marty let me paint the numbers on the hardtops, and
1769on Saturday nights we’d all go down to the races at the Cow Palace
1770in San Francisco and watch Joe smash up those wrecks.
1771My brother-in-law Bud (sister Shirley’s husband) bought used
1772cars and fixed them up for extra cash. Bud and Shirley had a big
1773backyard filled with old heaps that he would buy on the cheap and
1774we’d both work on. I liked working on cars, but I really dug motorcycles.
1775Compared to a car, a bike is a much more personal thing.
1776You can pull the motor off, spread it all out on your workbench, and
1777not have your head stuck down in the hood of some big hunk of
1778steel.
1779A trailer rental shop opened up next door to my house, and the
1780guy who ran the yard owned a bike too. He let me work for him,
1781and he would take me out for rides on his Norton motorcycle. Riding
1782the Norton, I realized how much more powerful they were than
1783Cushmans or Mustangs.
1784I saved my dough and bought my first real motorcycle when I
178538 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1786was eighteen after being discharged from the Army. The average
1787motorcycle rider was still a little older than I was. I was always the
1788younger guy riding out in front with my friends, most of whom
1789were in their middle twenties. The big bike companies in those days
1790were BSA, Triumph, Norton, Harley-Davidson, and Indian. I went
1791for the Harley and got myself a used 1936 model that, counting tax
1792and license, set me back $125. Gasoline was nineteen cents per gallon,
1793so now I had a cheap way to cruise the streets of Oakland. I was finally
1794on the loose.
1795Motorcycles were built on rigid frames then, which meant they
1796would vibrate when you rode them. When you hit bumps or a
1797pothole there wasn’t a lot of flex on the frame. The constant vibration
1798caused a lot of parts and pieces to come loose and fall off, sometimes
1799when you were riding. You had to constantly wrench up your bike
1800just to keep it shipshape.
1801Messing around with motorcycles is something I do best. It seems
1802I’ve been working on motorcycles all my life, modifying them,
1803chopping them, customizing them to my own taste, then changing
1804my mind, breaking them down, and starting over again.
1805The original Harleys were flatheads. A flathead literally means
1806the head of the engine is flat and it has valves on the side like a
1807flathead Ford engine. My 1936 Harley had overhead valves, instead
1808of valves on the side going up and down. These were called knuckleheads,
1809because they had a big aluminum block on the side where
1810the pushrods went, looking like a knuckle. In 1948, Harley changed
1811over to a tin cover called a panhead, which evolved in 1966 to an
1812aluminum cover called a shovelhead. Different engine heads never
1813overlapped on Harleys; when they changed, they changed across
1814the board. In 1984, Harley converted to a different-looking engine
1815they call an Evolution head.
1816Harley has enjoyed a huge share of the large-bike market for
1817decades. They control about fifty percent of cruiser sales, with Japanese
1818bikes making up the other half. As a result, they often act a
1819little high and mighty toward their customers.
1820An official at Harley-Davidson was once quoted as saying,
1821“Enough bikes is too many, and if we make enough, we lose mystique.”
1822While they keep saying they’re building more and more each
1823year, up until a couple of years ago I believe Harley-Davidson intentionally
1824held back production to stir up demand. Now there are
1825companies like Titan, American Eagle, and American Illusion imitating
1826Harley’s Softail model. That’s the fifties-styled bike all these
1827Hell’s Angel / 39
1828new riders want. Softail-type bikes look like rigid-frames but really
1829aren’t, and they don’t necessarily ride “soft” either. Although they’re
1830equipped with shock absorbers, if you ride them over fifty-five miles
1831per hour on the open road you’re not going to experience a smooth
1832ride. The motor is not rubber-mounted; it’s not much different from
1833a 1936 Harley in the ride. They still tend to break and vibrate if you
1834ride them too fast. For riders who just want to ride down to the bar
1835every Saturday night, the Softail is Harley’s bestselling bike for
1836modern times, and the design incorporated the cool look of the
1837chopper. In 2000, Harley came out with an 88B motor that is counterbalanced
1838and does not vibrate.
1839Titan, American Eagle, and American Illusion make what they
1840call “clone bikes,” and although some of these models are manufactured
1841in America, they often don’t make their own engines and are
1842just copies of Harleys.
1843But Hell’s Angels started riding Harley-Davidsons mostly because,
1844unlike today, they didn’t have much choice. In 1957, it was either
1845ride a Harley or settle for a Triumph or BSA. They’d already stopped
1846building Indians. It’s always been important for Hell’s Angels to
1847ride American-made machines. In terms of pure workmanship,
1848personally I don’t like Harleys. I ride them because I’m in the club,
1849and that’s the image, but if I could I would seriously consider riding
1850a Honda ST1100 or a BMW. We really missed the boat not switching
1851over to the Japanese models when they began building bigger bikes.
1852I’ll usually say, “Fuck Harley-Davidson. You can buy an ST1100 and
1853the motherfucker will do 110 miles per hour right from the factory
1854all day long.” The newest “rice rockets” can carry 140 horsepower
1855to the rear wheel, and can easily do 180 miles per hour right out of
1856the box. While it’s probably too late to switch over now, it would
1857have been a nice move, because Japanese bikes today are so much
1858cheaper and better built. However, Japanese motorcycles don’t have
1859as much personality.
1860I ride a Harley FXRT because it’s their best model for people who
1861put on a lot of miles. Harley doesn’t make them anymore, but they’re
1862the best of both worlds—it’s a good bike for long distances and also
1863handles and corners well on the short runs. It’s not as heavy as their
1864other dresser models, but they ride a little faster, and they still come
1865with saddlebags for traveling. But my FXRT is lucky if it does ninety,
1866that is, until I work on it. After you work on it, you make it unreliable.
1867I always say, the faster a Harley, the less reliable. New Triumphs
1868can do a quarter mile in ten seconds. If you get a Harley
186940 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1870street bike to run a quarter mile like that, it’s a bomb. The worst
1871thing about it is that once you get a Harley going that fast, you can’t
1872stop it. Right now, Hell’s Angels are stuck with Harleys, or maybe
1873we’re stuck with each other. Someday we’ll be smart enough to walk
1874away.
1875A Harley FXR is the bike of choice for most Hell’s Angels today.
1876FXRs have a rubber-mounted motor on a swing-arm frame. A swing
1877arm means the frame houses left and right shock absorbers in the
1878back section for better road flex. Harley developed the FXR as a reaction
1879to bike riders like the Hell’s Angels who preferred more
1880stripped-down bikes. The FXR and the FXRT are basically the same
1881bike. The FXR is more stripped-down, while the FXRT was designed
1882as a touring bike with saddlebags and a fairing, which is the plastic
1883piece that holds the windshield and reduces the wind on the rider.
1884The FXR is an efficient bike for speed and distance. For years,
1885most Hell’s Angels usually rode rigid-frame bikes. Nowadays,
1886they’re switching over to FXRs because they’re riding out of state
1887more, going longer distances, and riding faster.
1888As far as what Harley manufactures, the FXR handled and rode
1889the best, so everybody bought them. After 1993, Harley-Davidson
1890stopped making the FXR. When the 1999 limited series came out,
1891they were list-priced at $17,000. Because of demand, the shops sold
1892them for as much as $25,000. The Dyna Glide has since replaced the
1893FXR. In my opinion it’s not as good a bike because it doesn’t handle
1894as well as an FXR.
1895What it’s really all about with a Harley-Davidson is the
1896sound…everybody loves that fucking rumble. Another thing Harley
1897owners really crave about their bikes is the low-end torque, the raw
1898power coming out of the gate. It runs out pretty quick once you get
1899up past ninety miles an hour. Most Harley riders don’t care about
1900high speed, they’d rather have that low-end torque, the one that
1901gurgles down in your groin and gives you the feeling of power. The
1902Japanese bikes, while they have the power, they don’t quite have the
1903feeling of power. You can hook a rope up to a Harley and pull a Mack
1904truck. You can’t do that with a Japanese bike. Even though the power
1905is there, you’d tear the clutch right out.
1906In the early sixties, Honda had an ad, “You meet the nicest people
1907on a Honda.” That really turned the Hell’s Angels off and knocked
1908Harley for a loop with the average consumer. Honda had such tiny
1909bikes, 50cc and 100cc bikes, the biggest one being a 450cc. Later,
1910when they started coming out with 900, 1100, and 1200 and even
1911Hell’s Angel / 41
1912those big 1500cc bikes, man, that’s some machinery Harley can’t
1913touch. Kawasaki and some of the Japanese sport bikes have better
1914brakes and more horsepower and handle easier.
1915What Harley has is brute horsepower. A brand-new Harley comes
1916with about forty-nine to fifty-two horsepower to the rear wheel.
1917After I’ve done a little work on mine, I’ll get eighty-one horses to
1918the rear wheel.
1919Up until 1984, Harley-Davidsons were famous for leaking oil.
1920Even when they were brand-new, they leaked, and dealers had to
1921put pieces of cardboard under them in the showroom. Early Harleys
1922came with oil leaks because the tin primary cases had ineffective
1923cork gaskets around them. Sometimes the motors weren’t machined
1924properly. If you didn’t start your bike for a week, the oil accumulated
1925through the oil pump and into the crankcase. Once you started it, it
1926spit oil all over the ground. After stricter quality control and extra
1927research and development at the factory, they eventually took care
1928of the problem with the new Evolution motor.
1929If you fix an older Harley right, they won’t leak. You’ll never find
1930a drop of oil under my bike because I refuse to believe motorcycles
1931have to leak. What I do is make sure all the seals are quality, that
1932everything is sealed up right. If I see oil seeping, I wash the parts
1933and replace the gaskets. I guess I’m a bit of a fanatic. The only time
1934you’ll see a drop of oil under my motorcycle is after I’ve run it hard
1935at high speeds. One drop comes out of the breather tube as a result
1936of condensation a while after stopping. I probably could solve that
1937by installing a one-way PCV valve that only lets the engine breathe
1938in, keeping the oil from leaking out. But I’d rather let that single
1939drop continue to leak, because I still want my engine to breathe out.
1940With speed limits being raised across the United States, I recently
1941installed a RevTech six-speed transmission by Custom Chrome, Inc.,
1942in my bike. Having a sixth gear instead of a normal five-speed is
1943like an overdrive and it’s really nice. You can hit ninety-five miles
1944per hour and not have your engine rev up. It relieves stress on the
1945motor. If you’re doing ninety-five on the highway and turning 5,000
1946revolutions per minute, you can now do the same speed and only
1947be turning 3,500 RPM. I’m also awaiting my eighty-eight-cubic-inch
1948CCI RevTech motor to go along with the six-speed transmission.
1949Harley-Davidson has yet to convert to six speeds, while some Jap
1950bikes are already going up to seven speeds. I believe most Har-ley
1951riders will want to convert to six speeds. When we had three speeds,
1952riders wanted four. When Harley went to four speeds, people
195342 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
1954dreamed about five-speed motorcycles. Harley six-speed bikes are
1955only a matter of time.
1956Even though average Harley enthusiasts like the Softail and drive
1957short distances, they’ll instinctively want what the Hell’s Angels
1958want—faster horses and more efficient overdrive. Motorcycles went
1959to bigger motors (from eighty inches to eighty-eight to ninety-five)
1960because riders like the Hell’s Angels kept pushing for more. When
1961the rubber meets the road, the yuppies and the RUBbers (rich urban
1962bikers) will want what we want.
1963Hell’s Angel “choppers” were born when we started taking the
1964front fenders off our bikes, cutting off the back fender, and changing
1965the handlebars. When you watch The Wild One, check out the bikes.
1966Lee Marvin and his crew were riding Harleys and Indians with cut
1967front fenders. They hadn’t gone to smaller tanks or different wheels.
1968When the Hell’s Angels came along, we started taking our bikes
1969apart, improving them and fucking with Harley’s formula designs.
1970When you’d buy a new motorcycle it came equipped with standard
1971features. First we would take the windshields off, then throw
1972out the saddlebags and switch the big old ugly seat (with springs)
1973with a smaller, skinny seat. We didn’t need all of those lights either.
1974We converted the oversized headlight to a smaller beam, replaced
1975the straight handlebars with a set of high bars, and replaced the
1976bigger gas tanks with small teardrop-shaped tanks. We used old
1977Mustang motorcycle gas tanks until the mid-fifties, when we started
1978using narrow Sportster gas tanks. The tanks were changed for looks,
1979because the wide and thick stock tanks on a Harley covered up the
1980top of the motor. The design of the bike became radically streamlined,
1981the curvature of the body narrow and sleek. It looked cooler if the
1982front end was longer with a skinny front wheel. Plus you could see
1983the whole motor, a real extra for a street machine.
1984Next we’d toss the front fender, then cut the back one or make an
1985even thinner fender from the tire cover mount of a 1936 Ford. That
1986made a beautiful back fender for a Harley with a sixteen-inch tire,
1987and it was practical too.
1988The standard color on Harley frames used to always be black. The
1989gas tank and fenders would be another color. When we built our
1990own bikes we made the frames the same color as the gas tanks and
1991molded it so you didn’t see any welding marks. We’d chrome every
1992Hell’s Angel / 43
1993part we could and install dual carburetors. The results of all the
1994customizing we did were a lot of trophies at the competitions.
1995I painted myself like a pumpkin to match the new orange of my
1996motorcycle on Halloween night at the Fillmore, 1968. Someone who
1997worked at the Bay Bridge brought me some orange spray cans, so I
1998painted my bike with what soon became “Oakland Orange.” It was
1999kinda a bright racing orange. During the Oakland Hell’s Angels’
20001960s days, orange became a very popular color, and a lot of Oakland
2001members painted their bikes that color. Forget the symbolism, it was
2002free paint.
2003We painted our death heads and designs on the gas tanks. Tommy
2004the Greek, an old car painter in Oakland, was our man. You immediately
2005recognized Tommy the Greek’s designs because he had a
2006very distinctive flame design. Big Daddy Roth picked up on
2007Tommy’s style too. Von Dutch was another artist whose customized
2008paintwork was admired, especially in SoCal. There were other artists
2009like Len Barton in the Bay Area, Gil Avery in Fresno, Art Hemsel,
2010and Red Lee who were well known for painting cool designs on gas
2011tanks. Arlen Ness, who is one of the leading sellers of bike parts
2012today, got his start as a bike painter. When the Harleys came fresh
2013from the factory, guys like Arlen would take them apart and paint
2014everything one color to match, using fancy shades like candy-apple
2015red.
2016As opposed to choppers, “full dressers” are motorcycles that keep
2017all of the original manufacturer’s pieces on, plus they add accessories
2018like fancy Plexiglas windshields, mud flaps, leather saddlebags,
2019aerials for their radios with raccoon tails on them, extended fenders
2020with a lot of chrome, and lots of lights. Too much useless gear, man.
2021The street term for full dressers is “garbage wagons,” and in the old
2022days you’d never catch a Hell’s Angel on one of them. The casual
2023weekender who was going down to visit his mother-in-law usually
2024rode a full dresser. Or maybe off-duty cops.
2025These days if I was just a long-distance rider, I’d go for the Harley-
2026Davidson Road King. The Road King is better than Harley’s Dyna
2027Glide for long distances. The Road King is a rubber-mounted,
2028stripped-down version of the full dresser. It still has saddlebags and
2029the fairing, but doesn’t have stuff like a radio and the big passenger
2030seat.
2031The Hell’s Angels crafted a whole different type of motorcycle.
2032Just like Corvette and Thunderbird helped create the sports-car look
2033for Ford and Chevy, we created the chopper look from Harley-
203444 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2035Davidsons. Hell’s Angels didn’t buy a lot of parts. We made them.
2036I made the first set of high bars that I ever had from the chairs of
2037those old chrome tables in the fifties with Formica tops. You’d get
2038a set of those chairs and they were one inch thick and already bent.
2039You cut off the two ends of the chair, and bang, you had a set of
2040high bars.
2041Some of the other ways we’d modify our bikes were when we
2042took the rigid front end of one bike, cut it off, took another rigid, cut
2043it off, and welded them together to make the front end six inches
2044longer. By extending the front end of the bike out, the frame dropped
2045lower. Then we’d install the narrow fenders, grab rails, and sissy
2046bars. We made our own sissy bars and foot pegs, molding them out
2047of metal, bending and welding them to our own specifications. By
2048the late 1960s and early 1970s, we might chop a bike to make it sit
2049lower, but we didn’t usually cut the frame. It only seemed that way
2050since our seats sat way back, right up on the rear fender.
2051The only parts we had to buy were for the internal engine and
2052transmission parts. I’ve probably spent half of my life in a garage
2053so I always have a garage full of spare parts. We’d cut down the flywheels
2054on the left side to make them lighter so the bike would take
2055off quicker. For top-end performance for the long hauls, a heavier
2056flywheel was better, but it was important to us to take off quick.
2057It was a macho thing to have what we called suicide clutches and
2058jockey shifts, where you would shift gears with your left hand and
2059operate a clutch system with your left foot. Before bikes had electronic
2060ignitions, we would install magnetos to eliminate the need for
2061batteries and coils. A magneto generates electricity for the spark
2062plugs when you kick-start the bike. It was just another way to slim
2063down our choppers.
2064For the quick takeoff as well, we put in new cams and solid push
2065rods, installed bigger valves and new pistons, punched out the carburetor,
2066and put closer-ratio gears inside the transmission with
2067bigger sprockets to make our motorcycles accelerate faster.
2068Everything had to do with takeoff.
2069The back wheels were changed to an eighteen-inch wheel, and a
2070twenty-one-inch was used for the front. From the axle down, an
2071eighteen-inch rim with a 450 18 tire leaves four and a half inches of
2072tire from the rim to the ground. A twenty-one-inch wheel leaves
2073you only about two and a half inches of tire, so while it really doesn’t
2074raise or lower the bike that much, it makes it significantly narrower
2075and faster because of less tire on the ground.
2076Hell’s Angel / 45
2077The best deals for bikes were used Harley-Davidsons that the
2078police departments sold. By the way, they still auction them today.
2079Two hundred bucks in the sixties would buy about six or seven
2080thousand dollars in bikes and parts today. The highway patrol—in
2081the days of shovelhead engines—would put twenty thousand miles
2082on bikes before rebuilding them. After forty thousand miles, they’d
2083send them to their academies. Their reasoning was they thought the
2084bikes suffered too much metal fatigue. When the academy was
2085through with them, they’d auction them off, which is when we would
2086buy them. One of the reasons Hell’s Angels have stayed loyal to
2087Harley-Davidsons is that a Harley can always be rebuilt, no matter
2088what happens to it—unless it catches on fire and burns. That’s why
2089you can still see 1936 Harleys on the road today. They are indestructible
2090if you maintain them.
2091In the early sixties, the serial number on a motorcycle didn’t really
2092matter. They were on the left side of the engine case, and if the
2093number matched your pink slip, you were okay, whether it was a
2094factory number or inscribed with a punch. The cops then didn’t give
2095a shit if you had lights or license plates. Once bikes started getting
2096stolen, the law got more particular. The vehicle registration laws
2097tightened up and there started being a few more rules. Now even
2098frames have ID numbers.
2099A lot of the guys in the club would experiment with different
2100things. We’d move our brake to the middle of the bike, replacing
2101the old one with a hydraulic model. Harley-Davidson picked up on
2102that modification and put it on all of their stock bikes. We also
2103changed the kickstands by taking them off the front of the bike and
2104moving them to the middle. Then Harley started doing that on their
2105Sportsters and later on the Big Twins. For kick-start mechanisms,
2106one of the things I always did was cut the kick-start pedal in half
2107and add an inch and a half so you could start a lot easier. To make
2108a motorcycle start, you have to spin the motor enough, and the faster
2109you spin the motor, the easier it starts. If, like me, you weighed 150
2110pounds and you leaned into the pedal, that extra inch and a half
2111would increase the kick. If you weighed over 250 pounds like Junkie
2112George or Big Al, starting a bike was a snap.
2113We designed and built a bike that ran damn smooth, using the
2114least amount of parts and accessories. Choppers were stripped down
2115for speed, looks, and ultimate discomfort. After we got through with
2116them, they weren’t the easiest bikes to ride, but what the hell, at least
2117we looked cool. It became a style and look: a bitch bar (sissy bar) so
211846 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2119your chick could lay back. When we’d ride down the street, people
2120would check us out—and that was what it was all about.
2121The government started getting nervous about motorcycle clubs
2122chopping up their bikes. Laws were passed, and as club members
2123started raking bikes and putting on long front ends, the highway
2124patrol helped pass laws regulating handlebar height. For a while,
2125we ran with no front brakes. We didn’t need them. A small spool
2126wheel with nice long spokes and no front brakes looked real nice.
2127Then a law was passed requiring front brakes. Some of our handlebars
2128were well over shoulder height. The law was uptight and arbitrary
2129that handlebars should be at shoulder level and no higher. They
2130claimed you couldn’t control the bike if your handlebars were too
2131high, which is nuts. We tried to explain to lawmakers that aboveshoulder-
2132level handlebars were more comfortable on long rides.
2133The dumb-fuck politicians didn’t even consider that’s how the
2134everyday person controls their car. Look at people as they drive
2135their cars and notice how they place their hands: On top of the
2136steering wheel—well above shoulder level. It’s natural. But I guess
2137since we the Hell’s Angels did it, they had to get us for something.
2138In the early days of motorcycling, nobody even thought about
2139wearing a helmet. Now, of course, there are laws in many states.
2140While I was in jail in 1991, California finally passed its helmet law.
2141In the sixties, I was instrumental in keeping the helmet law off the
2142books. There was a San Francisco assemblyman named John Foran
2143who crusaded relentlessly to pass the first helmet law. I was always
2144in his face, fighting him, and for three or four years, I beat him every
2145time. The final time we clashed, he came up to me and said, “You
2146know, Sonny, next year I’m presenting a bill in front of the assembly
2147that says only you have to wear a helmet.”
2148As a club it became our personal mission, so we rode to Sacramento
2149to fight their laws on the steps of the capitol building. It always
2150brought out the news cameras when the Hell’s Angels helped
2151lead the battle against helmet laws, because the motorcycle industry
2152was too chickenshit to wage a visible fight against the California
2153assembly. The motorcycle industry was caught in a huge public relations
2154dilemma. They didn’t want to see the law passed either, but
2155they were afraid of looking like they weren’t safety-conscious. Motorcycle
2156manufacturers never wanted the law passed, because
2157wearing a helmet implied that a motorcycle wasn’t safe. The Hell’s
2158Angels didn’t mind being labeled the bad guys should the law pass.
2159We were used to it.
2160Hell’s Angel / 47
2161It’s funny when you think about it now, but in order to look cool
2162and have our own look, we cannibalized Harleys to the point where
2163Harley dealers didn’t even want us near their shops. We’d destroyed
2164the original Harley design and image by taking stuff off “their” bikes
2165and replacing them with our very own parts. Some Harley-Davidson
2166shops refused to sell us anything. Members used to have to send in
2167their old ladies to pick up parts.
2168To Harley-Davidson, we made motorcycle riding look bad. Even
2169if we did, we also made them tons of dough for the notoriety of us
2170riding Harley-Davidsons. In the 1950s, people were so intimidated
2171by Harleys that if you rode one sometimes you wouldn’t get waited
2172on in restaurants or they wouldn’t give you a room at a motel.
2173I think the Hell’s Angels are responsible for a lot of the current
2174designs and workmanship on modern motorcycles. When you look
2175at current custom Softail motorcycles (not the full dressers) you see
2176a lot of our design innovations. Our chopper motorcycles inspired
2177even kids’ bicycles, like the Schwinn Sting Ray with its banana seat
2178and gooseneck handlebars. It was only a matter of time before
2179everybody on top would cash in on selling custom motorcycle parts.
2180Custom motorcycles and bike-riding gear has become a bigger
2181business than ever. Thank the Hell’s Angels for that.
2182Stolen bikes have always been a major, let’s say, preoccupation
2183with clubs like ours. The Hell’s Angels have a rule that with any
2184bike riders who come over and party with us, you cannot steal their
2185motorcycle if it’s parked in front of the clubhouse or in front of a
2186member’s house. Now that’s fair, isn’t it? In 1967, three Angels, Big
2187Al Perryman, Fu Griffin, and Cisco Valderrama, stole twenty-seven
2188motorcycles in one day. It’s gotta be some kind of world record. The
2189story goes that there were twenty-seven bikers from this nameless
2190club from California that came down to party with the Richmond
2191Hell’s Angels one weekend. The clubhouse got raided and everybody
2192went to jail. Cisco needed a twenty-one-inch skinny front wheel, but
2193he knew we had this rule not to steal any bike stuff parked in front
2194of the clubhouse. Cisco knew about the party and all the jailing that
2195went on, so hey, who was gonna miss a front wheel? But a rule is a
2196rule. That’s when Big Al and Cisco came up with the scheme of
219748 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2198stealing all the bikes. Fuck the front wheel, they wanted the whole
2199enchilada. They rolled all the bikes down the block and parked them
2200there overnight. The next day they figured they were fair game—they
2201weren’t in front of an Angels clubhouse anymore and nobody else
2202had stolen them. Fu drove them down in Cisco’s ’65 Impala convertible
2203and they started bringing them back two by two to Oakland
2204and stashing them at Fu’s house. When they were through they had
2205a bike shop, twenty-seven to be exact, all for one lousy front wheel.
2206They stripped them all down and now they had a big—a really
2207big—parts shop.
2208Then I found out about it.
2209Cisco and Big Al were in trouble again. They’d fucked up. I told
2210them they’d crossed a thin line between right and wrong, so I made
2211them return every bike. Actually, since they had already been
2212stripped down, we had to have each guy come over to Fu’s house
2213and pick up his stolen motorcycle in a box.
2214But what goes around comes around, because one year later, in
22151968, my bike, my honey, my pride, my joy, got ripped off, and boy
2216was I pissed.
2217Sweet Cocaine. I couldn’t believe anybody would steal my beautiful
2218hand-built bike. Sweet Cocaine was featured on the album cover of
2219the Hell’s Angels ’69 soundtrack. I built it from the ground up, and
2220never a wrench was turned on that bike without the sweet sniff of
2221cocaine. When I finished that bike, I built a miniature Sportster version
2222of the same model for my girlfriend Sharon, calling hers Little
2223Cocaine.
2224I was in Hayward at a jewelry store buying my sister a ring when
2225I heard two ladies who were working in the store talking.
2226“He must be in his car, because I don’t see his motorcycle.”
2227“Are you referring to me?” I asked them. “My bike’s right outside.”
2228I walked outside, and sure enough Sweet Cocaine was gone. The
2229two ladies had called the cops, but when the police showed up, I
2230told them I had walked to the store. There must have been some
2231mistake. Inside, my guts were on fire, but on the outside I didn’t
2232want any cops involved in the search. I remained calm. I got on the
2233phone and called for an emergency meeting with the club.
2234“Everybody looks for my bike,” I told everyone in a rage.
2235“Nobody, and I mean nobody, rides a motorcycle in this town until
2236I get Sweet Cocaine back.”
2237Sharon manned the phones at home while everybody else scoured
2238Hell’s Angel / 49
2239the area. The first calls came in and someone reported seeing a pink
2240Cadillac near the jewelry store. I went from bar to bar, grilling people,
2241asking about the bike, the Cadillac, anything. I wanted the fucking
2242thing back now. Meanwhile, every known bike thief was calling.
2243Rick Motley, one of the better-known bike thieves—now
2244dead—called the house and told Sharon he would rather have the
2245Army, the Navy, the Marines, and the Green Berets after him than
2246Sonny Barger and the Hell’s Angels looking for Sweet Cocaine.
2247Then we got a vital lead. The Cadillac proved to be a dead end.
2248Some delivery guy outside the jewelry store had seen a guy riding
2249away on a bike, wearing a vest with only a bottom rocker. With a
2250rough description of the guy and the color of his patch, we narrowed
2251it down real quick to a club called the Unknowns. We knew which
2252bar they hung out in, so we raced over there and grabbed up a couple
2253of them fast and asked them what their prospects were up to. Prospects
2254are prospective members who’ll do anything, anytime, to
2255anyone just to get into a club. I asked about their prospects because
2256they were crazy motherfuckers with no brains, no history, and usually
2257no future. According to one of the members, yeah, a couple of
2258prospects were tearing down a bike they had just stolen. I told them,
2259“That bike is mine, motherfucker, and you’re going to help me get
2260it back.”
2261The prospects who stole the bike didn’t know whom it belonged
2262to. The guys who told them to steal it probably knew it was mine. I
2263had the registration by the back license plate in a clear round glass
2264tube. The guys tearing it down for parts that night had everything
2265unbolted, but when they got to the registration holder, they knew
2266they were in deep, deep shit. Rather than return Sweet Cocaine, they
2267dumped it into the Oakland Estuary.
2268We rounded up everybody who was responsible, tied them up,
2269and took them over to my house on Golf Links Road. Sharon was
2270supposed to keep an eye on them, but it was a good thing we tied
2271them up because it was so late at night Sharon kept falling asleep
2272clutching her gun. Every half hour or so, the front door would open
2273and another accomplice was tossed into the living room. When we
2274found the last guy the punishment began. One at a time we bullwhipped
2275them and beat them with spiked dog collars, broke their
2276fingers with ball peen hammers. One of them screamed at us, “Why
2277don’t you just kill us and get it over with?”
2278Then we took their motorcycles, sold them, and disbanded their
2279club.
228050 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2281Moral of the story—don’t get caught stealing a Hell’s Angel’s bike,
2282especially if it’s the president’s.
2283Hell’s Angel / 51
2284
22855
2286THE PROUD,
2287THE (FILTHY)
2288FEW…
2289THE HELL’S
2290ANGELS
2291The story of the Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club is the story of a
2292very select brotherhood of men who will fight and die for each other,
2293no matter what the cause. The Oakland Hell’s Angels, like all the
2294clubs, revolves around the individuality of its members. People have
2295come and gone, lived and died—and many of these men are still
2296around kickin’ ass right alongside the young guys to this day. It’s
2297true, some of these men are stranger than fiction. But they’re all oneof-
2298a-kind dudes. You need ’em next to you when the shit gets rough,
2299when the fists start swinging or the bullets start flying.
2300The whole thing with the nicknames started when the publicity
2301about the Hell’s Angels turned us into street celebs. As the press
2302crowded around us, a reporter shoved a mike into the face of John
2303Terence Tracy. “And sir, what’s your name?” Without missing a
2304beat, Marvin Gilbert cut in, “Why, that’s Terry the Tramp.” The
2305press guy then turned around and asked Marvin, “And sir, what is
2306your name?” This time Terry shot back, “That’s Marvin, Mouldy
2307Marvin.” These names—made up on the spot—stuck for life. As for
2308me, I’ll always be called Sonny, while some of the longtime members
2309refer to me as Chief.
2310One of the first Oakland members was Skip Workman. When
2311Skip—born Clifford Park Workman—served his hitch with the Navy,
2312he came out to the Bay Area. He was from New Harbor, Maine. His
2313mother came from a rich family. During his high school days, Skip
2314was a champion wrestler. He had more choke holds and fancy moves
2315than Hulk Hogan and could bar brawl like a drunken Popeye. Skip
2316loved one thing, being an Oakland Hell’s Angel. Skip was with us
2317throughout the sixties and into the seventies and served as vice
2318president for a number of years.
2319When I first met Skip, he rode a full dresser, a 1956 Harley—which
2320has a classic look. He bought it brand-new, stock as stock can be:
2321sixteen-inch wheels, full fenders, saddlebags, windshield, big seat,
2322and a straight-bar frame (instead of a bowed one). One day, while
2323riding daredevil on the Oakland mudflats, Skip flipped his bike end
2324over end and got knocked unconscious. After they rushed him to
2325Oak Knoll Naval Hospital, the doctors and nurses couldn’t believe
2326he was an active-duty Navy serviceman. Here was this guy sprawled
2327out on a gurney with tattoos, greasy beard, longish hair, and an
2328Angels patch. While Skip was in the hospital, I stripped his bike
2329down and made a chopper out of his virgin Harley. He dug it.
2330Skip worked at the local General Motors plant in Fremont, and
2331lived where 79th Avenue dead-ended into Foothill Boulevard. At
2332the end of 79th was a walk-through path, and Skip’s place was the
2333last house on the pathway. The word among Oakland cops was if
2334you wanted to be promoted to sergeant in the OPD, all you had to
2335do was knock on Skip’s door and tell him you were taking him to
2336jail for being drunk. In those days if you lit up a cop, it was only a
2337misdemeanor, so Skip knocked a hell of a lot of cops off his front
2338porch. Assaulting a policeman eventually became a felony in California,
2339but not then. Skip loved hitting cops.
2340Skip had one weirdo compulsion, and that was the front yard of
2341his house. Skip’s home was his castle. He had all these tiny colored
2342rocks in neat, orderly sections in his front yard. I never saw him do
2343it, but it must have taken him days, weeks, months to line up all
2344these little colored rocks. Sometimes when I would come over to
2345visit, I would take a handful of rocks and mix up the colors. He’d
2346go ballistic.
2347Skip was really strict about the guys smoking grass in his house.
2348Getting caught with pot in the sixties was a narco beef, and he was
2349afraid that one little roach might draw the cops and they would (and
2350could) take his house away from him.
2351Skip once called up the Oakland clubhouse pretending to sound
2352all freaked out. He claimed he had been taken prisoner by a bunch
2353of women. “I’ve been kidnapped,” he yelled into the phone, “and
2354they’re fucking the shit out of me. And they want a ransom, man!”
2355Yeah, right.
2356While I was in prison during the early 1970s, Skip went back East.
235754 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2358He transferred to our Massachusetts chapter for a while, but because
2359of a bad back and family obligations, he dropped out of the club for
2360good.
2361One of the early presidents of the Berdoo Hell’s Angels was
2362Bobby Zimmerman. On our way home from the 1964 Bass Lake Run,
2363Bobby was riding in his customary spot—front left—when his
2364muffler fell off his bike. Thinking he could go back and retrieve it,
2365Bobby whipped a quick U-turn from the front of the pack. At that
2366same moment a Richmond Hell’s Angel named Jack Egan was
2367hauling ass from the back of the pack toward the front. Egan was
2368on the wrong side of the road passing the long line of speeding bikes
2369just as Bobby whipped his U-turn. Jack broadsided poor Bobby and
2370instantly killed him. We dragged Bobby’s lifeless body to the side
2371of the road. There was nothing we could do but send somebody on
2372to town for help.
2373As the ambulance drove away with Bobby’s body, some Hell’s
2374Angels came from the San Gabriel Valley chapter, obviously upset
2375over Bobby’s death, called Jack Egan a “fucking punk” for what he’d
2376done. That’s when “Hi Ho” Steve, who had just transferred to Oakland,
2377stepped in.
2378“Wait a fuckin’ minute! He ain’t no punk. He’s a Hell’s Angel.
2379He’s just like you guys. Just like Bobby. Just like me. You got it?”
2380One San Gabriel Angel still wouldn’t let it lie. He insisted Egan
2381was a punk, so Hi Ho lit him up right on the spot with a few to the
2382face. The guy picked himself up and circled back and grabbed a
2383chain. Sensing a bad scene, I picked up a tire iron, hit him on the
2384wrist, broke it, and beat the chain off him. Then another San Gabriel
2385Angel jumped in, coming after me. Skip Workman stepped in
2386between us and knocked him out with one punch. Skip saved my
2387ass; it was the end of a bad situation gone worse on the open road.
2388While the SGAs were rightly pissed that a SoCal president got
2389killed, regardless, they shouldn’t have called anybody a fucking
2390punk unless they were willing to fight or be beat up. Fuck with a
2391Hell’s Angel and if the guy doesn’t light you up, he could be tossed
2392out of the club for not standing up for himself. No second chances.
2393Members are routinely voted out of the club—and beaten up—if
2394they don’t stand up for themselves.
2395We take such a hard line because if a Hell’s Angel is out in public
2396by himself and somebody insults him or rat-packs him, we expect
2397Hell’s Angel / 55
2398him to stand up for himself (and the club’s reputation) and not just
2399walk away. Light the guy up, fine. If you get beat up, you get beat
2400up. But never take an insult. If the guy fucks you up, your friends
2401can always return and rectify the situation. These rules apply at all
2402times, whether you’re with other Hell’s Angels or on your own. If
2403you can’t stand up for yourself in front of other members, how can
2404we be sure you’ll stand up when you’re alone? Angels don’t like to
2405make too many rules, but a few basics have kept the club in operation
2406for over fifty years.
2407When the Oakland Hell’s Angels first got together, I got my
2408teeth knocked out when I was run over by some asshole on a motorcycle.
2409The club was hanging out at Al Jayne’s house one night,
2410partying pretty hard, and these two drunken guys kept racing up
2411and down in front of the house on their bikes. Not only were they
2412getting on my nerves, but I figured they would draw the cops to our
2413party. So Joe Maceo and I went outside, and the next time they rode
2414by, we tried to grab them and pull them off their bikes. While I did
2415manage to grab the first one, he spun me around into the guy behind
2416him and I caught his handlebar across my face. It knocked me right
2417out. Joe got the other guy as he was slowing down and punched
2418him off his bike. Then the cops arrived and grabbed both of them
2419and hauled them off for drunk driving. When I woke up in the
2420hospital I had a broken nose and a busted jaw. My face was swollen
2421twice its size, my nose was torn loose, and all of my front teeth were
2422history. Shirley said I looked like something out of a monster movie.
2423Terry the Tramp was to many of us the ultimate Hell’s Angel.
2424He was loud and made a lot of noise and was always a fun-loving
2425guy. Terry was a drifter, although he was raised in a middle-class
2426family in Sacramento. Tramp rode with a motorcycle club in Sacto
2427called Hell Bent for Glory, which turned into the North Sacramento
2428Hell’s Angels in 1961. He switched to Berdoo and then ended up
2429back in NoCal, where he became most famous as an Oakland Hell’s
2430Angel. Terry the Tramp had a main speaking role in the movie Hell’s
2431Angels ’69 and was featured big-time in Hunter S. Thompson’s book
2432about the club.
2433Tramp was easily the most “out there” member of the Oakland
243456 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2435Hell’s Angels. Looking back, he was a trend-setter. Between the
2436beatniks and the hippies, Tramp grew his hair real long, wore a full
2437beard, and had large tattoos all over his chest and shoulders. He
2438carried a long bullwhip around with him, and when you heard it
2439crack you knew he was close by. Tramp and I spent a lot of time together
2440at one of our favorite hangouts, the Sinner’s Club in West
2441Oakland, owned by the Sinner family.
2442Terry took the Hell’s Angels from its greaser image of the 1950s
2443to the hipper, longhaired look of the late 1960s. He dressed mainly
2444in black leather, but he also wore bright psychedelic colors and
2445walked with a San Quentin penitentiary shuffle. He was sure of
2446himself. “Look out for me because I’m too fucking cool for school,
2447bro.”
2448I always think of Terry the Tramp and the Bass Lake Runs. It was
2449considered uncool to travel with a warm jacket or a sleeping bag.
2450We crashed where we fell. We used to drop reds after partying all
2451night, then pass out and fall asleep on the ground. This was a sleep
2452technique Tramp developed. And it worked!
2453Tramp used to walk around the campsite wearing nothing but
2454his Hell’s Angels patch and a pair of silver-buckled engineer boots.
2455One morning when we were camped out by the side of a rural
2456highway, Tramp walked out to the side of the road buck naked except
2457for his patch. Without a care in the world, he stuck out his
2458thumb. Families and truck drivers were driving by and saw this
2459bare-assed Hell’s Angel hitching a ride with his dick hanging out.
2460That was Tramp.
2461Whenever we’d be out on a run and pull off somewhere for the
2462night, especially if it was a small town, the Hell’s Angels always attracted
2463the local citizens and curious rubberneckers. The girls from
2464the town would always sneak by at night to check us out. Tramp
2465would sweet-talk some chicks into going back to their parents’ house
2466to round up blankets, bedspreads, and towels that we would set up
2467near the bonfires. Then after that, he’d try to convince them to get
2468naked, and he usually succeeded.
2469After we passed the no-needle rule in Northern California, Tramp
2470transferred back down to Berdoo with some of the other Northern
2471California members who were pissed off with the new rule. At that
2472time the SoCal club had not yet voted in such a rule. Tramp’s drug
2473thing spun out of control and he was found dead from an overdose
2474of Seconal. It happened right after the Hell’s Angels ’69 movie was
2475released. Nobody knows whether he was bum-kicked or was just
2476Hell’s Angel / 57
2477being his usual reckless self. We buried him in the Bay Area, and
2478afterward, without a word to anyone, his parents had the body exhumed,
2479taken back up to Sacramento, and buried there. John Terence
2480Tracy, a.k.a. Terry the Tramp, RIP, brother.
2481Big Al Perryman has been a Hell’s Angel for over thirty years.
2482He’s also one of my closest friends. He joined the Army at eighteen
2483in his native Missouri. The first time he got leave, Albert robbed a
2484gas station and got caught. He ended up getting a ten-year sentence
2485in a New Mexico prison. He did seven years, was released, then
2486moved to Sacramento, met some girl, and got married. Albert bought
2487a forty-five-cubic-inch Harley-Davidson motorcycle, then went to
2488his first Hell’s Angels meeting one night and never went home. He
2489began hanging out with the Sacramento Hell’s Angels and eventually
2490joined.
2491Someone in the Sacramento club started selling heroin, and after
2492a meeting he came up to Albert and asked him for a little favor.
2493“Hey, Albert,” the guy said, “would you drop this little package off
2494to a friend of mine?”
2495Albert didn’t know what was in the package and agreed to do it.
2496On his way home, he stopped by the place and knocked on the door.
2497Someone opened the door and Albert handed him the package. The
2498person at the door was an informant working with the cops. Here
2499comes Albert with the stuff, so Big Al ended up getting busted even
2500though he was clean.
2501Albert soon became a dope fiend. He started shooting heroin and
2502other drugs. When we passed the no-needle rule in Northern California,
2503Albert followed Terry the Tramp and moved to the Berdoo
2504club so he could stay on drugs.
2505Albert eventually landed in a California narco rehabilitation
2506prison. Throughout the time Albert was in jail, he and I wrote letters
2507back and forth.
2508“When you get out, Albert, the first thing you gotta do is come to
2509Oakland and speak with me. We need to talk. It’s important.”
2510I had already made arrangements with the SoCal club to transfer
2511Albert to Oakland when he got out of jail. Al didn’t know anything
2512about it, but I knew deep down Albert was a Hell’s Angel through
2513and through, and I was willing to test him.
2514“Albert, we’ve just had a meeting here in Oakland. You shoot
2515heroin one more time and you’re out of the club.”
251658 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2517We put him in the Oakland club as a way to keep him off drugs,
2518and he’s been clean ever since. That’s how much Big Al loves the
2519club. While some members who get in trouble with the law are
2520slapped with “nonassociation” clauses once they get out, meaning
2521they can’t hang out with the club while they’re out on parole, part
2522of Albert’s parole was that he “associate” with the club.
2523During the 1960s, backroom chemists tested their shit on us, because
2524we’d try anything. Charlie Magoo was usually the first in line.
2525I first met Magoo—real name Charles Tinsley—when he became a
2526Richmond Angel and then transferred over to Oakland. We called
2527him Magoo because he wore these big, thick glasses. The guy was
2528generous be-yond belief. He’d give me the shirt off his back if I asked
2529for it, but never his patch. When Charlie got out of the Navy in
2530Pennsylvania, his mother bought him an ice cream truck so he could
2531earn a living. But Charlie was such a easy touch, if kids had no
2532money he would just give them the ice cream for free. He ended up
2533giving his whole ice cream business away and lost his truck. Magoo
2534bought a motorcycle, rode to California, and became a Hell’s Angel.
2535One night some chick he met at a biker bar gave him a strange
2536pill and Magoo woke up on the floor of some garage a couple days
2537later all fucked up. He had lost his false teeth and didn’t know what
2538had happened or where he was, how he got there, or what it was
2539he’d taken. After that incident, he bought a copy of the Physicians’
2540Desk Reference and he never took anything unless he knew exactly
2541what it was. He read that PDR from back to front, and it never left
2542his side. From then on Magoo wore a white lab coat under his patch
2543and carried a medical satchel. It didn’t matter what kind of a pill
2544you showed him, he could tell you what it was, its side effects, what
2545you took it for legally, and what it would do to you if you took too
2546many.
2547I got into a fight with Magoo only once. We were at a place up
2548north we called the Nut Farm, a walnut orchard, having a New
2549Year’s party. Everyone was having a really good time and Magoo
2550had brought this girl to the party, but for some reason or another he
2551was really angry with her. He kept threatening her and it was bumkicking
2552everybody. After a couple days of this shit, I got tired of it.
2553“Hey, Magoo,” I told him, “why don’t you take your crap down
2554the road? Nobody wants to hear it. If you want to kill the motherfuckin’
2555bitch, take her down the road and do it there. Don’t snuff
2556her here in front of everybody, because we’re sick of it.”
2557Hell’s Angel / 59
2558He yelled back, “Piss off. I’ll do whatever the fuck I want.”
2559Magoo was a pretty powerful guy and I wasn’t near as big. When
2560we hit the ground, I was flat on my back and Magoo was on top of
2561me. I could see his fist coming down fast. Whoops! Before he knew
2562what happened I had flipped out from beneath him and bodyslammed
2563him to the ground. I was now sitting on top of him. He
2564couldn’t believe it.
2565“Let me up!” he screamed, as I held him down.
2566“I ain’t going to let you up. You’re not going to hit me no more,
2567motherfucker.”
2568I still have a scar on my nose from that fight.
2569Magoo once had this pill that he was really proud of, and he was
2570showing it off to another guy. The guy swiped the pill out of his
2571hand and popped it into his mouth.
2572“Hey, motherfucker,” Magoo said. “I paid five dollars for that.”
2573The guy laughed. “Well, you shouldn’t have offered if you didn’t
2574want me to take it.” It was some kind of synthetic heroin or Dilaudid,
2575but he didn’t give a damn what it was. If you offered him anything,
2576he took it. He was the guy who was going to show the world that
2577drugs wouldn’t hurt you. Drugs forced him out of the club. Magoo
2578wasn’t so lucky.
2579Magoo worked as a teamster by day, a lumper just like my dad,
2580unloading trucks. One day at lunchtime he went outside to eat his
2581lunch, laid down in his truck, went to sleep, and died. Magoo had
2582a heart attack. He was thirty-two. The medical examiners said he
2583had a seventy-year-old heart, worn out from taking too much speed.
2584We were once on our way to a party in Richmond near Oakland
2585and Big Al was riding his motorcycle ahead of us when he suddenly
2586hit a car that he was passing and fell off his bike. Because he was so
2587big and round, Al literally rolled off the freeway and into a ditch.
2588Magoo ran right up to where Big Al was lying, opened up his
2589black doctor bag, and found several pills to help Big Al cope with
2590the pain. With Magoo’s help, Big Al was able to leave the scene.
2591With Magoo’s medicinal assistance, he even made it to the party
2592later that night!
2593Back at the accident scene, the police arrived and found Al’s
2594wrecked motorcycle down in the ditch. The front end was completely
2595bent and twisted.
2596“Where’s the body?” the police asked the witnesses.
2597Winston McConnelly, another Oakland club member, jumped out
2598of the Cadillac he was riding in and walked up to the cops.
259960 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2600“That’s my bike, officers.” Winston was all decked out, wearing
2601purple leather pants and a sheer gold satin T-shirt, trying hard to
2602convince the police that it was him who had just stacked the motorcycle.
2603The cops looked at each other, shaking their heads. It was
2604impossible to believe that Winston, all decked out, actually rolled
2605that bike. We had Albert’s cycle towed back to Oakland, where I
2606fixed it.
2607Winston was a very “flashy” Hell’s Angel. Tramp was flashy in
2608the rebel/animal sense, which served as shock value for the public,
2609but it was Winston who was flashy with his money and clothes. He
2610wore lots of gold jewelry and had gold teeth. Winston was a ladies’
2611man. I used to send girls down to Winston’s house when I got tired
2612of going out with them. Then they’d become Winston’s old ladies
2613for a while, and he usually kept a stable of them. He also owned a
2614lioness named Kitty Kitty. Winston fed her live chickens. He used
2615to invite me to come over to his house to visit Kitty Kitty, but that
2616cat got so big I wouldn’t go near it. It roared out in his yard,
2617sounding like Jungle Gardens or something. Winston used to laugh
2618and say, “You know the difference between a big cat and a small
2619cat? A big cat’ll scratch your eyes out, but a little pussy’ll never hurt
2620ya.”
2621Words to live by from Winston.
2622After we lost Charlie Magoo, Sacramento’s Michael “Mother”
2623Miles, and Frisco’s Chocolate George, the Hell’s Angels became well
2624known for our giant funerals. When a member dies, everybody goes
2625to his funeral. It’s out of respect for the man and his particular
2626charter. Part of it is a show of strength. I’ve gone to funerals of
2627members I didn’t even know, but because they were members, I felt
2628obligated if I could make it.
2629Law enforcement agencies used to make fun of the Hell’s Angel
2630funerals when we would ride our motorcycles alongside the hearse
2631in a mile-long formation. The cops called us a bunch of clowns. But
2632it wasn’t too long after that, whenever a cop got killed on duty, they
2633started doing the same exact thing. Now it’s commonplace, damn
2634near regulation.
2635In the early days of the Oakland club, way before we bought our
2636Hell’s Angel / 61
2637own clubhouse, the Oakland Hell’s Angels used to hang out and
2638hold meetings in Junior Gonsalves’s basement. There was Johnny
2639Angel, Clint George, Jerry Pruchky, Junior, Dale Malen, Gus Pimental
2640and his cousin Waldo, and especially Jerry Jordan.
2641Jerry worked on the line at the Peter Paul Mounds candy factory.
2642He was a real wiseguy. He used to take little blocks of balsa wood
2643and chocolate-coat them with almonds on top. Then he’d wrap them
2644up in real Mounds Bar candy wrappers and leave them laying
2645around. Jerry died in a bike wreck in late 1959, the first Oakland
2646Hell’s Angel to die an Oakland Hell’s Angel. After visiting his baby
2647who had been born that day, he was hit by a train coming off the
264829th Avenue Bridge. He’d been racing the train to the intersection.
2649Jerry’s legacy was a twenty-five-foot skid mark.
2650Waldo was one of the early Oakland members, and one of the
2651biggest guys I ever saw in my life. He was the guy who advised us
2652against allowing heroin addicts in the club. When Waldo was in the
2653club, he used heroin before we had our rule against it. One day he
2654told me he was quitting the club because he was a heroin addict and
2655he couldn’t be an addict and a Hell’s Angel at the same time. His
2656bike sat with a flat tire for three weeks because he would rather fix
2657himself than his bike.
2658Before that rule, Waldo was the guy who got me started sell-ing
2659heroin. I sold heroin from the late sixties into the early seventies
2660directly to junkies. Sometimes I had other junkies selling it too. One
2661day Waldo asked me, “Hey, how much money you got?”
2662“I don’t know, about four hundred dollars.”
2663“Give it to me and I’ll show you how to make even more money.”
2664“No way, man. You yourself told me, never trust a junkie.”
2665“No, I meant other heroin addicts, not me.”
2666I gave him the four hundred bucks and Waldo sped down to
2667Mexico and came back with an ounce of heroin. When we got done
2668selling it, the original four bills turned into a cigar box full of money,
2669easily a couple of grand. Even Waldo made out on the deal, and
2670then he got loaded.
2671I handed him back the cigar box full of money.
2672“Go back down there.”
267362 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2674Jimmy Scraggs was another early member. Scraggs, whose real
2675name was Jim Stephenson, was a big ol’ hillbilly country singer. He
2676was also a sparring partner for a California boxer named Bo Bo
2677Olsen. Scraggs had his country band called Jim Long and His Tennessee
2678Playboys, and he played in a bar called Oakie John’s in Alvarado.
2679The Hell’s Angels used to hang out at Oakie John’s
2680whenever Scraggs had a gig there. The bar was rectangular and had
2681this long crowded hallway where you’d always end up bumping
2682into somebody and spilling their drink. Fights were always breaking
2683out. The stage was covered over with chicken wire so the bands
2684wouldn’t get hit by flying bottles. Scraggs used to bring three guitars
2685with him because one or two would usually end up getting broken
2686over somebody’s head.
2687Scraggs was cleaning a.25 automatic in 1973 and there was a bullet
2688lodged inside the chamber after he popped the clip. It went off and
2689shot him in the head. One of his daughters, seven years old at the
2690time, was the first to find him dead. Smart kid, she knew he was a
2691felon and wasn’t supposed to have the gun in the first place, so she
2692hid the piece before the police came to the scene. The cops thought
2693somebody murdered Scraggs for a long time until the little girl finally
2694coughed up the piece.
2695Hi Ho” Steve Vaughan was a total nut. He didn’t much care for
2696authority, so when he had to show up in court once he painted half
2697of his face green, right down the middle. The judge was so pissed
2698off he warned Steve, “Mr. Vaughan, you come back here to my court
2699at one o’clock and you better not be looking like that!” So Hi Ho
2700Steve went and painted the other half of his face yellow. Another
2701time Hi Ho Steve had a toothache and he tried to pull the offending
2702tooth out with a pair of pliers. He ended up pulling out part of his
2703jawbone too. When we were out on the road during one Hell’s Angel
2704run, Hi Ho Steve made a stew at the campsite out of some coyote
2705roadkill. Victims of Steve’s roadkill stew got as sick as the wild dog
2706they ate.
2707Norton Bob rode a Harley and a BSA, but originally he had a
2708Hell’s Angel / 63
2709Norton, which is how he got the name. He transferred to Oakland
2710from San Diego as a club member in high standing. During a war
2711with a rival motorcycle club, Norton was sent to the joint for messing
2712up one of their members real bad. When he was released from prison,
2713he received a certificate of rehabilitation from the governor, one of
2714the very few given out. He went on to become an accomplished pilot
2715and raced airplanes. Norton also designed special aerodynamic
2716parachutes and formed his own aviation company.
2717Norton died while delivering a custom twin-engine airplane to a
2718client in New Zealand. They had stripped it out and installed extra
2719gas tanks for the long journey across the Pacific, but when one engine
2720went out, the weight of the cargo was too much and his plane crashdived
2721into a wave. We received the last transmissions from the Coast
2722Guard and apparently Norton had lost altitude fast and disappeared
2723somewhere down under.
2724Cisco has been a Hell’s Angel for over thirty years. His real name
2725is Elliot Valderrama. He’s part Filipino and he was raised in East
2726Los Angeles with the tough Latin street gangs. Cisco made a trip up
2727to Oakland in the early 1960s with a contractor who had brought
2728his men in to install some fireplaces and chimneys. Cisco worked
2729as a bricklayer, and while he was on the job he saw a group of
2730Oakland Hell’s Angels on their motorcycles, pulling into a gas station.
2731At that precise moment he knew what he wanted to be for the
2732rest of his life. Although he had never ridden a motorcycle, if that’s
2733what it took to join the Hell’s Angels, then that was it. Cisco pulled
2734up stakes in East L.A. and ended up in Northern California.
2735The first time I met Cisco, he shuffled into the Star Cafe and said
2736to me he wanted to become a Hell’s Angel. He belonged to a club
2737in Sonoma County called the Misfits, and Pete Knell and Chocolate
2738George brought Cisco to Oakland to introduce him to me and discuss
2739the possibility of the Misfits becoming another Hell’s Angel chapter
2740in Northern California.
2741Cisco was an up-front guy. The second time he came around, he
2742was wearing a Batman shirt and was with his girlfriend. While we
2743were hanging in the bar, Cisco turned and asked his girlfriend to
2744wait out in the car.
2745“I’ll come out as soon as I get beat up.”
2746As the time passed, pretty soon his girlfriend got impatient, so
274764 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2748she came into the bar and asked Cisco, “Hurry up and get beat up
2749so we can leave.”
2750Cisco was determined to join us. He asked me what he had to do
2751to become a Hell’s Angel. There were some bikers then we’d been
2752trying to catch, running around San Rafael in Marin County wearing
2753phony Hell’s Angel patches. Cisco had already met them, these “San
2754Rafael Hell’s Angels.” Based on what Cisco had always heard about
2755us, these guys were a bunch of fuckups. The way Cisco saw it, if he
2756was in the schoolyard, he would have beaten them up and taken their
2757lunch money. They told Cisco, “If you want to be a San Rafael Hell’s
2758Angel, just have the patch made and put it on.” I was halfway being
2759a smart-ass with Cisco when I told him, “Go grab one of those San
2760Rafael patches and bring it to me. Then we’ll talk about it. But don’t
2761wake me up before noon.”
2762After our meeting, Cisco and a couple of his Misfit buddies
2763stopped into San Rafael and beat on the door of the bogus president’s
2764house. When he opened up, Cisco hit him hard and fast, knocking
2765him down and beating him senseless. His old lady was screaming,
2766so one of the Misfits bitch-slapped her, making her lay down on the
2767floor. Cisco took the president’s patch.
2768“You’re no Hell’s Angel, you fuckin’ motherfucker, and if you
2769want to get down about it with guns, we have no fuckin’ problem
2770with that.”
2771Cisco made him call the other seven guys. As each of them showed
2772up, they were beaten and rounded up into the corner of the house.
2773Collecting all the phony patches, they burned them all except for
2774the president’s patch. That night the “San Rafael Hell’s Angels” were
2775officially disbanded.
2776Cisco drove back down to Oakland the next morning. When he
2777got to my house it was eight o’clock, so he sat waiting in his truck
2778until a quarter to twelve, when Fu, a Fresno Hell’s Angel at the time,
2779stopped by my house. As Fu walked up to my door, Cisco yelled
2780out to him, “Hey! It’s not twelve o’clock yet. Don’t wake him up!”
2781Fu laughed. “Man, Sonny gets up early every morning. He’s
2782probably been up for hours.”
2783I invited Cisco in and he gave me the bogus patch. The next week,
2784I sponsored Cisco and fourteen other Misfits to start a Hell’s Angel
2785chapter in Santa Rosa. They were voted in no problem. Cisco is one
2786of a very few Hell’s Angels never to have served as a prospect.
2787When Cisco was still in his twenties he got into a fight with another
2788club from out of state. They didn’t get his patch, but they pointed
2789Hell’s Angel / 65
2790guns at his head and threatened to blow him away. “This is how we
2791do things in our state,” they said to him. When Cisco told me what
2792happened, for political reasons at the time, I told him to back off and
2793not get into any beefs with this other club.
2794Right after that, Bobby “Durt” England, an Oakland member,
2795called Cisco out of respect to let him know that a bike rider from the
2796same club was staying with him over at his mother’s house. Cisco
2797put the phone down and raced over to his house, pulling out his
2798pistol.
2799“Hey, motherfucker, this is how we do things in California.” He
2800pulled back the hammer and pointed the gun at the guy’s head.
2801Bobby’s mother, who looked just like Aunt Bea from The Andy
2802Griffith Show, without saying a word bent down and started rolling
2803up her fancy Oriental rug so no blood would get on it. Before pulling
2804the trigger, Cisco remembered his promise to me and backed off.
2805One time a friend figured that Cisco’s West Oakland party loft
2806might look cool with a casket for a coffee table. The next day, there
2807it was, a shining, brand-new mahogany coffin. Only thing, the damn
2808thing was so heavy. Opening up the casket, there was the embalmed
2809body still inside, swiped out of the funeral home. Cisco blew up at
2810his buddy. “Get this motherfucker out of here before I put you inside
2811it!”
2812Cisco became the president of our Oakland chapter while I was
2813in prison. He works in the movie business, and his close buddy is
2814Mickey Rourke. His passion is doo-wop music and vintage automobiles.
2815He only rides a motorcycle so he can be in the club, and he
2816owns a bunch of them, building the prettiest motorcycles you’d ever
2817want to see. While he loves working on bikes, he doesn’t necessarily
2818like to ride. He only rides to be in the club. With me, it’s the opposite.
2819I ride every day.
2820Hell’s Angels love to fistfight. There’s never a shortage of drunks
2821or foolhardy motherfuckers willing to take us on, and a lot of times
2822we’ll take on each other. Armand Bletcher stood six feet eight and
2823weighed in at 350 pounds. He was so strong he could pick up a
2824couple of motorcycles and put them on the back of a pickup truck.
2825In the early 1970s Armand could bench-press 705 pounds, but he
2826had to arch his back to do it. He was never in competition, but he
2827took steroids and was unbelievably big.
2828Only Johnny Angel would dare pick a fight with Armand Bletcher.
282966 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2830Armand turned to me one day, almost crying, practically begging,
2831“Sonny, please let me fight him.”
2832“Armand,” I said, “if you do it, we’re all going to have to jump
2833on you.”
2834We would have ended up stabbing him, because there was no
2835way in the world we could have beaten this guy in a fair fight. He
2836probably could have wiped out everybody in the room.
2837Armand once got into an argument on the phone with a friend
2838and warned him, “I’m coming over to kick your ass.” When Armand
2839walked through the door, his friend hit him over the head with a
2840baseball bat, which only made him madder.
2841“I’m going to stuff that bat right up your ass.”
2842His buddy dropped the bat, pulled out a gun, and shot Armand
2843dead in his tracks.
2844There was a Hell’s Angel in Sonoma County named Fuck ’Em
2845Up Chuck, a no-nonsense biker. If Chuck didn’t like you or something
2846you said, then—boom!—he fucked you up, which is why
2847everybody called him Fuck ’Em Up Chuck. He met this little hippie
2848chick in Marin County and asked her to make him a death head ring
2849for his club. They agreed on a design, and when she finished the
2850ring, she delivered it to Chuck. When he saw the ring, he got really
2851irate. “Why did you put Oakland on this ring? I’m from Sonoma.”
2852“I’m really sorry,” she said. “I thought all Hell’s Angels came from
2853Oakland.” Since it was useless to him, Chuck gave the ring to an
2854Oakland member.
2855James “Fu” Griffin was an Oakland Hell’s Angel who had transferred
2856from the Fresno club. Once Fu got sent to the joint after his
2857house got raided. The feds busted in with guns drawn and shooting
2858while Fu grabbed his gun and started popping caps back at the feds.
2859They machine-gunned Fu out of the house, and he got hit once in
2860the arm. When Cisco went to visit him in San Quentin, he wore his
2861bullet wound like a proud trophy. As long as we held on to the
2862house, we always left those machine-gun bullet holes in the walls,
2863drapes, and doors as a reminder of Fu.
2864Hell’s Angel / 67
2865There was a Hawaiian guy in the Oakland club we nicknamed
2866Pi. Pi’s real name was Alan White, and he was the meanest dude
2867you’d ever want to meet. Pi was physically tough, and he hurt
2868people. He was the kind of Hell’s Angel that you stayed away from
2869if you were an outsider hanging out with the club.
2870We were on a run once in the Gold Country when the wheel on
2871my bike broke. Luckily, we were right near a motorcycle shop in the
2872next small town. The plan was for me and Pi to separate from the
2873rest of the pack to go and get my wheel fixed. One of the other
2874riders—who wasn’t a member of the club—asked if it was okay if
2875he rode along with us. No problem. Then the new guy watched as
2876Pi took an Uzi out of a prospect’s truck, loaded it, wrapped it up in
2877a towel, and strapped it to the seat on his bike.
2878“What the hell’s that for, man?”
2879“I’m going with Sonny,” said Pi matter-of-factly as he packed up
2880the weapon.
2881That changed the guy’s mind. “You can go without me. I’m staying
2882with the pack.” Wherever I was, if Pi was nearby, I always felt well
2883protected.
2884Doug “the Thug” Orr was another uncontrollable member. He
2885came first from the Daly City Hell’s Angels, then transferred to the
2886Nomads before becoming an Oakland Hell’s Angel. Doug was raised
2887just outside of San Francisco in the Daly City area and was an extremely
2888violent dude by nature, a gangster motherfucker. The
2889longest time he ever spent out of the joint was during his stint with
2890the Oakland chapter. He finally got thrown back into San Quentin
2891for armed robbery and shooting his girlfriend through the head.
2892Doug the Thug was so tough he could pop a pair of handcuffs. Inmates
2893inside San Quentin cellblocks would walk around him rather
2894than next to him. During his stretch at Q he was found to be so violent
2895and bad-assed that they transferred him to the Napa Valley
2896nuthouse. Their plan was to perform a lobotomy on Doug to mellow
2897him out. Someone who had served time in the Napa hospital with
2898Doug alerted some of his friends about what was going to happen.
2899His friends helped get Doug out of the Napa State Hospital. When
2900he got out, he was so heavily drugged it took about five days before
2901the dope wore off and he came to. Doug the Thug was an institution-
290268 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2903alized guy all his life. He eventually went back to the penitentiary,
2904where he died of a heroin overdose in his cell.
2905During the acid heyday of the 1960s, Terry the Tramp and George
2906Wethern used to move most of the LSD and other psychedelics in
2907Haight-Ashbury during the Summer of Love. If it was acid made
2908by the famous LSD pioneer Owsley Stanley, chances were Tramp
2909and George were the guys selling it. George’s nickname was Baby
2910Huey, and when he wasn’t dealing LSD, George was a carpenter
2911and construction worker. Wethern was one of the first Hell’s Angels
2912to turn against the club, become a rat, and tell his story to the government.
2913Then he wrote it all down in a book that came out in 1978.
2914Wayward Angel was the first of many scary “tell-all” books about the
2915Hell’s Angels to be published. George was also one of the very first
2916Hell’s Angels to enter the Witness Protection Program.
2917But George was no fucking saint. He was a violent son of a bitch.
2918When he got loaded on PCP, he lost all sense of reality. George’s
2919best friend in the club was Billy Mitten. Billy was a thin, goodlooking
2920guy whose parents were Brazilian. He kept his hair slicked
2921back and sort of resembled the Spanish actor Antonio Banderas. No
2922matter how hot it was outside, Billy always wore his black leather
2923pants and a black leather shirt laced up in front. He rode a bright
2924“Oakland Orange” chopped motorcycle. Everybody in the club
2925called him Zorro.
2926Zorro was one motherfuckin’ con man. He could have five guys
2927sitting around the clubhouse, each convinced that they had bought
2928a Sportster motorcycle from him and that each was burning the
2929other. Meanwhile, Zorro would walk away with all the cash. Zorro
2930used to lie so fucking much he ended up believing his own bullshit.
2931The cops once busted him for some shit he didn’t even do; Zorro
2932took a lie detector test and failed.
2933George Wethern and Zorro were business partners as well as
2934friends, and one night they got into some weird argument. Zorro
2935had made some passing remark about burning George out of some
2936money they were supposed to use to pay taxes on some property
2937the two of them owned. Wethern flew into a rage and snapped.
2938George got so loaded on PCP that he grabbed a.45 pistol and pumped
2939seven slugs into Zorro’s body. In all, counting the entrance and exit
2940wounds, Zorro wound up with twenty-one bullet holes.
2941Freaked out over what had happened, George then picked up
2942Hell’s Angel / 69
2943Zorro’s body and ran him down to Fairmont Hospital, telling the
2944doctors, “I just shot my buddy in the leg.” George’s wife called me
2945in a panic, so I jumped on my bike and rode down to the hospital,
2946where George was cornered in the hallway with about fifteen doctors
2947who were working on stitching Zorro up. George was a pretty big
2948guy and he was really freaking out. The cops were there, and while
2949they didn’t want to shoot him, George wasn’t going to surrender
2950either. It was up to me to calm George down. The cops told me they
2951would shoot him if he didn’t calm down, so I finally convinced
2952George it was cool to be handcuffed. As they took him to jail, George
2953was still flying on the PCP. Remarkably, Zorro lived.
2954When it came time to go in front of the judge, Zorro refused to
2955press charges against his pal George, writing the whole thing off as
2956an accident. Zorro had tattooed rings around each bullet-hole scar.
2957One of them said, “.45s Ain’t Shit.” Zorro died a few years later as
2958a result of complications from the shooting.
2959With guys around like Skip, Magoo, Tramp, Big Al, Cisco,
2960Scraggs, Winston, Johnny Angel, Jerry Jordan, Norton Bob, Armand,
2961Pi, Fu, Hi Ho Steve, Bert Stefanson, Doug the Thug, Michael Malve,
2962Gary “GP” Popkin, Fuzzy, Stork, Deakon, Marvin, Guinea, Flash,
2963Fook, and Zorro, the Oakland Hell’s Angels were my family, especially
2964after I lost my father in January 1971. My dad died a few days
2965after we lost Magoo. My father was drinking heavily to the very
2966end, and when he became seriously ill, he refused to call an ambulance,
2967not wanting to bother anybody. My sister checked him into
2968a hospital and stayed there with him for three days and nights,
2969sleeping in the lobby. By the fourth morning, my father was gone.
2970Ralph Barger, Sr., died of cirrhosis of the liver and other complications
2971due to alcoholism.
2972The day after Magoo’s funeral, I buried Dad in a solid cherrywood
2973casket I had bought for myself. I’d honestly believed I’d beat him to
2974the graveyard. We passed on all the new clothes we gave him for
2975Christmas to a new member named Pop Linderman, who had just
2976gotten out of the service. My aunt got his Bible from the Teamsters
2977union. Shirley ended up with an insurance settlement that just barely
2978paid for the funeral and the cemetery plot. I inherited my father’s
2979guns.
2980After I buried him, I visited my father’s gravesite alone for three
2981days and nights, catching pneumonia in the pouring winter rain. I
298270 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
2983took my father’s death pretty hard, the hardest of anyone. I had tried
2984to take care of him, but as he got older and couldn’t work, he’d
2985given whatever little bit of money he had to other relatives in need.
2986Aside from my few months in Santa Rita on a pot bust, my father
2987missed most of my trouble with the law. He was proud of the club
2988and me. The members treated him with kindness and respect. My
2989father dug the fact that I was his son, and whatever shit I’d gotten
2990into that made the papers and magazines like Time and Newsweek,
2991well, that just made for some good old-fashioned barroom chat for
2992him.
2993No matter how outrageous or over the top some of the guys in
2994the club were, I felt like I could always keep an extra eye out on them
2995and help them in any way I could. If it pissed off the cops or my
2996parole officers to help a so-called hardened criminal in the club, well,
2997that was too fucking bad.
2998I can relate to and understand guys and motorcycles. But women…
2999well, that’s a completely different story. In terms of relationships,
3000nothing kept me more off-balance and confused than the “old
3001ladies” in my life.
3002Hell’s Angel / 71
3003
30046
3005OLD LADIES,
3006MAIN SQUEEZES,
3007AND THE MAID
3008OF LIVERMORE
3009Women. Old ladies. Babes. Chicks. Can’t live without them,
3010can’t use their bones for soup. Wherever there’s Hell’s Angels, you
3011can be sure there’s girls, old ladies, and good-time broads. The
3012higher-quality the old lady, the better the Hell’s Angel. Having an
3013old lady who doesn’t mind seeing her man having fun can make the
3014difference between a good Hell’s Angel and an excellent one. We
3015go out of our way to make sure the women who either go out on
3016runs with us, visit our clubhouse during parties, or are just associated
3017with us feel one hundred percent safe. Touch a Hell’s Angel’s old
3018lady and you risk the wrath of not only the member but the entire
3019club..
3020I’ve done my share of running around, but I’m generally a onewoman
3021man. Believe me, I’m not an expert on old ladies. Women
3022have baffled me since childhood, starting with my own mother.
3023After abandoning me as a baby, my mother wrote letters to me
3024and tried to make contact. But I threw her letters away without
3025opening them. Concerned I hadn’t answered, she called the sheriff’s
3026department to ask them to check up on us. The cops did a lot more
3027social work then, and they asked me if I had received her letters.
3028“Yeah, I threw them away. What of it?” The cops told me I’d better
3029write her back or else they’d throw my ass into Juvenile Hall. “Go
3030ahead,” I told them, “put me away.” I knew my father would stand
3031up for me in return.
3032When my sister, Shirley, turned sixteen, she eventually met up
3033with our mother, but I wanted no part of her. As a fourteen-yearold
3034boy I felt when your mother leaves you as a baby she becomes
3035none of your business, and I never let it bother me. I had a sister
3036watching over me. Soon enough, I figured, I would have complete
3037run of the streets of Oakland anyway.
3038That same year I had my first sexual experience. I was lying in
3039bed one morning when a girl who lived down the street sneaked
3040over and knocked on the window. We were both the same age and
3041she wasn’t too bad-looking. I let her into my room and then she
3042climbed into bed with me.
3043During the early days of the Hell’s Angels MC, the typical club
3044member was hardly a prime catch for some 1950s foxy lady or
3045sophisticated career girl. Outside of Tommy Thomas being married
3046and me usually having a steady girlfriend, if somebody scored a
3047girl, then chances are she was the town slut and everybody fucked
3048her.
3049In the 1950s, the most pussy anybody got was lying about it or
3050going to Tijuana. When the 1960s came, the situation exploded. It
3051was mostly a sign of the times when everybody was experimenting
3052with drugs and sex. The Hell’s Angels weren’t after America’s
3053daughters, but we were getting national attention in the media and
3054in the movies, so we were scoring big-time. Many club guys had
3055multiple girlfriends living with them at one time.
3056A lot of “respected” women are secretly drawn to wilder, more
3057macho guys while the so-called sensitive guy stands there with his
3058dick in his hand. It’s just human nature for a lot of chicks; that’s what
3059turns them on.
3060Gang bangs used to happen all the time. I wish I had a buck for
3061every woman who came up to me at one of our parties and asked
3062to use a spare bedroom with a bunch of horny guys hanging around
3063her ready to get down. For a certain kind of chick, it was an honor
3064to get fucked by a bunch of Hell’s Angels. Some women who saw
3065us riding down the road were neither terrified nor repulsed. They
3066wanted to be part of it, even if it meant jumping on the back of some
3067stranger’s bike. Bobby Durt used to stand in front of a bar wearing
3068his colors and stick his thumb out for a ride. If a chick drove by and
3069picked him up dressed the way he was, chances were she didn’t
3070want to know where he was going, she wanted to know where she
3071could take him. He was an Angel and the road was open.
307274 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3073Earning your Red Wings and Black Wings came from a fifties
3074and sixties HAMC ritual. You got your Red Wings by eating a girl
3075on her period and your Black Wings by eating a black girl. A few
3076members earned both wings at once. When Bobby Durt was drinking
3077with us in the Sinner’s Club he took a black girl into the bathroom;
3078we opened a stall door, looked in, and validated him. That’s how
3079he got his Black Wings.
3080Sometimes things between the public and the Angels raged out
3081of control to the point when a situation could boil over into an
3082overblown controversy. The Monterey rape incident, which was one
3083of the big stories that first launched the Hell’s Angels MC into a
3084national press phenomenon, was the prime example. I was doin’
3085some county jail time in Santa Rita at the time on that lousy pot bust,
3086otherwise I would have been there myself.
3087The Hell’s Angels rode down to Monterey en masse during Labor
3088Day weekend in 1964 for a run and a party. The locals were plenty
3089freaked out with us being loose in the town, and the Monterey
3090Chamber of Commerce was none too excited because we didn’t have
3091much money to spend. The guys ended up getting pushed out toward
3092Seaside and finally found themselves at a place called Marina
3093Beach near the Fort Ord military base. The Hell’s Angels stayed out
3094there to crash, party, and do drugs, but there were also local bike
3095riders from Monterey at Marina Beach, plus about thirty girls who
3096came out to the beach to hang out with us. Everything and everybody
3097was jumping and partying. By the end of the day, Oakland Angels
3098like Terry the Tramp and Mouldy Marvin Gilbert were doing the
3099wild thing and having big fun. Everybody was swimming in the
3100ocean and the girls were wearing their skimpy bathing suits if anything.
3101There were two very young girls there—one black and one
3102white—walking around the beach. One was wearing just a shirt and
3103the other one was completely naked.
3104Mouldy Marvin was taking a piss behind a parked car when he
3105saw a cop car pull up beside these two girls. The cops rolled down
3106the window, talked to the girls, put them in the backseat of their car,
3107and drove off. The next day an entire fleet of police squad cars
3108swooped down on the party. There were about sixty people still
3109hanging around Marina Beach, about twice as many guys as girls.
3110The cops lined up the guys on one side and the girls on the other,
3111Hell’s Angel / 75
3112and then another cop car drove between both lineups with the two
3113girls in the backseat. They identified some of our guys to the cops.
3114Another Richmond member was at the end of the guys’ line, and
3115one of the girls identified him. The police motioned for him to come
3116over, and before he approached the cops, he handed over his beer
3117to Jim “Mother” Miles, the president of the Sacramento club. Then
3118they waved over to Miles. “You, too.” Marvin started to laugh, so
3119the cops grabbed him next. Then Marvin’s sidekick, Tramp, who
3120was standing next to him in the lineup, blurted out some remark to
3121the cops, so they grabbed him too. The two girls had identified the
3122last four guys standing at the end of the lineup.
3123The Monterey cops dragged all four of them downtown, stuck
3124them inside a holding pen in the county jail, and announced that all
3125four were being held on rape charges. The newspaper headlines
3126screamed MONTEREY RAPE! HELL’S ANGELS HELD. The news media
3127from coast to coast covered the so-called Hell’s Angels Monterey
3128rape case. Our reputation had gone national.
3129A close relative of Terry the Tramp was a former district attor-ney
3130from Monterey (and later went on to become a Catholic priest). He
3131supervised the defense. Marvin, Tramp, Mother Miles, and the guy
3132from Richmond were bailed out, and when they returned for an arraignment,
3133the whole case was dropped. The prosecutors and the
3134cops knew they had a weak case. The Monterey rape fracas never
3135made it to trial, and once again our acquittal made the front page of
3136the newspapers all across the country. We were bad, we were nationwide,
3137and we were innocent.
3138The next year, California State Attorney General Thomas C. Lynch
3139dropped a major criminal dossier both on the press and the legislature
3140about the Hell’s Angels, and the shit came down. This was
3141the first time the state’s highest authorities proclaimed us a corroding
3142influence and threat to society. Let the publicity begin! Newspapers
3143and magazines hounded us after the government declared war. Soon
3144everybody wanted to talk to us.
3145My first wife, Elsie, and I met in 1962. She was a real babe. I
3146dug pretty girls, and I knew her long before she was my girlfriend.
3147Elsie was originally involved with a Hell’s Angel named Rick Risner.
3148Rick was in the club for a few years, then left the club—left
3149Elsie—and moved to Kentucky. After Rick left, Elsie and I started
3150going out together. Elsie was a real nice girl who liked to have fun
315176 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3152and ride bikes with me. She had long, dark-brown hair and beautiful
3153eyes, and everyone in the club liked her a lot. Elsie also had two
3154kids—a boy and a girl—and for her, everything centered on them.
3155One night Shirley, who was living in SoCal, got a phone call from
3156Elsie. She was giggling.
3157“Hello, this is your new sister-in-law. I just married your brother.”
3158We were hitched in Reno in 1965 after riding up to Nevada on my
3159motorcycle with another couple.
3160Our marriage was touch and go from the beginning. We separated
3161for a while in ’66, and then we got back together again with plans
3162to buy a house. I found a small brown single-story pad on Golf Links
3163Road in Oakland, right down the street from the city zoo. Lots of
3164members followed me into the area and found pads—Winston, Fat
3165Freddie, and later on Jim Jim Brandes, Sergey Walton, and Kenny
3166Owen.
3167In 1967, Elsie became pregnant right after New Year’s, and since
3168she already had two kids, we talked about it and decided we didn’t
3169need to have any more children. Anyway, children didn’t fit into
3170my plans. That February, while I was in Boston checking out a new
3171club charter, Elsie tried to self-abort the child by pumping air into
3172her vagina. It caused an air bubble to enter her bloodstream, and
3173Elsie died an agonizing but quick death.
3174Although my marriage with Elsie was on-again, off-again, hit and
3175miss, we shared good times together on my bike. Elsie’s death devastated
3176me, so much so that I had her headstone—a cross—tattooed
3177on my right arm. Elsie’s death came at a really strange time in my
3178life, just as club chapters were beginning to spread nationwide. I
3179had bought the new Golf Links house ready for us to move into.
3180After her death, I plunged deeper into club matters and responsibilities.
3181When the Hell’s Angels began in California, some of the
3182chapters actually had women members, specifically San Francisco
3183and San Bernardino. I’ve seen a couple of old photographs that show
3184girl members wearing Hell’s Angels patches.
3185Frank Sadilek was the president of the San Francisco chapter
3186during the late fifties. His wife, Leila, was a Frisco member and
3187secretary of the club. When Bobby Zimmerman was president of
3188Berdoo, his old lady, Keata, rode right with him. Keata ended up
3189getting killed—after Bobby died—when the handlebars of her bike
3190Hell’s Angel / 77
3191came off in her hands while she was speeding on the highway. I’m
3192not sure if she was ever officially voted in as a female Hell’s Angel.
3193By then we had already gotten all of the girls out of the club.
3194When I became president of the Oakland chapter, women were
3195no longer welcome as members of the club. I felt we didn’t need
3196girls in our club. The Hell’s Angels is an elite men’s club. Maybe
3197we’re sexist, male chauvinists, whatever, but since we don’t take
3198any money from the government, they can’t take us to court and
3199force us to change our bylaws and start accepting women. The fact
3200that they aren’t members doesn’t mean girls don’t ride with the club.
3201There are lots of women who ride bikes with the club right now—but
3202none will ever be voted in as members.
3203When we formed the early charters your patch was something
3204you had to defend. We had a lot of fistfights with other clubs. We
3205beat people up and took their patches. They tried to beat us up and
3206take ours. Women couldn’t defend the patch. It’s a stamina thing,
3207keeping up as a fighter and as a rider. We have women who ride
3208just as well as the members. Some of them can ride better than me,
3209but when it comes down to riding hundreds and hundreds of miles
3210in one day, they’re just not going to do it.
3211In the late fifties, we had a rule that stated women could wear
3212your patch when they’re packing behind you, so people could see
3213the patch riding by. But when she got off the bike, she had to give
3214it back immediately. This exposure was important in helping the
3215club grow. No such rule exists today. Anyone wearing a Hell’s Angel
3216patch who isn’t a member—man or woman—risks getting beaten
3217half to death.
3218Sharon, my second wife, was my main squeeze for over two decades.
3219We became—at least in the eyes of the cops—partners in crime.
3220I met Sharon Marie Gruhlke in the summer of 1969 after Elsie died.
3221She was a gorgeous nineteen-year-old who had been crowned the
3222Maid of Livermore. When she was fifteen years old she wanted to
3223be a fashion model, so she arranged to leave high school early and
3224enrolled in a modeling school. The summer she turned sixteen her
3225modeling schoolteacher took her aside and told her she needed to
3226weigh 113 pounds. Weighing in at 119, Sharon freaked and went to
3227see a doctor, who once a week would shoot her up with some kind
3228of speed cocktail. That was Sharon’s very first introduction to drugs.
3229She didn’t even know what she was being injected with, finishing
3230each week with little blue supplemental pills to keep going. At seventeen,
3231Sharon left her mom and stepfather’s home in Livermore,
323278 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3233moving to San Francisco in 1968. She kept her weight down to a
3234“professional level,” ate a lot of cottage cheese, and did her early
3235morning exercises to Jack LaLanne on the television.
3236Sharon’s move to “the City” was busy and successful. She was a
3237fucking knockout. She started out getting paid twenty-five dollars
3238an hour, but after an increased schedule of photo sessions, ramp
3239modeling, and television jobs, the agency forked out a ten-dollaranhour
3240pay raise. Although a working model, she still felt out of place
3241with the other girls from the agency. Sharon came from a middleclass
3242East Bay family and was raised by her mom. Most of the other
3243models came from richer families living in nicer places across the
3244Golden Gate Bridge, like Sausalito, Marin County, or the ritzier parts
3245of San Francisco. She was having the same problems I had when I
3246was riding my bicycle in San Francisco when I was eight. It was a
3247them-against-us, Oakland-versus-Frisco type of thing.
3248After moving to San Francisco, Sharon got used to the sounds of
3249motorcycles driving around her neighborhood. Her roommate began
3250going out with a prospect from the Daly City Hell’s Angels, which
3251at first really freaked her out. She warned her roommate, “Gail, you
3252better be careful. You know, you could get in trouble going out with
3253some of those motorcycle guys.”
3254The prospect started bringing a friend of his from the club over
3255to Sharon’s flat. Everybody in the club called him Nigger Rick, because
3256he was Portuguese with a dark olive complexion. Sharon went
3257out with Rick on a few dates. They stopped dating, but he still
3258dropped by the house and they stayed friends. Rick would sometimes
3259take Sharon out for rides on his motorcycle.
3260The Daly City club was ready to split in half and spin off into a
3261new San Jose charter, and Rick figured he stood a good chance of
3262being named president of one of the chapters. He needed to come
3263over to Oakland to discuss the new San Jose club with me, so Rick
3264invited Sharon to come along. When Rick pulled up to my house
3265and rang the bell, someone opened the gate and waved them in to
3266make a run for the door. My big Doberman pinscher jumped out of
3267his doghouse, patrolling the front yard as Sharon and Rick followed
3268me quickly into the house.
3269As usual, Golf Links was Party Central that day. The house was
3270filled with people. Tiny was there hanging out by the front door.
3271Johnny Angel was lurking around too, and everybody was stoked
3272about chartering a new San Jose Hell’s Angels club. Most of the
3273members and their old ladies were kicking back, talking in the bed-
3274Hell’s Angel / 79
3275room. I was still in bed with a curvy little blond bartender chick who
3276lived down the street. We both drove Corvettes and usually spent
3277Friday nights together. That Saturday morning, she hid under the
3278covers as the room filled up with club members and friends who
3279didn’t seem to give a damn whether she was there or not.
3280When Rick introduced me to Sharon, she seemed all nervous and
3281uncomfortable. I’m sure she felt a little out of place talking with the
3282other old ladies, standing next to Rick at the bedroom door, and
3283trying to avert her eyes from the blonde in my bed. Sharon was
3284younger and much more beautiful than the blond Corvette girl. I
3285needed to know: Who was this young, blond babe Rick was with?
3286That night there was going to be a big benefit concert at Longshoreman’s
3287Hall in San Francisco, and it cost a dollar to get in. I asked
3288Sharon if she planned on going to the party that night.
3289When she said no, I turned to Rick. “Well, I have a dollar for her
3290if you don’t.”
3291“Thanks anyway,” said Sharon, and she left and went home for
3292the night.
3293I kept in touch with Rick for a couple of weeks, because I was
3294hoping I could score Sharon’s phone number from him. I told him
3295to put in a good word for me, since she had seemed uptight at the
3296house. When Rick called Sharon at the exercise gym where she
3297worked, she didn’t seem too interested.
3298“Why doesn’t he call me himself?” she asked Rick.
3299Sharon was scared to go out with me, so Rick planned a party at
3300his house in Daly City, offering himself as a sort of chaperon. I
3301phoned Sharon and arranged a double date with her roommate and
3302another friend of mine from the club, Fat Freddie. That night when
3303I came to pick her up, she was all dolled up in false eyelashes and
3304a fall wig that matched her bleached-blond hair. At the party, Sharon
3305seemed a little uncomfortable, so we smoked some grass together
3306(her first time), and the phone rang all night. Most of the calls at the
3307party were for me and most of them were from other women.
3308One of the callers said that I needed to get over to Fat Freddie’s
3309house, pronto. Another one of Freddie’s girls had just gotten out of
3310the California Institution for Women, a women’s prison in Fontera,
3311and she had some guns she wanted to sell, stashed from before she
3312was in the joint. As I was planning on leaving the party, I asked
3313Sharon to take the ride with me back to Oakland. I didn’t know if it
3314was because she was a little high, but she still seemed scared of me.
3315Rick assured her that it was cool and we left the party together. We
331680 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3317smoked another joint on the bike as Sharon held on, desperately
3318trying to keep her fall from blowing off her head. We sped over the
3319Bay Bridge back to Oakland and made a couple of stops. When I
3320finished buying the guns, one of our members walked into Freddie’s
3321place wired and worried.
3322“Hey, Sonny, wh-wh-what do you do if an old lady ODs on
3323Seconal?”
3324I thought for a second.
3325“Depends on who she is.”
3326“She’s the mother of my children.”
3327“Fix her with speed. That’ll wake her up.”
3328I didn’t realize at the time that you could also kill a person doing
3329that. Our boy was freaking out. I could see he needed my help.
3330“Okay,” I said, reaching for my jacket. “So much for the party.
3331Let’s go wake her up.”
3332We needed to find a drug addict with a needle and kit, not a hard
3333thing to do. We left Freddie’s and raced over to the member’s house
3334on 82nd Avenue. Sharon felt spaced out. She wasn’t used to my pace
3335and didn’t know what to expect from one minute to the next. Being
3336so young, Sharon barely knew what the term “OD’d” meant. We
3337walked quietly into the house through the back door, looking for a
3338body.
3339The situation seemed calm but tense. We looked at the body of a
3340woman. Uh-oh, she looked dead. I asked Sharon to go and get me
3341a washcloth. Sharon tried to find the unconscious woman’s pulse
3342while I checked her breathing. She couldn’t find a pulse, and we
3343both thought she was finished. We injected her with some speed,
3344and miraculously, she came to. Neither one of us really knew what
3345the hell we were doing. Later that night, Sharon told me how safe
3346she felt being with me, even as people were dying around us.
3347As Hell’s Angels, we lived in our own underground world, barely
3348part of the citizens’ world and having as little to do with them as
3349possible. Live or die, we handled our own situations our own way.
3350With drug overdoses, it was never an option to run and call a doctor.
3351We were in the sights of law enforcement. We handled our own
3352situations without getting the cops or the paramedics involved. That
3353night the woman didn’t die, and I guess I probably saved her life
3354risking it. It was also my first date with Sharon. Par for the course,
3355one gun buy and an overdose of Seconal.
3356Despite all the excitement, Sharon needed to get home that night
3357so she could go to work the next morning. I tried my best to convince
3358Hell’s Angel / 81
3359her to stay at my house, but she insisted on leaving. I arranged for
3360a friend of mine to ride her ride back into Frisco. Sharon thought I
3361was a bit of a jerk about wanting her to stay, but it was my way of
3362saying I didn’t want her to leave.
3363Sharon and I lost touch for a spell in the summer of 1969. I had
3364finished filming Hell’s Angels ’69, and the Hell’s Angels were planning
3365a major run. Little did I know Sharon had quit her job at the
3366exercise gym and was waiting for me to call her and take her with
3367me on the big run. She had bought some white plastic Nancy Sinatra
3368go-go boots and a fake fur coat, assuming I was going to call. When
3369I split without her, the next time I heard from her was when she sent
3370me a birthday card special delivery. Inside the card she wrote a long
3371note telling me how angry she was that I had ignored her, writing
3372that she could never really tell what my feelings were toward her,
3373but admitting that she still really liked me. She thought I had other
3374ideas and told me to “have a nice life.” A strange thing to say to a
3375Hell’s Angel.
3376That card did it. I picked up the phone and called her. Terry the
3377Tramp had arranged a big birthday party for me that night at his
3378house. It was late, I told her, and the party had already started, but
3379I would wait for her if she would just take a cab straight over to Golf
3380Links. When an old Italian cabby pulled up to Sharon’s flat in the
3381Mission district and she gave him the familiar Oakland address most
3382people knew from the newspapers, he tried to talk her out of the
3383fare.
3384“Why should I drive such a pretty young girl like you to that
3385horrible place?”
3386Sharon showed up at Golf Links that night and never left.
3387Johnny Angel’s girlfriend was confused about how many girls I
3388had actually brought to Terry the Tramp’s party. When I had been
3389back in Buffalo starting a new charter, I had met a girl named Sally,
3390and I rode her all the way back with me to Oakland. I really didn’t
3391bring her back for myself. Good club girls were so hard to find in
3392those days, and I thought she would make a good old lady for
3393somebody else in the club. Sally took her things and moved out of
3394my place and in with another club member. When Sharon moved
3395into Golf Links, her brother helped load her stuff in a van to Oakland
3396just as Sally was leaving.
3397Sharon loved sitting out in the garage, watching me wrench up
3398my bike. Instead of cleaning house and cooking, she sorted out nuts
3399and bolts on the garage floor. Because Sharon was under twenty-
340082 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3401one, I wouldn’t let her stick around any of our biker bar hangouts,
3402figuring I’d set an example for the other members.
3403When the Hell’s Angels ’69 movie was released, I took Sharon out
3404on the publicity tour with me. We stopped in several cities across
3405the country from Texas to New York to California. The tour was
3406high-class; limousines met us at each stop. Sometimes they would
3407furnish us with a motorcycle, which I would ride to the premiere to
3408sign autographs. When we were in Dallas, I took Sharon to Neiman
3409Marcus and slipped her five one-hundred-dollar bills and told her
3410she had fifteen minutes to spend it. She had no trouble doing that,
3411buying a cool pair of leather pants for the ride with me.
3412As my new old lady, Sharon always bugged me to smile more.
3413Elsie had been dead for two years, and I guess I kept my reaction to
3414her death to myself. We never talked much about it. I had a whole
3415bunch of girlfriends between Elsie and Sharon, an endless parade
3416of old ladies. I can’t even recall their names or faces. Life at home
3417was chaos as gifts poured in from the other chapters—pictures and
3418plaques leaned up against the wall instead of being nailed up. My
3419house was a zoo near the Oakland Zoo with Oakland Orange walls.
3420Rather than mourn my wife’s death, I had jumped into a partying
3421frenzy.
3422On one of my road trips, Sharon and I visited the Buffalo Hell’s
3423Angels, which had just started. Denny McKnight was elected president
3424of the chapter, and while we were staying at his house, Sharon
3425and I dropped acid. Sharon went into the bathroom and began
3426washing her face over and over with Noxzema. After what seemed
3427like an eternity, I banged on the door. “Come out, girl, and make us
3428some coffee.” She came out with the Noxzema on her face and then
3429spent what seemed like hours in the kitchen. As it turned out, she
3430had never made coffee before, so a bike rider named Thief, who rode
3431in from Philly, taught her how to make coffee, high on acid. Old
3432ladies aren’t necessarily known for their kitchen skills anyway.
3433When we got back from Buffalo, I was parking my bike and I
3434didn’t put the kickstand all the way out. The bike fell over right on
3435top of my foot, causing it to swell up badly. Actually, it was already
3436fucked up. I had gotten into a fight with Hi Ho Steve up at Bass Lake
3437and he bit me on the foot. It turned out that the bite had not healed
3438up properly. It’s common knowledge that a human bite can be as
3439dangerous as an animal’s, but with Hi Ho Steve, it could be even
3440more hazardous.
3441As a result, I spent the next couple of weeks limping around on
3442Hell’s Angel / 83
3443crutches. Sharon had a severe chest cold, so I suggested she spend
3444a few days at her mother’s to get well. In the meantime, I had gotten
3445a call from the club in Buffalo. Denny McKnight had hit a brick wall
3446on his motorcycle and was dead on arrival. Bad foot or not, I rode
3447cross-country to Denny’s funeral. Sharon was upset with me when
3448I insisted she was too sick to make the trip.
3449After she moved into the Golf Links home, there was a knock at
3450the front door one day. I opened up to find a little lady standing on
3451the porch. It was Sharon’s mother, Barbara. We had not yet met.
3452“Can I help you?”
3453“I just want to see who my daughter has been living with, and
3454whether or not she’s living in a garage.”
3455I told her that no, Sharon wasn’t living in a garage. She just turned
3456around and walked away. Later on, we did become good friends.
3457Sharon had come a long, long way from the nineteen-year-old
3458ex–Maid of Livermore. One time I was fighting a charge of being a
3459felon possessing a firearm, and the gun in question actually belonged
3460to Sharon.
3461In the courtroom, the U.S. attorney cross-examined me on the
3462stand as he held up a pistol.
3463“Mr. Barger, is this your gun?”
3464“No, it belongs to Sharon.”
3465Sharon was in the courtroom, so the prosecutor brought her up
3466on the stand. Holding the gun out to her, the prosecutor asked her,
3467“What do you know about this gun?”
3468“Well,” she said, “one thing, the clip is still in it. Be careful. It
3469might be loaded.”
3470The stupid prosecutor nearly dropped the gun handing it to her,
3471but Sharon caught the piece, jacked it back, pumped the clip out,
3472threw the clip back in, and slid the gun back to him.
3473“Don’t worry,” she said, “it’s not loaded.”
3474The judge grunted and looked down at the prosecutor. “The gun
3475is obviously hers, now get her off the stand.”
3476The two of us liked to get high a lot around the house, and we
3477used more than our share of blow during the early 1970s. During
3478that time I was getting busted a lot and having huge scrapes with
3479the law. My cocaine mood swings got me into a lot of deep criminal
3480shit and would ultimately land me in Folsom Prison. Sharon was
3481doing a fair amount of speed, but I still wasn’t much interested in
3482methamphetamine. My cocaine habit ruled then and was much larger
3483than Sharon’s. Sharon’s drug use spiraled off in a whole different
348484 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3485direction. She was used to taking uppers during her modeling days.
3486To help her cope with me being away in prison, Sharon cut way
3487down on cocaine and increased her reliance on speed. In the short
3488term, it counteracted her depression over me being locked up.
3489What got Sharon through the rough and lonely times was her
3490being able to ride her motorcycle. It cleared her head. I had taught
3491Sharon how to ride alongside experts in the club like “Flash” Gordon
3492Grow and Fu Griffin. I bought her her first motorcycle, a 650 BSA.
3493I picked that particular bike because it shifted on the same side as a
3494Sportster. Then I built her the special little bike we called Little Cocaine.
3495Sharon always loved to ride with the club, so whenever the
3496Oakland guys would get ready to ride off somewhere, Deacon would
3497let her know beforehand so she could meet up and come along with
3498the pack.
3499One of my craziest battles with the law was when Sharon and I
3500decided to get legally married. I was serving time in Folsom Prison
3501at the time. We never spoke much about marriage until I was sent
3502to prison. While I was waiting for my transfer from the Alameda
3503County jail to Folsom Prison, I phoned Sharon one night and asked
3504her if she wanted to get married. She was totally up for it and went
3505out the next day and got a blood test and a tattoo on her back that
3506read “Sonny” with a small sun. For the longest time I wouldn’t allow
3507her to mark up her body, but this time I was inside so I didn’t have
3508shit to say about what she did or didn’t do.
3509The doctors in prison gave me my blood test, and after we completed
3510all the preliminary steps to be legally married, we found out
3511not one single judge in Alameda County would volunteer to marry
3512us. They were too nervous to be involved. Every response was “No
3513way.”
3514When they shipped me off from county jail to Vacaville to be
3515processed for Folsom, even though we were still legally single,
3516Sharon signed in as my wife during visiting privileges and received
3517immediate clearance. When I landed in Folsom, Sharon reapplied
3518for visiting privileges. They knew we weren’t legally married, and
3519when they ran her rap sheet, they found she had a case pending for
3520possession of methamphetamine. Sharon had gotten into a bike accident
3521on the freeway and the cops had found some speed in her
3522pocket. Once I got to Folsom in the summer of 1973, I couldn’t receive
3523visits from a “partner in crime.”
3524Meanwhile, we finally found a legal loophole, which enabled us
3525to marry, thereby granting Sharon visiting privileges. We found a
3526Hell’s Angel / 85
3527law on the books that stated you didn’t necessarily need to be in the
3528“same place/same time” to be legally married. If you lived together
3529for a certain period as common-law man and wife—which we did
3530before prison—we could then get a marriage license regardless of
3531whether either of us had valid blood tests.
3532My lawyer became the mail-order minister/justice of the peace.
3533Although the prison authorities would not permit a justice of the
3534peace physical access to marry us, they legally couldn’t keep my
3535lawyer from visiting and performing the service separately. Sharon
3536started the process; the lawyer married her to me first. Ten days
3537later, he came to Folsom and finalized the arrangement and married
3538me to Sharon. We were officially wedded in the eyes of the State of
3539California on December 16, 1973, but Folsom prison officials still
3540wouldn’t permit Sharon’s visits. They felt we had conned them,
3541which, in a sense, we had.
3542Being the old lady of a Hell’s Angel officer like me was no fucking
3543picnic. Sharon and I faced more adventures together than ten couples,
3544but we spent a lot of time apart. Of our twenty-seven-year relationship
3545together, I was away from her for a total of thirteen years, either
3546tending to club business, sitting in jail, or being on trial for my life.
3547When I got into trouble with the law, Sharon would often bail me
3548out and help plan the details of my defense with my court-appointed
3549attorney. She even sold a line of “Free Sonny” T-shirts when I was
3550locked up in the joint.
3551Sharon and I were a strong couple, but the cracks began to show
3552through in our relationship. When I was released from Folsom, I
3553had kicked my cocaine habit. On the other hand, Sharon’s reliance
3554on speed grew and grew as the years went by. God damn, I know
3555I’m fucking far from perfect and I’m set in my ways. I’ve been doing
3556things my way all my life, and I can’t change that. But it’s difficult
3557to explain what it’s really like to live with somebody who is constantly
3558loaded on speed. The situation grew worse and worse until
3559suddenly I couldn’t take it anymore. I told her she had to leave.
3560In 1996 we made arrangements for Sharon to check into a detox
3561hospital in SoCal run by the Seventh-Day Adventists. I visited her
3562at the hospital and told her, “If you get straight and want to come
3563back home that’s fine.”
3564Personally, I prefer a steady life, a long-term relationship. If our
3565marriage was broken down, I wanted to try and fix it and keep on
3566going. But Sharon ended up staying in SoCal for over a year getting
356786 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3568straight. I had a hard time handling such a long break in our relationship.
3569Just before she left, Sharon made arrangements for an acquaintance
3570of hers to take care of things around the house while she was gone.
3571Noel Black had hung around the club for a while. I have no idea
3572how Sharon and Noel met, although I had seen her at club functions.
3573I never really got to know Noel until she came over to the house a
3574few days after Sharon left. One day she was at the house and did a
3575little bit of cleaning up. That evening she asked me where the
3576blankets were. I said, “What blankets?”
3577“I’m going to sleep on the couch,” Noel said, “because I’m not
3578driving all the way back to Sonoma County tonight.”
3579“You don’t have to sleep on the couch,” I told her as I pointed toward
3580my bed. “Sleep in here.”
3581Sharon and I still had our understanding that she was free to come
3582home whenever she became straight. When she was ready to be
3583discharged from the detox hospital I asked, “What’s up?”
3584Sharon told me now she was clean and sober, but she couldn’t
3585come back. “I can’t live with you and not take drugs.”
3586On Christmas of 1996 I wrote Sharon a letter saying in order for
3587both of us to be happy and healthy, we should split up and go our
3588separate ways. We filed for divorce and our long association ended.
3589Even today, we keep in touch. Sharon and I are still friends, and
3590she’s continued to stay off drugs and alcohol and lives happily in
3591SoCal. Noel and I married October 8, 1999, in Las Vegas, and with
3592our young daughter, Sarrah, we live in a house in the desert in sunny
3593Arizona. Noel breeds mares and once owned a world-champion
3594stud. Now she’s got me. I’ve taken on a kid and a beautiful “old
3595lady” as well as three mares on the property. Noel also owns a motorcycle
3596and is a fine rider. What more could I ask for?
3597Hell’s Angel / 87
3598
35997
3600THE SIZZLING,
3601ACID-DRENCHED
3602SIXTIES
3603The Angels never changed,” said UCLA folklore professor
3604Donald Cosentino in a 1999 documentary about the Hell’s Angels.
3605“Everybody around them changed. Every time we wanted them to
3606act in a certain way, every time the left wanted them to act as tribunes
3607of the working class, every time the hipsters wanted them to act like
3608hippies, every time the drug cultures wanted to see them as allies,
3609they flunked the test.”
3610The Hell’s Angels are an apolitical organization. But when the
3611peace marches started in the sixties, there were club members who
3612didn’t like the upper-class antiwar radicals’ attitudes toward vets
3613like us. One afternoon we decided to express our opinions and take
3614a stand against these left-wing peace creeps.
3615“Let’s go down there and fuck with them.”
3616A Vietnam Day Committee stop-the-draft demonstration took
3617place on October 16, 1965, on the Oakland–Berkeley city line on
3618Adeline Street. The night before, VDC organizers called the Berkeley
3619demonstrators back at the last minute when they chose not to clash
3620with Oakland police. The next day the protesters were ready for
3621action. The antiwar machine was revved up for a rumble. Eight
3622thousand VDC marchers from Berkeley clashed with a squad of
3623Oakland cops, who dug in, blockading them from moving further
3624into their city.
3625When I decided to go to the demonstration, to add to all the
3626trouble, seven other Hell’s Angels from the Oakland club went along
3627with me. Supposedly one hundred different anti–Vietnam War
3628protest marches were planned simultaneously across the United
3629States that day. The University of California, Berkeley campus, antiwar
3630snobs looked at many of us from Oakland as if we were a bunch
3631of crackers from Alabama. There was no grand entrance by the Hell’s
3632Angels on their choppers, gunning their engines. No. Instead we
3633jumped into a couple of cars and parked several blocks away.
3634While the cops and the marchers were faced off against each other
3635and undecided what to do next, we sifted through the cops’ line
3636from the back end. Stories in the papers claim the Berkeley police
3637were protecting the protesters and it was the Oakland cops who let
3638us in. I don’t think anybody expected any Hell’s Angels to show up
3639in the first place. In fact, the cops were as surprised as anybody else
3640when we came down and walked through the crowd. We just wanted
3641to go down and see what these people were claiming.
3642We were pretty hard to miss. Michael “Tiny” Walters stood about
3643six feet seven inches, almost three hundred pounds, and looked
3644tough as hell. Zorro and Fat Freddie were with me too. We were
3645wearing our colors, and this was well after the 1963 Porterville and
36461964 Monterey incidents and we were pretty well known.
3647The eight of us moved through the crowd. We fanned out and
3648made our way forward through the protesters, who were milling
3649around and carrying signs. At first, the crowd cheered us. They
3650thought we were there to support them. I felt a rage come over me.
3651I was a vet and I loved my country. I was also pissed at the government
3652that wasn’t going to let us win this stupid war. All of the
3653chanting, signs, and speeches weren’t going to do shit for the troops
3654overseas. What good was this gathering? Something inside me
3655snapped, and I responded the only way I knew how, violently. I
3656grabbed a few college kids at random and roughed them up good.
3657“Why don’t you fucking people just go home?” I screamed as I
3658pushed through the VDC’s protest lines.
3659We didn’t hit any women or kids, there were more than enough
3660guys in love beads and madras shirts to push around. Some of the
3661protesters scattered while others fought back. There was no heated
3662discussion or emotional political arguments. Our fists and the end
3663of our boots did our talking.
3664“Those guys got their constitutional rights too,” an Oakland Police
3665Department cop said to marchers who complained about us breaking
3666through and taking on the crowd.
3667When we got through the police lines we pushed our way to the
3668front, to the platform where antiwar radical/writer/march organizer
3669Jerry Rubin spoke. Rubin wore a ring I had read about in the newspaper
3670that, he boasted, was forged from the remains of a downed
3671American fighter plane in North Vietnam. As Rubin stood on top
367290 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3673of a sound truck making his speech, I thought, Fuck this guy, I’m
3674going to get that ring.
3675So I went for him.
3676I came close. I jumped up on the truck and nearly had him, but
3677just as I lunged toward Rubin, a group of cops caught up with me
3678through the crowd, which was hysterical by then. There was a picture
3679of me in the newspaper, upside down with about twenty cops
3680beating me with clubs. The Berkeley Police Department nearly beat
3681themselves half to death trying to hit me. As an experienced brawler,
3682I knew that if more than three guys try to stomp someone, they’ll
3683probably get in each other’s way and hurt themselves. The guy
3684whose ass they’re trying to kick usually gets away. Any Hell’s Angel
3685will tell you: there’s an art to rat-packing on unlucky motherfuckers
3686and these cops weren’t on top of their game with me that day.
3687As I was getting iced, Tiny was having problems of his own. When
3688an Alameda County sergeant smacked Tiny on the head with his
3689blackjack, he knocked him cold, and Tiny fell like a mighty oak,
3690breaking the sergeant’s leg. Meanwhile the rest of the Angels were
3691fucking with the cops to pry me loose. At the end of the day, we all
3692got away. The Berkeley police arrested Tiny for breaking the sergeant’s
3693leg, and he was the only Hell’s Angel nabbed.
3694We made it clear to the peaceniks, the cops, and the rest of the
3695country where we stood on the war. We dug it.
3696When we made it to the jailhouse to bail Tiny out, the cops had
3697the place barricaded with lines of police surrounding the Berkeley
3698police station. The area was secure. Stupid cops. We managed to
3699walk straight in. When the cops looked up, there we were, inside
3700their station house. They panicked and arrested us. The news of the
3701demonstration had already spread on the local and national news;
3702public sentiment was on our side. Shirley watched me getting
3703cracked on the head on television from her home in Los Angeles. So
3704many people phoned the station to help bail us out, they had to let
3705us go. We also bailed out Tiny, who eventually pled guilty to a
3706lesser charge, serving no time. I felt we’d accomplished what we
3707had set out to do. I still would have felt better if I had gotten to that
3708wimpy Jerry Rubin. I was willing to cut that bastard’s finger off in
3709order to get that fucking ring.
3710As a vet, I felt we ought to stick up for America. As long as there’s
3711at least two people on earth, there’s going to be war. If you can’t
3712settle peacefully, then fight it out. If you don’t want to participate
3713Hell’s Angel / 91
3714in the war, fine, but don’t yell chickenshit names and throw blood
3715on the guys forced to go.
3716The battles between the Hell’s Angels and the peace demonstrators
3717ended that October day in 1965. From then on, every time antiwar
3718protesters held a march, I was served with a restraining order. My
3719restraining order became part of the process in granting the VDC
3720any future permits to assemble.
3721When a major rally was announced a month later, we issued a
3722statement to the press that explained our lack of presence.
3723Hell’s Angels Statement for Immediate Release:
3724We have called this press conference to explain our position in
3725regard to the VDC street march through Oakland that was scheduled
3726for tomorrow.
3727Although we have stated our intention to counter demonstrate at
3728this despicable, un-American activity, we believe that in the interest
3729of public safety and protection of the good name of Oakland, we
3730should not justify the VDC by our presence.
3731We intend to absent ourselves from the area. We encourage all
3732others to do likewise.
3733We have made this judgment because:
37341. Our patriotic concern for what these people are doing to our
3735great nation may provoke us to violent acts.
37362. Although the majority of citizens feel as we do, we believe
3737that any physical encounter would only produce sympathy
3738for this mob of traitors.
37393. If a riot occurs, we want it clear that the Hell’s Angels did
3740not participate in it. Any violation of the law may be laid at
3741the doorstep of the VDC. They are the irresponsible group
3742in our community.
3743We have discussed this matter with several responsible community
3744leaders and they unanimously concur with our position.
3745To most Americans, we instantly became heroes. Little kids came
3746up to us and wanted to touch us, pensioners wanted to shake our
3747hands, and a lot more women wanted to fuck us. After the VDC
3748demonstration and the national television news coverage, I got sacks
3749and sacks of mail from people instructing me how to dress, how to
3750act, and besides supporting what we stood for, what to do now that
3751I was in the public eye. Letters from all types of Americans urged
375292 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3753me, now that I was representing their point of view, that maybe I
3754should think about a shave and a haircut.
3755Fuck that. I wasn’t going that far.
3756I had enlisted in the Army, and although I didn’t serve in any war,
3757had there been one going on while I was in the service, I would have
3758gladly gone to the front lines—or behind the lines, for that matter.
3759That got me to thinking, so I sent a telegram to the White House for
3760LBJ, offering the services of the Hell’s Angels to fight in Vietnam.
3761Dear Mr. President:
3762On behalf of myself and my associates, I volunteer a
3763group of loyal Americans for behind-the-line duty in Vietnam.
3764We feel that a crack group of trained guerrillas could
3765demoralize the VietCong and advance the cause of freedom.
3766We are available for training and duty immediately.
3767Sincerely,
3768Ralph Barger
3769Oakland, California
3770President of the Hell’s Angels
3771I got a letter back from an officer basically stating that if we wanted
3772to go and fight, we’d have to join the Army. That was impossible,
3773since most of us were card-carrying felons.
3774After that first Berkeley demonstration, the left wanted to have a
3775sit-down. Ken Kesey, the counterculture writer who wrote One Flew
3776over the Cuckoo’s Nest, called me. We arranged a meeting at my house
3777on 12th Avenue between the VDC organizers and the Hell’s Angels.
3778I knew Kesey by then, having read his stuff and having been introduced
3779to him earlier by the Frisco Hell’s Angels. Kesey set up the
3780meeting between Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassady, and me after our
3781first antiwar demonstration confrontation. When the group showed
3782up at my house, before the sit-down, Ginsberg took out his Tibetan
3783silver prayer bells and began to chant a Buddhist prayer in an Eastern
3784lotus position. I knew about Ginsberg and his flaky poetry, but it
3785was still a bit weird seeing a robed and bearded Jewish man meditating
3786and chanting in my living room. The first thing on the agenda:
3787they wanted to know why we beat their people up. We wanted to
3788know why they wouldn’t let our American military fight the war
3789and protect themselves. The meeting must have worked. They didn’t
3790Hell’s Angel / 93
3791get beat up at any more demonstrations. That first fistfight proved
3792our point anyway. The beer and drugs then came out and we listened
3793to Bob Dylan’s “Gates of Eden” and “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue,”
3794which was okay even though the guy couldn’t sing. But I dug that
3795skinny little Joan Baez and I even liked her music.
3796In 1965 not only did the Hell’s Angels shake up the left with the
3797VDC demonstrations, but we also rattled the cages of the rightwingers
3798too. As I mentioned, during the Monterey rape rap, California
3799Attorney General Thomas C. Lynch, responding to pressure from
3800other politicians, released a report denouncing the Hell’s Angels,
3801claiming we were a menace to society. The sixteen-page report called
3802us “disreputable” and even said you could tell a Hell’s Angel by his
3803patch and his odor. “Probably their most universal common denominator,”
3804said the report, “is their generally filthy condition.”
3805Hunter S. Thompson wrote an article in the May 17, 1965, issue
3806of the The Nation about the Hell’s Angels and called it “The Motorcycle
3807Gangs, Losers and Outsiders.” I actually liked the way it was
3808written, even though some of the facts were exaggerated. After the
3809article received a good reaction, Thompson came back to Oakland
3810and hung around the club’s favorite biker bar hangouts until he and
3811I finally met face-to-face. He told me he wanted to ride with the club
3812and me and write a book about us. Since I liked the way he wrote,
3813the Oakland and Frisco chapters let Hunter hang out with the club
3814for a price, two kegs of beer. But as time went by, Hunter turned
3815out to be a real weenie and a stone fucking coward. You read about
3816how he walks around his house now with his pistols, shooting them
3817out of his windows to impress writers who show up to interview
3818him. He’s all show and no go. When he tried to act tough with us,
3819no matter what happened, Hunter Thompson got scared. I ended
3820up not liking him at all, a tall, skinny, typical hillbilly from Kentucky.
3821He was a total fake. Hunter got along with some of the members
3822better than me.
3823Tramp, Tiny, Magoo, Buzzard from Berdoo, Zorro, Gut, Skip, and
3824I were all making the Bass Lake scene in ’66 and Hunter had followed
3825us in his car. As at most Angels gatherings, a fight was brewing with
3826the cops, so Hunter jumped into the trunk of his car, pulled down
3827the hatch, and hid. I never had too much more to say to him after
3828that.
3829When his time came, he got it. He got beaten up by the Hell’s
383094 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3831Angels so he could say, “I met them, I rode with them, and I was
3832almost killed by the Hell’s Angels.” He got into some really stupid
3833shit to get beat up. First, he’d been away from us for a long time
3834finishing his writing. When his book was done, he asked if he could
3835ride up with us to Squaw Rock for a gun run. While we were there,
3836Junkie George got into an argument with his old lady and slapped
3837her. Hey, it happens. Then George’s own dog bit him. Junkie George
3838was so pissed off he kicked the dog too. Hunter walked up to George
3839and told him, “Only punks slap their old ladies and kick dogs.”
3840This really pissed George off, so he poleaxed Hunter while a
3841couple of us kicked him around. He was bleeding, broken up, and
3842sobbing, and we told him to get in his car and drive away. He rode
3843to a nearby police station and they told him to clear out too. They
3844didn’t want him bleeding in their bathroom.
3845I read the book, Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga, when it
3846came out in 1967. It was junk. The worst part is that it became a law
3847enforcement guide on the club. There was a lot of writer’s exaggeration
3848along with a writer’s dream-and-drug-induced commentary,
3849like when he talks about members pissing on their patches or
3850members having to wear pants dipped in oil and piss. Blood in,
3851blood out. The cops claimed that for years after. That kind of stupid
3852mythology came right out of Hunter’s book. Plus, Hunter never
3853delivered on the beer kegs, the cheap son of a bitch. The rest of the
3854Hell’s Angels saw the book for what it was, another burn.
3855We held a Memorial Day California Run to La Honda in 1966
3856to hook up with Kesey and his Merry Pranksters again. They lived
3857in a rural commune. The Merry Pranksters were sort of like
3858us—underground free spirits—except they didn’t ride bikes and
3859weren’t as violent. Kesey was straight up and okay, so I took half a
3860pound of grass to his place in La Honda. Along the way, I stopped
3861by the El Adobe, where eight or ten more Hell’s Angels joined me
3862for the ride over, fifty miles south of Oakland and west of San Jose
3863toward the coast. While Kesey was expecting us, I doubt he was
3864ready for the kind of entrance we were about to make.
3865Halfway through the run and not far from La Honda, the cops
3866started chasing us. Exhaust pipes roared through the canyon and
3867the Pranksters could hear us coming for miles. Rather than stop, we
3868just kept going, heading around the bend toward the entrance to
3869Kesey’s place. With the gate wide open, we all whipped in, and they
3870Hell’s Angel / 95
3871quickly shut it behind us. The cops pulled up but couldn’t get in.
3872We motherfucked them for a while until they finally gave up and
3873drove away.
3874Kesey stashed the pot I had brought in a safe place and we ended
3875up staying and partying with Kesey and his Merry Pranksters for
3876about four days.
3877The Pranksters had a pet pigeon, which I accidentally killed. The
3878poor, nutty pigeon lived in a cage on a steady diet of marijuana
3879seeds. Since I love animals, I took him out of the cage to set him free,
3880and a pet named Lion Dog came along and ate him.
3881This was where I first got to know Neal Cassady. I loved Cassady,
3882the only guy I ever met who could hold a conversation with five
3883people simultaneously and not miss a beat. He was wired. I still
3884believe he committed suicide down in Mexico with reds. Eventually,
3885Kesey turned the Pranksters over to someone named Babs, making
3886him the top honcho. Neal probably felt let down, feeling that it
3887should have been him. Cassady went down to Mexico and probably
3888killed himself in a fit of depression.
3889After a while we had a really good party going. Everybody was
3890mixing real good. The hippie chicks were fine and we all got it on
3891fine. Babs became an instant friend and remained so for a long time.
3892The groovy Mountain Girl was there too.
3893A bunch of Hell’s Angels went along with me to Kesey’s famous
3894Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. After all, acid was something we all
3895had in common.
3896There’s no way to truly say how much I loved LSD. I’ve never
3897had a bum trip. I first took it in 1965—legally—with my first wife,
3898Elsie, when I bought two sugar cubes for five bucks apiece and stored
3899them in the refrigerator. Early one morning we decided nothing was
3900happening, everything was cool, so we’d drop the stuff to see what
3901happened. About an hour later, nada, so I told Elsie, “I’m going to
3902have to go and find this guy who sold me this shit. We got burned,
3903baby.”
3904Elsie agreed, so I got up and went into the bathroom, and as I was
3905standing in front of the toilet taking a piss, I looked up on the shelf
3906at a box of Yogi Bear bubble bath. Yogi was chasing a cat around
3907the box. I fucking cracked up and almost peed on the floor, calling
3908for Elsie to come into the bathroom. “Don’t worry, girl,” I told her.
3909“We didn’t get burned. You’ll see in a minute.”
3910I was having so much fun I needed to tell Skip about it. It was still
3911early in the morning and I hopped on the highway toward Skip’s
391296 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3913house. Sailing down the highway on my bike, I was going so fast
3914the road was standing up while my front wheel kept pushing the
3915road back down. When I got near Skip’s, I was glad to be off the
3916freeway. I was convinced I was going to kill myself riding so fast.
3917But when I looked down at the speedometer, I was doing thirty
3918miles per hour! I tried to explain to Skip what was happening to me,
3919but I doubt I made much sense. Waldo came by, and we all had to
3920drive somewhere. I sat in the car with Skip and Waldo as we drove
3921down Lake Merritt near downtown Oakland. We stopped at a stop
3922sign as I heard a roaring, raging waterfall coming from the lake. But
3923there was no waterfall; it turned out to be a trickle of water running
3924down the gutter going into the sewer.
3925It was my first trip on acid, and I loved it! But I knew I couldn’t
3926do this shit every day, nor could I tell everybody how much I liked
3927it, otherwise the entire club would be on this stuff permanently—a
3928pretty scary thought.
3929By November 1965, when Tramp and George “Baby Huey”
3930Wethern were deep into the drug business, the Haight-Ashbury
3931scene and the flower children created quite the marketplace for drug
3932sales. George says in his book that he and Owsley Stanley provided
3933most of the LSD in Haight-Ashbury. There was always an ample
3934acid supply on hand, and I took quite a bit of it, making for fun
3935times. The best stuff we ever got was pure Sandoz acid from
3936Switzerland. The kit came with twenty-five-milligram tabs. You
3937could take up to four hits, or until you got as loaded as you wanted
3938to be.
3939The sixties were the best thing that ever happened to the Hell’s
3940Angels. Every hippie was glad to give you his old lady to fuck,
3941sometimes in exchange for a ride on your motorcycle. There was a
3942big difference between the hippies in San Francisco and the antiwar
3943radicals in Berkeley. Hippies in San Francisco were a mellow bunch
3944who didn’t want to work or go to school. They wanted to get loaded,
3945fuck, and party. Berkeley people were idealistic students who held
3946firm left-wing political beliefs and acted on them. Some were violent,
3947but not in a stand-in-the-middle-of-the-street-and-fight kind of way.
3948They preferred sneaking around and blowing up buildings and
3949creating chaos.
3950We actually had a lot in common with the hippies, but believe it
3951or not, California Attorney General Thomas Lynch, I think we took
3952Hell’s Angel / 97
3953more baths. We hung out on Haight Street, and many of the Hell’s
3954Angels had long hair before many of the hippies did. Before he was
3955killed in 1962, Bobby Zimmerman, president of the Berdoo chapter,
3956had hair down to his waist. Terry the Tramp had real long hair in
3957the early days, and his dressing style linked the look between the
39581950s motorcycle leather guy and the 1960 psychedelicized Harley
3959rider. This was the look that a lot of hippies and rock ’n’ roll bands
3960took on. This was the look America saw in Life magazine, and we
3961were lumped in. I never let my hair get too long, because it was curly
3962and uncomfortable. Plus I was riding a motorcycle all the time and
3963it would get all knotted up. I preferred a long goateed beard. It scared
3964more people.
3965Some Angels started weaving their lives into the hippie scene.
3966Gut was a Berdoo Hell’s Angel who came up to Oakland and put
3967together Blue Cheer, one of the loudest rock power trios in history.
3968When Frisco member Chocolate George died, there was a big party
3969in Golden Gate Park in his honor after the funeral. The hippies loved
3970Chocolate George Hendricks. He looked like a hippie, but he was
3971all Hell’s Angel all of the time. He had just gotten out of prison
3972during the middle of the Flower Power days. He couldn’t believe
3973what he found on Haight Street. There’s a famous poster of
3974Chocolate George with a hippie girl standing up on the back of his
3975bike leading a parade. He eventually got arrested for that poster.
3976The cops wanted to violate his parole and send him back to prison.
3977We also got along with the Grateful Dead when we met them
3978through the Frisco chapter. It seemed like I’d known Jerry Garcia
3979all my life. He was that type of guy. I miss him. He also loved and
3980respected the Hell’s Angels. If you were a Hell’s Angel and if you
3981ever showed up at a Grateful Dead concert, you never paid. During
3982the so-called Summer of Love, 1967, the Hell’s Angels showed up
3983at the be-in at Golden Gate Park mostly because the Frisco
3984chapter—along with Tramp and Fu—got along so well with many
3985of the performers. Bill Graham always let us into his gigs at the
3986Fillmore and the Longshoreman’s Hall for free. One time some fuck
3987was at the door and I had to threaten to burn the place down to get
3988in. The Hell’s Angels also staged benefit concerts and annual parties
3989of their own at Longshoreman’s with the Dead, Janis Joplin and Big
3990Brother and the Holding Company, Blue Cheer, and Cold Blood.
3991During the late sixties and early seventies, I started working for
399298 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
3993movie people. I let them use my name on movie scripts in exchange
3994for a $5,000 fee, which at the time was a year’s salary. After we made
3995Hell’s Angels on Wheels, producer Joe Solomon pumped out a shitload
3996of bike movies. He and I became pretty good friends. Over the years
3997he paid me as a technical adviser on every biker movie he made.
3998He’d send me a script; I’d read it and advise him. Then he’d pop
3999my name in the credits and pay me a consulting fee. I recall the
4000movie company giving each charter—San Bernardino, San Diego,
4001Frisco, Richmond, Oakland, and the Sacramento charter that became
4002Nomads—$25,000. That was big bucks. At one point during the
4003sixties, everybody was making bike movies. Peter Fonda made a
4004movie with Nancy Sinatra called The Wild Angels with publicity that
4005hinted it was based on real Hell’s Angels. Peter Fonda went to the
4006same school as Hunter Thompson—Chickenshit High. We sued the
4007producer, Roger Corman, for five million bucks and threatened to
4008beat the crap out of him. We eventually settled for ten grand and no
4009stomping. We still have a rule that a filmmaker can’t use a Hell’s
4010Angels patch unless it’s voted on by the members.
4011Easy Rider, supposedly the greatest bike movie ever made, wasn’t
4012really a bike movie at all. It was a movie about two drug dealers
4013who happened to travel cross-country on bikes. There he was, that
4014pretty boy Fonda again. Joe Solomon’s drive-in hit Hell’s Angels on
4015Wheels came out in 1967, before Easy Rider. He was the first who
4016approached us to make a legit movie. He paid us, and although the
4017money and the movie weren’t great, it was something to do, something
4018we could do without thinking too much. Bike films weren’t
4019anything other than low-budget drive-in movie flicks. Hell’s Angels
4020on Wheels was Jack Nicholson’s first serious movie. Nicholson played
4021a bored young gas station worker named Poet who runs into the
4022club and decides on the spur of the moment to ride along with the
4023Hell’s Angels. Poet gets into fistfights alongside the Angels against
4024a rival club and is accepted into the pack.
4025During the filming, Nicholson fit in with the Hell’s Angels while
4026the film’s principal actor, Adam Roarke, had a harder time. On the
4027set, some of the crew thought Nicholson was a member from another
4028charter, his style was so convincing. Even a few of our club members
4029thought he was a Hell’s Angel.
4030After the first Hell’s Angels on Wheels screening in Oakland we all
4031went out to celebrate at the Hangover Club. It was right around the
4032corner from Skip Workman’s house. There were twelve of us in the
4033bar drinking when an Oakland PD sergeant walked through the
4034Hell’s Angel / 99
4035door with a couple of his rookies. They saw us and left quickly. We
4036suspected something was up when they ducked out and came back
4037later with more guys. The sergeant was pulling on his gloves and
4038acting tough. With ten rookies by his side, he walked right up to
4039Skip and shouted, “You’re drunk.”
4040Skip looked up from his beer at the sergeant and said, “Fuck you!”
4041It was a fair fight. No guns. No clubs. Chairs, glasses, and windows
4042were broken. When they called for reinforcements, there were about
4043forty cops at the Hangover. Twenty-nine of them ended up going
4044into the hospital. Nine of us got arrested, but it was the first time in
4045my life I got away—unlike me, since I usually stay until the last
4046punch is thrown. Amid all the commotion, I walked out into the
4047backyard, got on my bike, and rode out, and nobody stopped me.
4048The next day, Joe Solomon called to tell me about the headline in
4049the newspaper: ANGELS WAGE WAR WITH OAKLAND PD. He called it
4050a “producer’s dream.” We sure as fuck didn’t plan it that way. Shit
4051happens between the cops and the Hell’s Angels.
4052When Hell’s Angels on Wheels opened in the United States, I toured
4053all over the country. They didn’t open movies in several cities at
4054once like they do today. Instead, they would open in a few places
4055then move on. I flew into each city to promote the film. I’d borrow
4056a motorcycle and ride to the premiere wearing my Hell’s Angels
4057patch. Sometimes I’d give a little speech. I’d show up for special
4058appearances at drive-in movie theaters too. One of our bike movies
4059opened the same week in Texas as Paint Your Wagon, starring The
4060Wild One’s Lee Marvin. We out-grossed them at the box office. Sorry,
4061Chino.
4062After Hell’s Angels on Wheels, Dick Clark Productions contacted
4063us about making a film. A nice guy, Clark came to Oakland to try
4064to negotiate a movie deal. When we met, I was driving a modified
4065blue-black Corvette that took second place in an auto show. Clark
4066drove a remake of a Cord. I remember him wanting to trade cars
4067because he really liked my ’vette. (Incidentally, that Corvette later
4068got me into a tax beef. I entered it in a roadster show and the guy
4069who designed it said it cost $12,000 to build. The IRS creep who had
4070just audited my taxes saw it, then realized I only declared $6,000 in
4071income for the whole year.)
4072After Clark left town, we went with his film crew to a Half Moon
4073Bay run which we called Stumble Creek, so named because the Hell’s
4074Angels liked to take a lot of reds there. I took a whole lot of reds that
4075day, and when I woke up, I found the film crew had left. They had
4076100 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4077done some filming and they wanted to continue, but the script called
4078for a Hell’s Angel to be hung in the end. The Angels that were still
4079conscious didn’t want that. The film crew insisted it be part of the
4080movie, so fuck it, they split and the movie was never made.
4081We made another film in 1968. The clubhouse scenes in the Hells
4082Angels ’69 movie were shot at the actual Daly City clubhouse. This
4083time several members had prominent speaking parts, including
4084Tramp, Skip, and me. The desert scenes were filmed in the Mojave,
4085near Red Rock Mountain. For the dirt bike chase scenes in the desert,
4086we all got on scrambler bikes, something we wouldn’t normally do,
4087but it was part of the script and we had a good time. I must say, the
4088movie is pretty accurate on the way we looked and acted and the
4089kind of Harleys we rode at the time.
4090The scenes in Hell’s Angels ’69 where we pulled up to a Las Vegas
4091casino were actually filmed in California, in front of the Teamsters
4092Union hall in Mountain View. It had been rebuilt to resemble a
4093miniature Caesars Palace. We didn’t want to go to Las Vegas to film,
4094so if you look closely during the scene where the guys are riding
4095into the casino, my stand-in is riding a Sportster. When the shot
4096closed in, I was riding Sweet Cocaine, my Harley 74, a bike I built for
4097the movie.
4098Tramp was a definite moving part on the set. Tramp was someone
4099who knew no restraint and could do a lot of stupid things. He dosed
4100one of the girls in the movie with acid. Tramp turned her on without
4101her knowing and she freaked out. Then he tried to fuck her in her
4102little movie trailer, and when she said no, Tramp just couldn’t understand
4103why.
4104I was picked out to be an actor in those movies because I was
4105president of the Oakland chapter. Had I not been an officer, the
4106movie people probably would have preferred using someone much
4107more outgoing than me, like Johnny Angel, Hi-Ho Steve, Winston,
4108or Magoo. Hell’s Angels ’69 was the only movie that captured the
4109rough-and-tumble of the club. During the 1960s we really did our
4110own thing. We put the peace and love vibe of the time together with
4111the thrill of our own private counterculture, and it worked. As a
4112result of the books, movies, newsreels, and newspaper stories, we
4113really did have a love/hate groove thing going with the press and
4114the public. While we were more than outlaws—more dangerous
4115than lovable—like I’ve said before: no publicity is bad publicity.
4116The books, the movies, the magazines, and the newspapers had
4117Hell’s Angel / 101
4118us all over the place, going wild, beating the fuck out of cops, citizens,
4119and our mothers, almost.
4120As Hollywood westerns faded in popularity, B-movie biker films
4121took over and invaded small-town theaters and drive-ins, where
4122kids got a glimpse of something wild. After Roger Corman’s 1967
4123Wild Angels opened the Venice Film Festival, America was subjected
4124to an endless lineup of budget motorcycle flicks, many using the
4125word “Angels” in the title: Naked Angels, Angels Unchained, Angels
4126Die Hard, Angels from Hell, and Black Angels. Drive-in triple features
4127included other movies like The Glory Stompers, The Miniskirt Mob,
4128The Losers, and Werewolves on Wheels.
4129It was all over the top and blown up. The way we were depicted,
4130we were Vikings on acid, raping our way across sunny California
4131on motorcycles forged in the furnaces of hell. It was sold to a lot of
4132people, and it was free publicity for us. And there ain’t anything
4133wrong with publicity, especially when it’s followed up with money,
4134girls, and bikes.
4135102 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
41368
4137RUNNING
4138THROUGH THE
4139JUNGLE,
4140PORTERVILLE,
4141AND SHOOTING
4142POOL WITH AN
4143AUTOMATIC
4144In the beginning days of the Hell’s Angels, we really didn’t travel
4145any great distances. We rarely rode outside of the state of California.
4146We rode around Oakland. A trip to San Jose—fifty miles away—and
4147back was considered a long trip. Five-hundred-mile rides to places
4148like San Bernardino during the late fifties—man, now that was an
4149adventure! You were special on the highway. It was rare if you saw
4150another motorcyclist on the road. You’d wave. That’s how many
4151bike riders there were when I first started the club.
4152Today, the USA Run is one of the annual Hell’s Angel events.
4153Every member who can get away for a couple of weeks tries to
4154go. It usually takes a week to ride cross-country and a week or so
4155to get back home, with a few days in between at the site. USA Runs
4156are held in the middle of the country for convenience. The American
4157East Coast clubs will sponsor the run one year, and the West Coast
4158hosts the next. There are also World Runs, which are held in Europe
4159one year and in the States the next. Sometimes it’s in Australia,
4160Canada, or Brazil. If it’s sponsored in the United States, we try to
4161combine our USA Run with the World Run.
4162Bass Lake was one of our favorite places to go on runs. Only
4163fourteen miles from the entrance of Yosemite National Park, Bass
4164Lake is seven miles from the exact center of California, making it
4165nearly equal distance from San Francisco and Los Angeles. It was
4166the ideal, centralized spot in the wilderness for all the different
4167chapters to meet.
4168During the early Bass Lake Runs, we traveled light. No sleeping
4169bags; a bag looked uncool on the back of your bike. If you had an
4170old lady on the back of your bike, where was the room? There were
4171no tents or provisions, and staying in a motel—well, forget it. Besides,
4172even if we had the money, who the hell would give rooms to a pack
4173of Hell’s Angels? Instead, we just pulled over to the side of the road
4174and after a little partying we’d sleep where we fell. We built big-ass
4175bonfires at night and would wake up covered with ashes and
4176smelling like burned wood.
4177We settled a lot of bad blood between members at the Bass Lake
4178Runs. If you had a beef with somebody in the club that had not been
4179settled, then you knew you were going to settle it up with them
4180there. What better time to take care of it? No cops around, just Angels
4181going toe to toe, crossing swords.
4182Another favorite Oakland Hell’s Angel pastime was the
4183Bakersfield drags. Other clubs had their patches, and while there
4184were lots of motorcycle clubs in California—especially ones out of
4185the Los Angeles area—going to the drags, we were different. Forty
4186or fifty of us would get on our bikes and leave the clubhouse together.
4187When we’d show up in Bakersfield, the people’s reaction was off
4188the fucking map. They couldn’t believe our vibe and what we looked
4189like. Some of us had hair down to our waist and foot-long beards.
4190We drove stripped-down Harleys instead of full dressers and didn’t
4191dress up in fancy head-to-toe leather outfits. Our tattoos were our
4192calling card. Everywhere the Hell’s Angels went we’d outdrink,
4193outfuck, and outfight everybody. People would take one look at us
4194and step back. They were just plain scared. We became the show.
4195We were usually too broke to pay to get in, so we’d camp by the
4196side of the road. The cops went nuts, worrying like a bunch of
4197schoolgirls. That was before law enforcement organized mutual aid
4198pacts, meaning the cops weren’t able to call nearby counties to come
4199in to help control anything.
4200In the Bakersfield bars, there was usually trouble between Hell’s
4201Angels and the Okies. Cowboys and bike riders have always clashed.
4202Put them both in one room and there’s always a fight. A lot of the
4203cowboy types worked as oil riggers or ranchers, and a lot of them
4204104 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4205came out of the Oklahoma Dust Bowl thirties. Man, they liked to
4206fight, and they were tough as hell too. In many ways, we were all
4207the same animal, except the Bakersfield Okies drove trucks and rode
4208horses. We Angels rode motorcycles.
4209We’d fight right inside the bars. Like Hell’s Angels, Okies didn’t
4210call the cops when things got rough. When Scraggs played the bars
4211down there, we’d usually turn the place upside down. We liked
4212country music too, so when the fighting was over, everyone would
4213just settle down and we’d all start drinking and get hammered together.
4214Okies weren’t the only guys who liked to test the Angels. Cops
4215always thought they had bigger dicks. From the beginning the cops
4216in Oakland made it their mission to bust the Hell’s Angels, starting
4217with a flood of traffic tickets and bullshit citations. When cops would
4218retire or be transferred, the new recruits who would take their place
4219would hassle our asses from the get-go. After forty years, I’ve been
4220through three or four complete shifts and generations of Oakland
4221cops hell-bent on breaking us. It hasn’t happened yet, and it never
4222will.
4223Oakland during the fifties and sixties was still a tough town, a
4224blue-collar area overshadowed by glittery Frisco-by-the-Bay. There
4225were cops in Oakland like Tommy. He’d take his badge off and if
4226you whipped his ass, you weren’t drunk. If he whipped your ass,
4227you were drunk and disturbing the peace, so it was off to jail for a
4228couple of hours. Fifteen or twenty bucks later you were bailed out.
4229A vice squad cop named Bob was another old-style Oakland cop.
4230During any fight, he’d pull off his badge and take you on one-onone,
4231off the record. The Oakland PD boys didn’t lose a lot of fights
4232either; they were pretty tough. There were a lot of Oakland cops like
4233Tommy and Bob during the early days of the Hell’s Angels. These
4234were guys who walked the beat and stayed in shape. They didn’t
4235drive around in air-conditioned squad cars eating doughnuts and
4236talking to their boyfriends on their cell phones. The OPD once came
4237by a biker bar called Frank’s Place and jumped a bunch of our
4238members, beat the shit out of them, and then took them to jail. Afterward,
4239they said to me, “Now we’re even for last month.”
4240We had lots and lots of hangouts all over the East Bay. The Sinner’s
4241Club was right near the house where I grew up in East Oakland.
4242Then there was the El Cribbe, but it burned down. Another Hell’s
4243Angel hot spot was the Tail’s End, and we even hung out at the
4244Circle Drive-In, a vestige from our high school days. The average
4245Hell’s Angel / 105
4246Joe would probably get his ass kicked if he stumbled into some of
4247our early hangouts. Occasionally we’d fight “citizens,” usually guys
4248who were drunks. I probably got into as many fights over not
4249drinking as most people did getting drunk. It’d usually go something
4250like this. Someone would offer to buy me a drink. I’d say okay and
4251I’d order a Coke.
4252“Oh, you don’t want to drink with me?”
4253“I don’t drink.”
4254“Well then, fuck you!”
4255Off go the gloves, and the bartender would stand back and watch
4256the shit and the fists fly.
4257We had a big fight at the El Adobe bar once. Well, more than once,
4258but there was this one particular fight. The El Adobe was practically
4259our clubhouse at that point. It sat back a ways on the corner and had
4260a triangular parking lot out front. A giant black guy—nearly seven
4261feet tall and fucking huge all over, big arms, fists the size of typewriters—
4262ambled into El Adobe knowing it was a Hell’s Angels
4263haunt. He had seven or eight quick drinks and pretty soon he was
4264shooting his mouth off about how he could whip any Hell’s Angel
4265ass who took him on. He was a hard motherfucker to beat, but he
4266got beat. It took about six of us to finally bring him down. You have
4267to beat a guy like that pretty damned bad before you could kill him.
4268He left the El Adobe crawling, vowing he’d be back that night. As
4269a precaution, we put a couple of guys on the roof with some AR-15s.
4270He never came back.
4271About eight or ten of us were hanging out at LaVal’s Pizza Parlor,
4272just off the northern end of the Cal Berkeley campus, in 1962. A
4273bunch of the University of California football players filed in after
4274practice, acting like a bunch of smart-ass motherfuckers. They were
4275about our age, but these were college boys who thought they were
4276tough and they started acting like a bunch of spoiled rich kids in
4277need of a lesson. One of the football players got into Little Joe’s face.
4278“Don’t take that!” I told Joe. “Slap that motherfucker!”
4279Little Joe slapped him hard all right, and we had us a good fight
4280going with the Cal football team. Although the football players were
4281big kids, we kicked their asses pretty good. We fistfought our way
4282across the room, up the stairs, and eventually out the front door. As
4283the police drove up, seeing we were the Hell’s Angels, they didn’t
4284arrest us. They sent the jocks back to their dorms. Having whipped
4285these college kids’ asses, we just agreed to leave too. As we were
4286making way to split, one of our guys’ bikes wouldn’t start. As Johnny
4287106 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4288Angel continued to kick-start his Harley over and over, the cops got
4289pushy. They ordered every bike that was running to get the hell out
4290immediately.
4291I told the cop we would leave only when the last guy got his bike
4292started, and no sooner.
4293The Berkeley PD wouldn’t listen. They wanted us out of their
4294town. One copper motioned to me. “Yours is running, so leave now.”
4295I shut my bike off and told them it probably wouldn’t restart.
4296We exchanged words and hard looks. Finally, I told the cops,
4297“Look, assholes, we’ll leave when my buddy gets his fucking bike
4298started and no sooner.”
4299They arrested me. Charges: failure to heed a law enforcement officer
4300and using profanity in front of women and children.
4301I was taken to the Berkeley jailhouse and bailed right out, no big
4302thing. The next day there was a story in the newspapers that the
4303Hell’s Angels had gotten into a fight at LaVal’s. If I would plead
4304guilty, I could get off easy with a fine. But since I wouldn’t, I took
4305the charge to court and hired an attorney. He was a brand-new freshfaced
4306lawyer at the time, and I was a green, rebellious defendant.
4307During the trial the district attorney told the jury that when the cops
4308told me to leave I supposedly said, “I will leave only when my
4309fucking bike starts.” At that time, under the law you could swear in
4310front of a man, but not in front of women or children. The court had
4311already dropped the charge of failing to heed, but I was still being
4312tried on the profanity charge, and looked at a few months jail time.
4313The police and the DA had presented their case and chose not to
4314bring up any witnesses, relying on the testimony of the cops. The
4315jury deliberated and after weighing the evidence came back out with
4316a question for the judge. An elderly lady in her seventies served as
4317the jury foreman.
4318“We have one question, your honor.”
4319“What is it?”
4320“Where’s the woman or child the defendant allegedly swore in
4321front of?”
4322My lawyer started smiling, then he whispered to me, “We’re
4323okay.”
4324The jury came back out a half hour later with a not guilty verdict.
4325I was happy; it was my first jury trial, and my first successful scrape
4326with the system. It was a valuable experience, my first legal high,
4327winning in court.
4328What those Cal football college kids at LaVal’s and the DA didn’t
4329Hell’s Angel / 107
4330understand was why and how hard Hell’s Angels fight. We fight
4331for our lives, and that’s what all the Okies, jocks, drunken cowboys,
4332oil riggers, other one-percenters, and police never understood. When
4333we take members into the club, we’re particular about who gets
4334voted in. A lot of the other clubs might take anybody, but when the
4335shit comes down and you’re outnumbered, guys who are in a motorcycle
4336club just to be in a club will leave. In choosing Hell’s Angels,
4337we take on men who can live up to what we believe in: we stand up
4338for ourselves and a Hell’s Angel should never break and run.
4339That includes fighting each other. At Bass Lake we heard some
4340SoCal members had hung a brand-new California Hell’s Angel flag
4341(with its new design) and then shot it with a gun. I guess they had
4342a problem changing from the old to the new, bigger patch design.
4343We asked some of the SoCal members, was it true? They owned up,
4344but according to them, it was none of my fucking business. So I
4345asked Grubby Glen, who actually wasn’t involved. He wouldn’t say.
4346A second passed and we hit the ground punching.
4347Then there was another fight between Cisco and Wayne. I jumped
4348in. Wayne had a knife when I hit him, so I pulled mine too. Then I
4349grabbed him around the neck and knocked him into the lake. I didn’t
4350want to stab him, so I hit him on the head with the butt of my blade.
4351Then we both fell into the water. Wayne was unconscious. As I let
4352go of him, I knew I’d made a big mistake. I didn’t know how to
4353swim, and I nearly drowned until a bunch of the guys jumped into
4354the water to save me. Andy Holley from the San Francisco chapter,
4355who, at the time, had a broken leg, was the guy who saved me. It’s
4356been a joke ever since. Still angry over the patch, the Frisco Angels
4357tried to kick him out for saving me from drowning that day. While
4358he’s no longer in the club, Andy is still a good friend of mine.
4359Aside from the patch disputes, the Oakland Hell’s Angels had a
4360major running battle with San Francisco in 1961. It turned into a bad,
4361bloody out-and-out war. The Oakland/Frisco wars were a major
4362incident in the Hell’s Angels’ history, part of the club’s growing-up
4363process. It all started when the Frisco chapter had a dance party
4364going on at a transmission shop called the Box Shop. A Frisco
4365member named French, who drove a three-wheeler in the pack, ran
4366the Box Shop and used it at night for Hell’s Angel parties and dances.
4367Another motorcycle club, the Presidents, was there that night too.
4368There was a guy named Kemp who came up from Berdoo. He
4369was sitting back with some Oakland guys, including Mouldy Marvin
4370Gilbert, drinking beer when his old lady came back from getting
4371108 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4372another beer. She told him that a Frisco member named Howdy
4373Doody had patted her on the ass. Kemp got fired up and walked up
4374to Howdy Doody and asked him if he had patted his old lady on
4375the ass.
4376“Yeah,” he told Kemp. “So fucking what?”
4377Kemp reeled back and floored him. Then somebody fired on
4378Kemp. Mouldy Marvin turned around and fired on Howdy Doody.
4379That’s how it all started. The lights went on in the Box Shop and
4380everything got straightened out. The Presidents were there (along
4381with a club called the MoFos), who became the Hell’s Angels Daly
4382City chapter a couple years later. The Frisco president, Pete Knell,
4383wasn’t at the Box Shop that night, but I was there and saw things
4384get really tense between Frisco and Oakland.
4385Papa Ralph from Frisco walked up to Charlie Magoo and said, “I
4386want to see how tough you are, asshole, so let’s go outside.” They
4387fought and Charlie Magoo whipped his motherfucking ass like he
4388owned him. Mouldy Marvin then got into another beef with one of
4389the Presidents and they went toe to toe. Of course, if Oakland fights,
4390all of Oakland jumps in. So Oakland jumped on the Presidents, and
4391when the Frisco Hell’s Angels jumped in—because they were real
4392good friends with the Presidents—they jumped in for the Presidents
4393and against the Oakland Hell’s Angels. What the fuck? Man, it’s like
4394a golden rule: when a Hell’s Angel fights a citizen or a rival club
4395member, everybody rat-packs to his side. That didn’t happen, which
4396caused the Oakland chapter to go to war with Frisco.
4397We battled long and hard for about a year, and it wasn’t pretty.
4398Oakland and Frisco Hell’s Angels would fuck each other up at every
4399chance. Sometimes we would ride into San Francisco, head over to
4400their favorite spots, find them, and beat up whoever was there and
4401ransack their bars. If you ever ended up on the ground, forget about
4402it, you got the boot. Your face got smashed in. We did the same to
4403them.
4404It wasn’t just Oakland against San Francisco, it was all the
4405Northern California chapters against Frisco. Everybody was fighting
4406mad over Frisco sticking up for someone outside the club, and rather
4407than single out their one member, the entire Frisco chapter chose to
4408back him up.
4409I guaranteed Pete Knell’s safety to come over to Oakland to a safe
4410house and talk about the war with me. Pete came over, and I’m sure
4411he was nervous. Enemy territory. We met in a coffee shop to go over
4412the rules of the war. We agreed: no guns and no knives. Chains,
4413Hell’s Angel / 109
4414bottles, boards, pipes, and boots—all that shit was cool. No going
4415over to a guy’s house and fucking him up in front of his family, wife,
4416kids, mother and father. No fucking up a guy at work; a man has to
4417make a living for himself and his family.
4418Other than that, it was watch out. If you were at a bar partying,
4419or wherever you might be, down the street or at the bike shop or
4420walking in the fucking park smelling the flowers…look out—the
4421shit is on.
4422There was a Doggie Diner hamburger joint where Zorro, another
4423member, and I were eating. The Frisco boys drove by. Two carloads
4424of guys looking for trouble. When they saw us they drove around
4425the corner and parked. When they walked back around to the diner,
4426I had split. Zorro and the other member weren’t so lucky and they
4427got fucked up real bad.
4428We finally resolved things after about a year. I was living on 12th
4429Avenue when I got the phone call. There were two Frisco Angels in
4430our bar—the Star Bar and Cafe, a restaurant and tavern owned by
4431Skip Workman. I hopped on my bike and shot down to the Star.
4432Sure enough, two Frisco Angels who had both just gotten out of
4433prison were sitting there having drinks. I walked up to them.
4434“What the fuck are you doing in our bar?”
4435“We drink wherever we want to drink.”
4436“Well, you don’t drink in our bar.”
4437We fucked them up pretty good, but after that incident our war
4438with Frisco was over. Pete Knell, Junkie George, Puff, and Norm
4439Greene—all Frisco Angels—came over to Oakland, and first we
4440hammered out a peace treaty, then we all got hammered and laughed
4441about the end of the war.
4442Around the same time there was another hassle between Oakland
4443and another motorcycle club. We didn’t shoot or stab anybody, but
4444anytime we saw any of their members, we’d fuck ’em up, then cut
4445their patches off with hunting knives. Snatching somebody else’s
4446patch is a serious act of battle. Sometimes they’d give it up out of
4447fear and we’d just throw them away. Originally we would keep
4448them as trophies, but that only created a reason for clubs to raid our
4449clubhouse looking for their patches. If a club caught a Hell’s Angel
4450on his own, they would surely do the same thing. Any Hell’s Angel
4451forced to give up his patch without fighting for it is automatically
4452voted out of the club.
4453110 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4454Our first Porterville Run was one of the first really big semiorganized
4455outlaw motorcycle get-togethers in California. I was twentyfive
4456years old at the time. We picked Porterville as a centralized
4457town where the Northern and Southern California clubs could meet
4458for Labor Day weekend in 1963. It was that run which established
4459Oakland as a strong voice and arm for the entire Hell’s Angels Motorcycle
4460Club. It was also one of the first of many, many battles
4461between the HAMC and LEOs, law enforcement officers.
4462Porterville was another excuse for the press to sensationalize outof-
4463control motorcycle clubs converging on the so-called helpless
4464town, much like what happened to Hollister in 1947. Here’s what
4465Newsweek said about Porterville (March 29, 1965):
4466A roaring swarm of 200 black-jacketed motorcyclists converged
4467on the small, sleepy Southern California town of Porterville.
4468They rampaged through local bars, shouting obscenities. They
4469halted cars, opening their doors, trying to paw female passengers.
4470Some of their booted girl friends lay down in the middle
4471of the streets and undulated suggestively.
4472There weren’t just Hell’s Angels in Porterville. Other clubs joined
4473in, including the Satan’s Slaves, Gallopin’ Gooses, Co-mancheros,
4474Stray Satans, and Cavaliers. In fact, anybody who was anybody in
4475the motorcycle world came to Porterville.
4476It all started getting crazy when Charlie Magoo was having a beer
4477in one of the Porterville bars and some fuck in the bar said something
4478stupid to him. Magoo lit him up and broke his nose. Pissed off and
4479shown up, the guy went home, grabbed a gun, and came back to
4480the bar and pointed it at Magoo.
4481Bigger mistake.
4482Magoo and the Angels took the gun away from him and stopped
4483short of shoving it up his ass. After a couple of turns, he was beaten
4484so badly he had to be taken to the hospital. While he was checking
4485into the hospital a couple of other Hell’s Angels who had gotten into
4486a wreck on the highway ended up in the emergency room at the
4487same hospital. When the guy from the bar saw the Angels walking
4488around the ER, he freaked out and yelled for the police, thinking
4489the Angels were after him. The police arrived and the scene turned
4490very ugly. Nothing like a punch-up in a hospital.
4491As the evening wore on, everybody was partying furiously and
4492Hell’s Angel / 111
4493having a great time. Motorcycles raced up and down the main street.
4494There were wet-T-shirt contests happening on top of the bars in the
4495saloons, and the booze (and drugs) flowed like ice cream and cake
4496at a kiddies’ birthday party. It was fucking heaven. The Hell’s Angels,
4497along with the locals and other bikers, were having a wild time.
4498The Porterville chief of police panicked. He felt he and his men
4499were outnumbered, so out went a three-county mutual aid call. In
4500less than an hour, over 250 cops, firemen, and highway patrolmen
4501(there probably were even some curious forest rangers) swarmed
4502into Porterville. Fire trucks hosed down the main streets and lathered
4503the roads down with soap, making it impossible to race up and down
4504the street anymore. Motorcycle riders who tried were then shot off
4505their bikes with powerful water streams. After the fire trucks showed
4506up, kids got up on top of the buildings and threw bricks down. We
4507stayed at ground zero. That’s where the real action was.
4508The cops lined up their vehicles and the fire trucks and instructed
4509all motorcyclists to leave town in one direction. There were two
4510choices: leave town or get your bike washed over. Hundreds decided
4511to leave Porterville. Only one day of the Labor Day holiday weekend
4512had gone by.
4513The Hell’s Angels all met up a couple miles out of the town in
4514front of a skating rink. Pissed off, we pulled our bikes over to assess
4515the whole situation. Someone was missing. Some bike rider said he
4516saw him get shot off his bike with one of the water hoses. The Galloping
4517Gooses were also missing one member. A Berdoo member
4518and a Slave member had also been arrested, leaving a total of four
4519people unaccounted for, unable to leave town. I felt the responsibility
4520to do something. What the fuck, all we had really done was have a
4521little…fun.
4522Some of the other clubs had decided they had had enough. The
4523party was over. They had all their people accounted for, so it was
4524time for them to leave Porterville. But I decided the Hell’s Angels
4525were not leaving without all their members. We were going back
4526in—the Oakland Hell’s Angels along with a couple of Berdoo and
4527Slave members.
4528We turned our bikes around and headed south back toward
4529Porterville with revenge on our minds.
4530The cops had the main bridge blocked off and we couldn’t get
4531past. So we blocked off the other side of the bridge, meaning if the
4532cops wouldn’t let anybody into town, then we sure as fuck weren’t
4533going to let anybody out. The cops threatened to arrest us, and we
4534112 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4535were ready to fuck ’em up and fight back. Back and forth, hurling
4536threats, sneer and spit, a true Mexican standoff.
4537Then an officer from the highway patrol came over to talk to us.
4538He had stars on his collar, and to this day I’ve never seen so many
4539stars on a CHP uniform. He came over and wanted to speak with
4540me, Sonny Barger. Was I the man? I was pissed off but calm. I told
4541him the Porterville police still had a few of our guys. All we wanted
4542was to get them back. My deal was this: I’d post twenty-five dollars
4543bail, forfeit it, and then get the hell out of Dodge.
4544“C’mon inside here, Sonny,” he said. “We need to talk this over.”
4545After we spoke, a Berdoo Hell’s Angel and one of the Slaves and
4546I got into the patrolman’s car to go see the Porterville chief of police
4547in town. We met and I explained our terms and told him that I would
4548post the twenty-five-dollar bail for all four guys. The chief said he
4549had calculated a $50,000 bond. Then I got agitated as hell.
4550“Take me the fuck out of here,” I said, and stormed out the door.
4551The CHP with all the stars seemed anxious to settle the matter. I
4552reminded him of our twenty-five-dollar offer. He left and went back
4553into the office with another highway patrol officer. He came back
4554out.
4555“How about fifty?”
4556Deal.
4557We passed the hat, bailed the four guys out, and then all headed
4558back out of town toward the group still waiting for us at the skating
4559rink. We were pretty satisfied with what had gone down. It was
4560getting close to a Sunday sunrise, so everybody started heading out.
4561The cops, as usual, were waiting and began pulling over groups of
4562motorcycle riders and handing out tickets for infractions like high
4563handlebars, muffler violations, and other small-time shit. They’d
4564finish up and then a few more miles down the road, more cops would
4565stop the same riders again and write them up another batch of tickets
4566for the same shit. With 250 cops in the area, they decided to do only
4567what they know how to do and that’s play cop. There were sure
4568enough of them around. The situation was all of a sudden out of
4569hand again. I pulled off the road not far from where yet another
4570group of bike riders was being ticketed.
4571I got up and stood on the seat of my bike and announced our intentions
4572to everyone within earshot.
4573“The Oakland Hell’s Angels are going north. Anybody who wants
4574to go with us can go, but when we leave here we’re leaving and not
4575Hell’s Angel / 113
4576fucking stopping for another fucking ticket. If they stop us, we fight!
4577Anybody who doesn’t want to fight, stay here.”
4578We took off as a group slow and easy, but loud, gunning our engines
4579north all the way home. It was deafening. If they wanted to
4580stop us then they’d have to catch us, roadblock us, and knock us off
4581our bikes first. Looking back, when I stood on my bike, it was at that
4582moment that the Oakland Hell’s Angels became a force to be
4583reckoned with. We weren’t about to get fucked over. The Oakland
4584chapter assumed a special leadership position within the entire Hell’s
4585Angels club. I learned that when you take a stand against the cops,
4586they know better than to fuck with you.
4587Elsie and I were sitting home one night in December of 1965
4588when I got a phone call from a member’s girlfriend. She sounded a
4589little drunk and shaken up; she was calling from a bar in Oakland.
4590A Hell’s Angel was inside, she mumbled, and he was about to get
4591into a lot of trouble. I got the name of the joint, packed a little.25
4592automatic pistol, jumped on my bike, and rode over there. It was
4593Friday night after work, and it seemed like everybody in Oakland
4594was getting drunk and rowdy. There was someone in the bar who
4595owned a chrome shop across the street and he had about six or seven
4596friends and employees with him. He was really getting mouthy. The
4597Angel was motherfuckin’ him. It was in the air. There was going to
4598be a fight.
4599When I walked into the bar, the 400 Club, I could almost smell
4600who the asshole was right away. He was acting like a tough guy in
4601front of his employees.
4602I pulled my Angel brother aside. “Let’s get out of here, now.”
4603But then the chrome shop straw boss said something to me. I
4604snapped, grabbed him, spun him around, and slipped the.25 automatic
4605into his mouth.
4606“Listen, motherfucker, maybe you ought to sit down and shut the
4607fuck up before you really get hurt.”
4608He did. I walked out of the 400 Club with my friend and his girlfriend,
4609who had phoned me. Then she had to go back into the bar
4610to get her purse. We waited for her by our bikes for a few minutes,
4611and then I walked back into the bar to check up on her. The chrome
4612shop boy was now yelling at her. For me, that was it. I hit him in the
4613head with my gun and it accidentally went off, hitting his skull. The
4614first shot had been an accident, but since the motherfucker was
4615114 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4616already shot in the head, I bent him over the pool table and shot him
4617again. I then turned and stalked out of the 400 Club.
4618I found out later that the bartender knew my name and gave it
4619up to the cops. I thought the guy might have been dead, but the next
4620day I read about our fight in the paper and found out that he had
4621actually survived! The.25 automatic gun barrel was so small; he only
4622went temporarily blind. The cops knew where I lived but they hadn’t
4623come to get me yet, so I figured everything was cool. A week later
4624I still hadn’t been picked up, so I figured all was clear.
4625A little bit after that, I received another phone call. Terry the Tramp
4626had gotten into a fight down at the Sinner’s Club and Tramp was
4627raging out of control. The people he was hassling lived a couple of
4628doors away from the bar.
4629The lady bartender at the Sinner’s Club called to tell me Tramp
4630was outside trying to get these people to come out of their house.
4631When I rode up, I spotted Tramp out on the street in front of the
4632house.
4633“Hey, let’s just kick in the door and go in.” Which is exactly what
4634we did.
4635After the front door flew off and the flying broken glass settled,
4636we went in and fucked up everybody in the house. Blood, tears, and
4637sweat flowed.
4638The cops naturally came and arrested both Tramp and me, taking
4639us directly to jail. A detective threatened to break my arms, warning
4640me not to fuck with any of his witnesses.
4641After I bailed out the next day, I was alone riding my motorcycle
4642down the MacArthur Freeway. I pulled off the High Street exit, and
4643when I looked back, sure enough, a bunch of cops were tailing me.
4644In fact, the High Street exit was blocked off with cops, guns drawn
4645at me. They had an ambush set up and a warrant out on me for attempted
4646murder.
4647“Fuck you, assholes,” I said, figuring it was the scuffle with Tramp.
4648“I bailed out on that charge yesterday.”
4649As I pulled out my bail slip and threw it at them, I suddenly
4650realized their warrant was for the pool table shooting and not the
4651Tramp thing. The cops had shown my picture to witnesses, who
4652ID’d me, then charged me with assault with intent to commit murder
4653and for being a felon with a gun. The felon part came as a result of
4654a 1963 prior marijuana beef.
4655When I went to trial, they dropped the gun charge, but I was still
4656Hell’s Angel / 115
4657tried for assault with a deadly weapon. The DA and I struck a deal
4658after a hung jury failed to convict me.
4659With probably more than a million miles on the road, I’d been
4660relatively accident-free up until 1993. We were coming back from a
4661USA Run in Missouri and headed toward the “big show” at Sturgis,
4662South Dakota. We’d pulled into a small town somewhere with the
4663intention of staying one night, then riding into the Sturgis rally the
4664next morning. But Johnny Angel’s alternator went out, so Johnny,
4665Michael Anthony, and I made plans to ride over to a Harley shop
4666in Pierre, South Dakota, which opened early in the morning and get
4667some parts and fix it. We always fixed our bikes ourselves.
4668At eight o’clock the next morning, the three of us rode out to an
4669old highway intersection where one of the roads takes you into
4670Pierre. We disconnected the headlight on Johnny’s motorcycle and
4671ran his bike from the battery, bypassing the alternator. We had until
4672sundown to get Johnny’s bike fixed. I rode out front, and as I pulled
4673up to the intersection and stopped at the stop sign, I looked both
4674ways. Nothing coming. As I made my left turn a woman in a pickup
4675truck came screaming over the hill doing about seventy with the
4676sun in her eyes. I saw her crest, and instantly thought, Oooh, fuck!
4677I attempted a quick right turn out of her way. She hit her brakes but
4678still broadsided me.
4679My saddlebag was packed full, so it served as a buffer. While her
4680truck missed my leg, the impact spun me around. She hit my bike
4681low enough so that instead of knocking me down the road, she
4682flipped me into the air. As I was hitting the pavement, she was
4683sliding off the road. She hit a sign and fence post up over a gully
4684and totaled her truck.
4685Chief is dead, Michael and Johnny thought as they ran toward
4686me. But after I hit the ground, I got up, picked up my bike, and
4687pushed it over toward the side of the road. They couldn’t believe
4688their eyes. I had only skinned one arm. Days later, the accident report
4689showed over 140 feet of skid mark from the truck.
4690The woman was scared to death when Michael Anthony told her,
4691“Lady, you almost killed a leader of the Hell’s Angels.”
4692After the accident we made it to Pierre. I taped all the damaged
4693plastic parts on my bike with duct tape and rode all the way back
4694to California that way. Eventually, the woman wrote me, asking
4695would I send her a sweatshirt from my motorcycle shop to give to
4696116 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4697her brother, who rode a Harley. Of course, I sent it off. Not many
4698people can run over a Hell’s Angel and live to tell about it. The way
4699I looked at it, she’d been there and had the shirt to prove it.
4700Law enforcement scuffles and media pie fights—like the
4701Monterey rape case, the Vietnam Day Committee demonstration,
4702and the Porterville Run—created a love/hate relationship with the
4703straight world. We had grown accustomed to the fact that wherever
4704we rode, trouble was always right around the corner. If it was
4705counterculture and antisocial, chances are the Hell’s Angels ended
4706up in the eye of the hurricane. Still, nothing prepared me for the
4707chaos and frenzy that happened at the Rolling Stones’ free concert
4708at Altamont Raceway.
4709Hell’s Angel / 117
4710
47119
4712LET IT BLEED:
4713NO SYMPATHY
4714FOR THE DEVILS
4715OF ALTAMONT
4716Toward the end of November in 1969, the Rolling Stones got it
4717into their heads that they wanted to play in the San Francisco area.
4718The story goes that they wanted to have their own Woodstock, but
4719Mick Jagger–style. What they had in mind was a large-scale free
4720concert that would signal the end of their American Let It Bleed tour.
4721Rolling Stones representative Sam Cutler, a San Francisco hipster
4722named Emmett Grogan, and a Grateful Dead guy named Rock Scully
4723contacted the San Francisco parks and recreation department about
4724staging a free concert in Golden Gate Park. When reporters from the
4725Los Angeles Free Press and the San Francisco Chronicle found out about
4726it and leaked the story, the public started going wild. Another idea
4727was an impromptu set at the Fillmore, but that was killed because
4728the place was too small and the Golden Gate Park idea was gaining
4729steam anyway. The problem with Golden Gate was security. It was
4730Grogan who first thought of using the Hell’s Angels.
4731“We’ll have one hundred Hell’s Angels on their hogs escort the
4732Stones into Golden Gate Park,” Grogan was quoted as saying.
4733“Nobody’ll come near the Angels, man. They wouldn’t dare.”
4734A deal was apparently struck between the Stones’ people and the
4735Frisco Angels. For $500 worth of beer, Pete Knell, president of the
4736Frisco Angels, gave his word that they would provide security. Pete
4737was a Frisco Hell’s Angel of high standing. We respected each other,
4738even when Oakland and Frisco were at war. By the late sixties, the
4739two charters had patched things up and everything was way cool.
4740I was at the monthly Hell’s Angels OM (officers’ meeting) when
4741Knell came in with the news: there was going to be a free Rolling
4742Stones concert and the surrounding chapters were invited to attend.
4743The deal was simple: would we join Frisco and sit up on the stage,
4744watch the crowd, and drink free beer? Soon enough, the Stones
4745would find out that California Hell’s Angels were a little bit different
4746from their English counterparts of the day. As Stones guitarist Mick
4747Taylor said, “These guys in California are the real thing. They’re
4748very violent.”
4749The plan for the Stones playing Golden Gate fizzled. The park
4750was nowhere near large enough to hold the crowds they expected,
4751and the San Francisco parks and recreation department backed down
4752on the permits.
4753The next place chosen was Sears Point Raceway, north of San
4754Francisco in Sonoma County. It could handle the masses. When
4755local officials put a stop to that, stage construction was halted and
4756the negotiations between the Stones and the Sears Point Raceway
4757owners—Filmways—was over. Filmways controlled Concert Associates,
4758who promoted the Stones’ Los Angeles appearance, and when
4759the Stones refused to add an extra performance, the plan to use Sears
4760Point Raceway unraveled. Filmways supposedly demanded a huge
4761insurance liability policy, and a hundred grand just for rent, plus
4762an interest in the distribution of a film that was going to be made of
4763the concert. None of this sat well with anyone. The local radio stations,
4764television news, and local papers that had heavily publicized
4765the event suddenly had nothing.
4766A man named Dick Carter had been staging drag strip races at
4767his Altamont Raceway, which was located in the Livermore Valley,
4768between two small towns—Tracy and Livermore—thirty miles from
4769Oakland. Carter had been getting advice from a Stanford University
4770business administration student to expand his drag strip business
4771to include outdoor rock events, so Carter stepped forward. Through
4772San Francisco attorney Melvin Belli, he contacted Sam Cutler and
4773the Stones to offer his site after Sears Point had been killed. In a
4774matter of a couple of days, the deal was done. Altamont was going
4775to be the place to see the Stones for free.
4776The Frisco members and a few other members from around the
4777Bay Area left early on Saturday, December 5, making their way to
4778Altamont in the yellow school bus owned by the Frisco chapter.
4779Others rode their bikes earlier in the day. The bus ended up about
4780a hundred yards from the stage that the Stones road crew had constructed
4781the night before. In addition to the Hell’s Angels, the Stones
4782organization brought in six security guys from New York who were
4783120 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4784dressed in golf jackets and sported short haircuts. When Mick Jagger
4785came out the night before to see the stage built by Chip Monck (who
4786had done the staging for Woodstock earlier that summer), his rented
4787limousine ran out of gas.
4788As the crowds filled the cow pastures in Altamont, we were finishing
4789up our OM in Oakland. I rode home to pick up Sharon before
4790heading off to the speedway late in the afternoon. As we rode past
4791Hayward and Livermore, tens of thousands of people were still
4792making their way to the free concert site. Parking was nonexistent
4793and the freeway was still under construction. A lot of people ditched
4794their cars on the highway near the freeway exits. From there they
4795hitchhiked or walked the remaining miles. VW buses full of kids
4796picked up stragglers stumbling on the side of the uncompleted
4797freeway.
4798To avoid the traffic, we took an even shorter route—our very own
4799shortcut. I signaled for the rest of us to cut over on our bikes through
4800the hills, past the frontage road, coming up off the top of the hill
4801overlooking the Altamont stage. I was relatively clean, meaning I
4802hadn’t taken any major drug. Sharon and I had a nice ride out there.
4803When we arrived, the concert had already been going on for a few
4804hours, and when we pulled into the valley we saw two or three
4805hillsides crammed with kids sitting on blankets and sleeping bags.
4806I immediately thought about the problems of getting in and out of
4807such a crowded place. As we rode down the hill toward the stage,
4808the crowd parted for us. Somebody handed Sharon and me a jug of
4809wine. We were lucky it wasn’t laced with acid.
4810Before we got there, there had been a fight onstage between Marty
4811Balin of Jefferson Airplane and a Hell’s Angel named Animal. A
4812bunch of Hell’s Angels jumped on a black kid. When Balin got in
4813Animal’s face and told him, “Fuck you,” Animal’s response was to
4814knock him out—during his set. Airplane manager Bill Thompson
4815pulled Animal aside and asked him why he had cold-cocked his
4816band’s singer, and was told, “He spoke disrespectful to an Angel.”
4817Another band member, Paul Kantner, announced to the crowd that
4818a Hell’s Angel had just punched out their lead singer. There was no
4819reaction.
4820When Sharon and I, with a few others on bikes, got to the bottom
4821of the gorge where the stage was, we parked our motorcycles four
4822feet from the front edge of the stage. It formed a sort of buffer zone.
4823Right away I was surprised to see how low the stage was. It was
4824barely three feet off the ground! As we parked, Gram Parsons and
4825Hell’s Angel / 121
4826the Flying Burrito Brothers and then Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
4827played their sets. When some of the crowd took to yelling at us,
4828Crosby stood up for us. We took on the task of trying to keep order
4829amid organized confusion.
4830The night before, looking at a fence broken down by anxious fans
4831arriving early, Keith Richards uttered ominously, “Ah, the first act
4832of violence.” Later, the afternoon of the show, when a helicopter had
4833delivered the Rolling Stones, someone approached Jagger yelling,
4834“I’m gonna kill you, I hate you,” and slugged him. Jagger’s jaw and
4835ego were bruised, and he quickly ran and hid in the offstage trailer.
4836Terry the Tramp, Sharon, some of the Hell’s Angels officers, and
4837I were escorted to a backstage area and introduced to the Rolling
4838Stones. They came out of the trailer in their prissy clothes and
4839makeup and we shook hands, then they disappeared back inside. It
4840was like they were little kids as they ran back into the house to hide
4841or something. They didn’t say anything.
4842All the opening bands had finished playing, and it was time for
4843the Stones to come out. The sun was still out and there was plenty
4844of daylight left. The crowd had waited all day to see the Stones
4845perform, and they were sitting in their trailers acting like prima
4846donnas. The crowd was getting angry; there was a lot of drinking
4847and drugging going on. It was starting to get dark.
4848After sundown the Stones still wouldn’t come out to play. Mick
4849and the band’s egos seemed to want the crowd agitated and frenzied.
4850They wanted them to beg, I guess. Then their instruments were set
4851up. It took close to another hour before the band finally agreed to
4852come out. A cold wind was blowing through the valley.
4853Nobody from the Stones organization told me anything. So we
4854just sat and drank beer, watching the crowd getting more and more
4855fucked up. When it was totally dark, the Rolling Stones ordered me
4856and the Hell’s Angels to escort the band out to the stage. I wouldn’t
4857do it. I didn’t like the fact that they wouldn’t come out earlier. I could
4858no longer picture the Hell’s Angels playing the part of bodyguards
4859for a bunch of sissy, marble-mouthed prima donnas. When they finally
4860got out, I didn’t like the way they acted onstage either. They
4861had accomplished what they’d set out to do. The crowd was plenty
4862pissed off and the craziness began.
4863The Stones’ ego trips had turned into our problem. The people
4864who were the most fucked up on drugs were the ones who got to
4865Altamont first—the so-called Friday-nighters—the ones who camped
4866a day earlier to get a good seat. They’d been exposed to the open air
4867122 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4868and hot sun for hours on end. They’d staked their territory up front.
4869When we came in on our bikes, they wouldn’t give up their space.
4870But…they moved. We made sure of that. We pushed them back
4871about forty feet. When the Stones came out onstage, people moved
4872back in toward the roped-in area where our bikes were parked, trying
4873to jump up on the stage. In response, we began pushing them off
4874the stage. Plus, they were messing with our bikes.
4875One Frisco Hell’s Angel named Julio had parked his bike near
4876mine. The battery on Julio’s motorcycle was near the oil tank, with
4877the springs of his seat right above the tank on each side of the battery
4878posts. Some fan was kneeling on the seat, his weight causing contact
4879between the springs and the battery, shorting out Julio’s bike. I saw
4880smoke coming out around the battery and yelled at the guy from
4881the stage to get off Julio’s bike. He wasn’t paying any attention at
4882all, so I jumped off the stage and pushed him off the bike. A number
4883of Hell’s Angels jumped down with me and pushed their way
4884through the crowd. They didn’t know what I was doing at the time,
4885but they were getting everybody out of the way to give me room so
4886I could snuff out the burning motorcycle. That single incident ignited
4887even more tension between the Hell’s Angels and the crowd. While
4888we secured the stage, some of the people who had been hit and
4889pushed got mad and started throwing bottles at us and really started
4890messing with our bikes. Big mistake. That’s when we entered the
4891crowd and grabbed some of the assholes vandalizing our bikes and
4892beat the fuck out of them.
4893Now that the situation had totally spun out of control, the Stones
4894were talking a lot of “brothers and sisters” type of hippie shit.
4895Everybody who tried to rush the stage was thrown off. A big fat girl
4896was trying to get up on the stage. She was topless and probably very
4897fucked up on drugs. Some of the Angels tried to stop her, and it
4898looked to me like they were trying to get her off the stage without
4899hurting her. Keith Richards of the Stones leaned over to me and said,
4900“Man, I’m sure it doesn’t take three or four great big Hell’s Angels
4901to get that bird off the stage.” I just walked over to the edge of the
4902stage and kicked her in the head.
4903“How’s that?”
4904Richards walked over to me after finishing “Love in Vain” and
4905told me the band wasn’t going to play anymore until we stopped
4906the violence. “Either these cats cool it, man, or we don’t play,” he
4907an-nounced to the crowd. I stood next to him and stuck my pistol
4908into his side and told him to start playing his guitar or he was dead.
4909Hell’s Angel / 123
4910He played like a motherfucker.
4911I didn’t see the stabbing of Meredith Hunter but I remember him.
4912Hunter had a loud green suit on and really stuck out from the crowd.
4913When he rushed the stage and pulled out a huge black gun, the rest
4914of what went down happened pretty fast. Jagger was singing “Under
4915My Thumb” when the Hell’s Angels bravely moved quickly toward
4916the gunman. Once we jumped off the stage, that’s when I heard the
4917gun go off. All I know is that Hunter was up on the stage, got
4918knocked off; a gun was flashed and fired. Then he was stabbed. He
4919was close to the stage when we stopped him. By the time I got to
4920Hunter he had already been stabbed. We picked him up and passed
4921him over to the medics.
4922Meredith had shot a Hell’s Angel. Since the guy he shot was a
4923fugitive at the time, we couldn’t take him to a doctor or an emergency
4924ward. It was just a flesh wound anyway.
4925Afterward, I didn’t feel too bummed about what had happened
4926at the concert. It was another day in the life of a Hell’s Angel. I did
4927feel it was lucky more people—including the Stones—hadn’t been
4928shot dead by this guy, Meredith Hunter. I felt as though the Hell’s
4929Angels had done their job.
4930The press said that Hunter experienced “shock and hemorrhage
4931due to multiple wounds in the back, a wound in the left side of the
4932forehead and right side of the neck.” Even if he had been on the
4933doorstep of a hospital or a doctor’s office, after all of that he still
4934would have died.
4935The Hell’s Angels stayed at the site until it was over. We hung
4936out in the audience for a while, drank some wine, and smoked a
4937little bit of pot with the straggling crowd. The Stones’ Let It Bleed
4938tour ended with blood, all right.
4939Say what you want, but I blame the Stones for the whole fucking
4940bad scene. They agitated the crowd, had the stage built too low, and
4941then used us to keep the whole thing boiling. They got exactly what
4942they originally wanted—a dark, scary environment to play “Sympathy
4943for the Devil.”
4944It’s hard to say what we could have done to improve the situation
4945had we been asked, but we were in a very bullshit position. Had I
4946known how poor the arrangements were and how the Hell’s Angels
4947were actually being used, I wouldn’t have agreed to do it. We would
4948have planned things differently, with probably a much more informal
4949role as security.
4950We rode the beef on Altamont for years.
4951124 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
4952As far as I’m concerned, the Stones are a good band and everybody
4953likes them. But just because you sing well doesn’t mean you can act
4954like a bunch of assholes to your fans—and that’s what they did that
4955night in Altamont.
4956Just before midnight, we jumped on our bikes and cut over the
4957fields for about five miles to Highway 5, around to Junction 680, and
4958headed back to Oakland. It’s funny, I’ve been back to that area since
4959and have never been able to figure out how we did it.
4960When we got to the main highway, Terry the Tramp’s motorcycle
4961ran out of gas. We decided to “peg” Terry home—I stuck my leg out
4962and put my foot on his foot peg, and pushed Terry home while he
4963leaned his bike into mine, so as to keep them next to each other.
4964Marcy was on the back of Terry’s bike, and Sharon was on the back
4965of mine. None of us thought about how dangerous it was with the
4966terrain, the heavy traffic, and the high speeds we were going. I
4967pegged Terry the twenty-something miles to our house, not even
4968stopping for gas. When we got back, the girls confessed how scared
4969they’d really been. We made a fire in the fireplace and there were
4970all kinds of phone calls from friends who heard on the news about
4971what had happened.
4972The next day there were comments that racial elements were involved
4973in Meredith Hunter’s death. He was at the concert with a
4974white girl and apparently he had been a problem all day long. You
4975can see it in the pictures in Look or Life magazine. He was there
4976looking for trouble.
4977KSAN, the underground rock ’n’ roll radio station, held a special
4978phone-in show the next night trying to make sense of what had
4979happened. People were calling in about the aftermath of Altamont.
4980Sam Cutler from the Stones organization was on the air trying to
4981explain the Stones’ side of things. Bill Graham came down heavily
4982against Mick Jagger on the air. I never really got along with Graham,
4983and others in the club didn’t either, but this time he agreed with us.
4984Mick Jagger had been responsible for letting it get out of hand. It
4985was his trip.
4986Somebody phoned me at home to tell me about the show, so I
4987called KSAN to stand up for the Hell’s Angels. I took all the cocaine
4988we had in the front room with me into the bedroom and called the
4989station. They gave me the runaround until I convinced them I was
4990actually who I said I was. Then they put me on the air. I was loaded.
4991“Flower people ain’t a bit better than the worst of us,” I said. “It’s
4992about time everybody started realizing that. We were told if we
4993Hell’s Angel / 125
4994showed up we could sit on the stage and drink some beer that the
4995Stones’ manager had bought us, you know. I didn’t fucking like
4996what happened there. We were told we were supposed to sit on the
4997stage and keep people off and a little back. We parked where we
4998were told we were supposed to park…. I didn’t go there to fight. I
4999went thereto have a good time and sit on the fucking stage.”
5000I didn’t know anything about anybody getting beaten during the
5001day with pool cues. As far as I was concerned, if you’re going to
5002beat somebody, you should use an ax handle or a baseball bat. A
5003pool cue is a very bad weapon to use on somebody because they
5004break too easily.
5005I spoke about how some of the people started knocking over our
5006bikes. “Now I don’t know if you think we pay fifty dollars for them
5007things, or steal them, or pay a lot for them or what. But most of us
5008that’s got a good Harley chopper got a few grand invested in it. Ain’t
5009nobody gonna kick my motorcycle. And they might think because
5010they’re in a crowd of three hundred thousand people that they can
5011do it and get away with it. But when you’re standing there looking
5012at something that’s your life, and everything you got is invested in
5013that thing, and you love that thing better than you love anything in
5014the world, and you see some fuck kick it…if you got to go through
5015fifty people to get to him, you’re gonna get to him.
5016“That stuff made it personal to me. You know what? I’m a violent
5017cat when I got to be. But there ain’t nobody gonna take anything I
5018got and try to destroy it. And that Mick Jagger, he put it all on the
5019Angels. He used us for dupes. As far as I’m concerned, we were the
5020biggest suckers for that idiot that I could ever see.”
5021All that shit about Altamont being the end of an era was a bunch
5022of intellectual crap. The death of Aquarius. Bullshit, it was the end
5023of nothing. One magazine article said that the sheriff’s department
5024was slow to investigate the Altamont death because the Hell’s Angels
5025had some kind of arrangement after our presence at the 1965 VDC
5026peace rally. There was even rumor in the press that Altamont had
5027taken a toll on the membership of the Hell’s Angels.
5028Wrong on both counts.
5029Altamont might have been some big catastrophe to the hippies,
5030but it was just another Hell’s Angel event to me. It made a lot of
5031citizens dislike us, but most of the hippies and journalists and liberals
5032didn’t like us anyway. When it comes to pleasing the right people
5033at the right time, the Hell’s Angels never came through. As for me,
5034126 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5035with the 1970s on hand, I was headed for some wilder times that
5036would make Altamont look like a church picnic.
5037Hell’s Angel / 127
5038
503910
5040MURDER,
5041MAYHEM, LIVING
5042OUTSIDE THE LAW
5043Getting into trouble with the law forces you to think on your
5044feet. It’s a game. They use their crazy rules and end-around strategies
5045to put you away, and you use your wits to find a way out. Those of
5046us who have spent long stretches of time outside of the law know
5047that accumulating a long rap sheet can be tricky and complicated.
5048Sitting in jail is one thing, but fighting off serious crimes you didn’t
5049commit or watching charges stack up against you requires a level
5050head. The ultimate price in life is your personal freedom.
5051Once when I was small boy I was home alone when two cops
5052came to the house and banged on the door. They said they were
5053looking for me. I hesitated for a minute, then let them in. They
5054wanted to know if my name was Ralph. I nodded my head. Nobody
5055in the neighborhood or at school ever called me Ralph, but evidently
5056somebody had told the police a kid named Ralph had set fire to a
5057house in the neighborhood. It was another Ralph, and while I knew
5058exactly who they were looking for, I just shrugged my shoulders
5059and gave them the silent treatment. Even then I never felt the urge
5060to rat on anybody, especially to the cops.
5061When you play the game of law and order, sometimes the shit
5062stacks so high you need wings to stay above it all. Being a Hell’s
5063Angel, I’ve been involved in a lot of criminal scrapes; Clint Eastwood
5064couldn’t make up half the shit I’ve been through. Even the most
5065routine bust can light the fuse for something more serious down the
5066road.
5067Take my first marijuana bust, for example.
5068In 1963 I lived in a small house on Arthur Street in Oakland. My
5069girlfriend at the time had just moved in with me from Vallejo, and
5070a friend named Gus Pimental (who’s dead now) also stayed at my
5071house, renting a room. One day Gus sold a stash of grass to a drug
5072agent in Oakland, who followed him home. The cops, armed with
5073a warrant, burst into the house, having no idea it was my pad. They
5074were surprised to see me there. Since I had already had a few hassles
5075with the Oakland cops, some of them looked familiar.
5076“Hey, Sonny!” one of them said after they broke down the door.
5077“What are you doing here?”
5078“I live here, man. What the hell are you doing here?”
5079The cops were relatively cool about the whole thing. They grabbed
5080Gus in his room and found a couple pounds of grass. I honestly had
5081no idea the pot was there. Had I known, I probably wouldn’t have
5082let Gus deal out of my place; it was a stupid thing to do, especially
5083in those days when the cops were so uptight about pot. Considering
5084the circumstances, the cops were okay with my girlfriend and me.
5085If they didn’t find anything else in the house, they said, they weren’t
5086going to bust us, since they found all the grass in Gus’s room.
5087Well, almost.
5088Going through my girlfriend’s suitcase, they found another half
5089ounce of grass. The cops told me that either the two of us would be
5090arrested or I could go it alone. I chose to take the beef for both of us.
5091I went downtown and took the rap.
5092There was no fucking around with a narcotics beef in ’63; marijuana
5093at the time was five to life. When I was found guilty for possession,
5094the law stated that I had to be sentenced to five years to life.
5095I figured I’d be officially sentenced but would get the time suspended
5096on probation. Oddly, I wasn’t officially given a prison sentence. The
5097judge instead pounded the gavel: “I hereby sentence you to six
5098months in the county jail and six months probation.”
5099The six months probation ran concurrent with the jail time. In
5100other words, if I didn’t fuck up and got out in four months and
5101twenty days (a six-month sentence with good behavior), I could be
5102off probation in the same amount of time—four months and twenty
5103days. By law and procedure, that order should have been read aloud
5104to me in court and put into the record to make sure I understood
5105that a felony grass charge was going on my rap sheet despite the
5106reduced sentence. That stupid marijuana bust proved to be a pain
5107in 1963, but it would save my bacon nine years later.
5108In 1968 I used to spend a lot of time hanging out with Tiny Walters.
5109It was during the time when cocaine was my drug of choice, and I
5110started using so much it got me into a lot of trouble. When I didn’t
5111come home nights, odds were I was usually out riding and doing
5112130 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5113blow with Tiny. We could be gone several days at a time, and when
5114Sharon would start to worry, she’d tune in to the police radio to see
5115if I’d been arrested or shot. Sure enough, one night Sharon heard on
5116the radio about me and Tiny getting pulled over by the cops and
5117there wasn’t a damn thing she could do but listen to the cops talk
5118about it on the shortwave. With cocaine, fast cars, and motorcycles,
5119I was clearly out of control, and it was one scrape after another with
5120the cops.
5121With the coke came the guns. Hell’s Angels have always been accused
5122of stockpiling guns. Lots of Americans—especially Hell’s
5123Angels—love guns. While I was in the Army I was taught to love
5124guns.
5125I kept a small collection before the feds passed a crime bill restricting
5126felons like me from stockpiling firearms in our homes. I was
5127caught in a gray area when the law was passed in 1968. I had that
5128damned felony arrest for marijuana, and according to the law, if you
5129could have received a sentence of one year or more—whether you
5130received it or not—and you were found guilty, your right to bear
5131arms was restricted. As a convicted felon, owning guns became a
5132major no-no in the state of California.
5133I was raided at my home in June of 1968. The feds confiscated
5134a.30/30 commemorative Theodore Roosevelt rifle, and my favorite,
5135an AR-15, the hottest rifle on the market, a real collector’s item. The
5136Oakland Police Department ended up buying twenty-five of them
5137after seeing mine. After that the state police raided my house and
5138took my Mossberg shotgun, something any red-blooded average
5139American should have for home protection.
5140Based on the new laws at the time, I honestly didn’t know
5141whether I could or couldn’t own a gun. When I went in to add to
5142my collection, there was no resistance at the neighborhood gun store.
5143I signed off on all the forms with absolutely no idea that I could no
5144longer legally own guns. The feds eventually hit me on three
5145weapons charges.
5146The cops were only beginning to play hardball with me concerning
5147my guns. For the next few years my Golf Links neighborhood was
5148under constant surveillance, with cops on the lookout for gun-toting
5149Hell’s Angels like myself. They were hoping they could find something
5150that would stick once and for all. Government agents managed
5151to turn an ex–San Jose member into an informant, and he sang to
5152the cops that I had a huge stash of grass in my house. When they
5153Hell’s Angel / 131
5154raided Golf Links, the cops found no bags of grass for sale in my
5155house. Instead they found two lousy fucking joints.
5156Then things took a bizarre turn.
5157As I was being busted for the two joints, a bodybuilder guy I knew
5158named Don walked through the front gate into my yard with a
5159briefcase. The police were also busy raiding Fat Freddie’s house
5160across the street. Man, Golf Links Road was crawling with cops, and
5161as Don came to the door, he saw what was going down and turned
5162and ran. Don looked so clean-cut that the cops across the street
5163thought he was another policeman, but when he did the cut-andrun,
5164one cop from across the street ran over to see what was going
5165on. As Don slipped around the back of the house, he threw the
5166briefcase into my garage. The cops immediately tackled and arrested
5167him. They brought Don into the house in handcuffs with the confiscated
5168suitcase, containing half a pound of heroin and six ounces of
5169cocaine.
5170“Look what we found,” the cops said to me, and they charged me
5171with possession of his drugs too.
5172The walls were closing in. I had all sorts of charges hanging over
5173my head. Just as I was scheduled to appear in federal court on the
5174gun charges, my attorney pulled me aside and told me he had a big
5175problem defending me on the federal beefs (as opposed to state and
5176local ones). He said he didn’t feel confident he could adequately
5177defend me and I could be looking at some serious prison time.
5178Shit. With no attorney and a court date breathing down my neck,
5179I did what I had to do: I decided to jump bail, find a federal attorney,
5180and ponder my next move…
5181As a fugitive.
5182While I was on the run, two Drug Enforcement Agency men were
5183robbed by a couple of wise guys that the agents claimed were Hell’s
5184Angels. According to the DEA, although they weren’t wearing death
5185head patches, one of them had some kind of skull tattoo on his arm.
5186It turned out the DEA had staged a drug buy with these two con
5187men, but instead of their netting them, the two supposed Hell’s
5188Angels turned the tables and stole the agents’ guns, badges, and
5189stash of marked bills.
5190The DEA was plenty pissed off and righteously embarrassed that
5191their agents got done in and robbed. They were convinced I was in
5192on it, so the DEA set up another surveillance team in front of my
5193house—parked across the street—hoping to trap these clowns,
5194thinking they might catch them coming out of my house with a load
5195132 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5196of grass, drugs, or money. Of course, it wasn’t going to happen, because
5197these two knuckleheads weren’t even Hell’s Angels. Since I
5198was a fugitive jumping bail on my own federal gun charges, I was
5199used to seeing lazy-assed cops parked outside my house. I had
5200enough trouble of my own without these assholes drawing heat.
5201The DEA had a burr up their ass over these guys, so they drove
5202over to Deacon’s house, broke down the door, knocked over his
5203bike, and wrecked his drum set. While the feds were ransacking
5204Deacon’s place, I ditched the two agents parked in front of my house,
5205waited awhile, then slipped over to Deacon’s, figuring that since the
5206DEA had already been over there, I was safe. Wrong move, Sonny.
5207The Oakland cops came knocking on Deacon’s door, so I jammed
5208out the back way, jumped the fence, and tripped and fell as I scaled
5209over. An Oakland cop in hot pursuit followed me over the wall. He
5210drew his gun and pointed it at my forehead. Flat on my back, I
5211already had my gun drawn, pointed back at him. We motherfucked
5212each other and things got tense until we both holstered our pieces.
5213It turned out they weren’t looking for me anyway. They wanted the
5214two who robbed the DEA agents. We put our guns away and sat
5215down and talked—rather they talked and I listened. Based on what
5216they told me about the heist and how they described these two
5217characters, I figured out fairly quickly who these phony Hell’s Angels
5218were.
5219Once the cops left, I went out and rounded up both guys. We
5220roughed them up pretty damned bad. We stuck their hands in vises
5221and beat them senseless with bullwhips and mallets. After they
5222handed over the money, IDs, and badges to us, we let them go. One
5223of the guys was beaten up so badly the cops didn’t even bother arresting
5224him when they finally caught them. I took the badges and
5225money and gave them to an Oakland cop I knew, who, in turn, gave
5226the booty back to the DEA. Technically, we weren’t cooperating with
5227the cops. These two guys were passing themselves off as Hell’s Angels
5228and they got beat up for that. Plus, when we gave the Oakland
5229cops back the DEA badges, in return, they gave us back a club
5230member’s revoked driver’s license.
5231After Altamont, life was one criminal cluster fuck after another.
5232Sharon nagged me about too much club business on my shoulders.
5233I was taking on way too much. She felt the members treated me almost
5234like a god. I could do no wrong. I was totally crazed on cocaine,
5235Hell’s Angel / 133
5236but because of my high standing in the club as president, nobody
5237flagged me like I did the other members when I helped pass the noneedle
5238rule. I snorted so much coke I didn’t know what I was doing
5239from one moment to the next.
5240During one weekend coke binge at the Brookdale clubhouse, I
5241wanted to see how long I could stay up. I managed nine days and
5242went absolutely nuts. After that, I knew I had lost control. Although
5243it was a very popular social drug, I had serious doubts about my
5244use. I spent a couple of weekends by myself attempting to self-detox,
5245but no go. I had a real nose problem.
5246One night I was out riding in a beat-up Cadillac on Skyline
5247Boulevard in the wooded Oakland hills with two other members.
5248We were following some other Angels driving a hopped-up Pontiac
5249when two park rangers in a patrol car pulled in between us. After
5250a mile, they noticed that the Pontiac was riding low in the back and
5251suspected some poaching in the parklands. They signaled the Pontiac
5252to pull over, but instead of pulling over, the car took off, and the
5253rangers followed in pursuit.
5254The rangers and the Pontiac left our Cadillac in the dust. Both cars
5255were so far ahead of us that when they turned off the main road into
5256the fog, we missed the turn. Turning around to catch up, we drove
5257by and saw the Pontiac wrecked by the side of the road. The rangers
5258had shot a tire out, and after a sharp turn, the Pontiac rolled over,
5259and the rangers called for backup. Everybody in the car jumped out
5260and ran. When the cops opened the trunk of the abandoned Pontiac,
5261they found two dudes tied up, one with his throat cut from the spurs
5262of the other guy’s boot. We knew them as prospects being hazed
5263into the club. A small arsenal of weapons was also found in the
5264Pontiac.
5265With our own guns stashed in the Cadillac, we wasted no time
5266and hauled ass past the downed Pontiac. Lights flashing and sirens
5267blazing, another cop car on the scene took off after us. In a fuckedup
5268frenzy, we decided to throw our weapons out the window. I had
5269an ammo clip on my belt, so I undid the belt, laid it down on the
5270floor, took off the clip, and chucked it out the window. Unfortunately,
5271before pulling over, my buddy took my belt—a Hell’s Angel
5272buckle with my fucking name on it—and threw it out of the car.
5273Dumb move. As the cops saw my belt and the weapons flying out
5274the window, they stopped to collect the stuff. Then the cops put two
5275134 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5276and two together: Hell’s Angels driving a speeding Pontiac with the
5277two prospects tied up in the trunk; more Hell’s Angels following in
5278a funky Cadillac. Something was up. We were immediately busted.
5279The cops took the two prospects who were in the trunk to Highland
5280Hospital. The guy whose throat was cut turned out to be a fugitive,
5281so he gave the hospital a phony name. They bought his story
5282and checked him in. He then split from the hospital, slipped out the
5283back, and made his way to a friend’s house several blocks away.
5284Knocking on the door, and still bleeding badly, he passed out on
5285the front step. Completely freaked out, his friend called an ambulance,
5286which brought him right back to Highland Hospital. By then
5287the cops had found out he was a fugitive.
5288I was arrested and charged with kidnapping and bodily harm
5289along with a couple more weapons charges. The kidnapping was a
5290capital offense (and a possible death-penalty beef), so we were
5291thrown in county without bail. While we were in jail, the United
5292States Supreme Court knocked out California’s death penalty. Judge
5293Lionel Wilson (who later became a longtime mayor of Oakland)
5294granted us bail.
5295By February of 1972, there were more and more outstanding bench
5296warrants for Oakland Hell’s Angels. A few days after we were released
5297on bail, two more Oakland members got into a murder beef
5298with a guy named Bradley Parkhurst. Parkhurt’s spleen was ruptured
5299after being kicked in. According to what I heard, when he was introduced
5300he did all these crazy hand-jive gestures. When one of the
5301Angels told him to “shake hands like a white man,” Parkhurst came
5302back with a swift “Fuck you.” He was stomped to the floor and his
5303enlarged spleen popped. After our guys left, his friends showed up
5304and found him unconscious. Thinking he was loaded on reds, they
5305probably fixed him with some crank and dumped him off at the
5306emergency ward, where he soon died.
5307The newspaper headlines screamed HELL’S ANGELS almost every
5308day in the fall of 1972. It was chaos in our house. Sharon had broken
5309her leg in a motorcycle accident on an Oakland freeway in late
5310summer and then was busted for illegal possession of
5311methamphetamine. In September, two Angels picked up five-to-life
5312prison terms for the death of Bradley Parkhurst. In late September,
5313Tiny, one of the stars of the 1965 VDC antiwar demonstration, was
5314reported missing by his wife after a sudden disappearance. She
5315called the police and freaked out. Tiny was never seen or heard from
5316Hell’s Angel / 135
5317again. We had already lost Terry the Tramp to a drug overdose after
5318the release of Hell’s Angels ’69.
5319But of all the murder and mayhem that went down, none matched
5320what came down next—a triple murder trial, AKA the Agero bathtub
5321murder, one of the longest-running criminal trials in Oakland’s judicial
5322history. Of course, I was dragged right into the middle of the
5323whole ordeal.
5324On Sunday morning, May 21, 1972, three men were shot to death
5325in a house on Sol Street in San Leandro. The three dead men, all in
5326their twenties, were identified as Kelly Patrick Smith, Willard
5327Thomas, and Gary Kemp. Kemp lived across the street and frequently
5328hung out with Thomas and Smith. FBI agents on the scene found
5329three guns in Kemp’s apartment, guns that had been reported stolen
5330from another state. Their bodies were discovered at 6:35 P.M.;
5331neighbors said they saw a thirty-five-year-old man with long hair
5332and a dark-haired female about twenty-five years old leaving the
5333house Sunday morning at about 9:30, a half hour before pathologists
5334figured the three men died. In addition to the mystery man and
5335woman, police wanted to question Thomas and Smith’s roommate
5336on Sol Street, Richard Rounder (not his real name).
5337That same Sunday, a few miles away, Severo Agero, a Cuban national,
5338was shot to death execution-style in a house in the Oakland
5339Hills. Agero was found barefoot and fully clothed in the bathtub.
5340Police traced Agero’s last fixed address to McAllen, Texas. The
5341perp(s) doused the Oakland Hills house with gasoline and set fire
5342to the kitchen. Police called it homicide and an arson job. Time of
5343death was estimated at 11:30 A.M., about two hours after the triple
5344murders occurred in nearby San Leandro.
5345According to the papers, the two small-caliber guns used in the
5346triple slaying in San Leandro were also used in the Oakland bathtub
5347slaying. Police also found out that Agero associated with Kemp on
5348some dope deals.
5349While I had never met Willard Thomas, Kelly Smith, or Severo
5350Agero, I knew Richard Rounder and his friend Gary Kemp. At the
5351time, I was selling small amounts of heroin. I would buy a quarter
5352ounce of smack from Kemp, then cut it to make an ounce of really
5353smart street dope. I was also printing up fake driver’s licenses for
5354my friends who had lost their licenses.
5355As part of the dope deals, I was making phony IDs and driver’s
5356licenses for Kemp and the two other guys, Kelly Smith and Willard
5357Thomas. A few nights before, a friend of Kemp’s had brought me a
5358136 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5359stack of Polaroid portraits along with all the relevant ID information.
5360Since I was in the gun biz with the cops, there were also pictures of
5361weapons Kemp’s friend had for sale. In order to make the IDs, I
5362maintained a secret darkroom in my house, built into the side of a
5363closet. Inside I kept all of the pictures Kemp’s friend gave me.
5364Rounder knew about my darkroom too.
5365The Sunday night the police discovered the shooting victims, I
5366was at Golf Links sleeping when somebody dropped off Rounder
5367at my home. Three Oakland club guys—Gary Popkin, Sergey (pronounced
5368Sir-Gay) Walton, and Whitey Smith—were also at the house
5369when Rounder stopped in for a while. It got late and Rounder needed
5370a lift home, so we all jumped into Gary’s car to drop Rounder off at
5371his house on Sol Street. When we drove up to his neighborhood,
5372Rounder’s entire street was blocked off. There were fucking cops
5373everywhere. I got nervous and told Gary to keep on driving.
5374We headed over to Kenny Owen’s house on Bartlett Avenue in
5375Oakland. I jumped out of the car and went inside to see Kenny, who
5376immediately asked me, “Chief, did you hear what happened to
5377Rounder?” Kenny knew he was a friend of mine.
5378“Tell me,” I said.
5379“He just got murdered.”
5380I laughed. “Bullshit. He’s out in the car.”
5381Kenny insisted, “No! Rounder’s mother just called and told us he
5382was murdered.”
5383“Kenny, how the hell can he be murdered when he’s right outside
5384in my fucking car?”
5385I went out to the car and brought Rounder into the house.
5386“There’s cops all over your house and your mom is convinced
5387you’ve been killed.”
5388So now we knew people had been killed on Sol Street, although
5389we weren’t exactly sure who, and more important, why. I made
5390Rounder call his mother. I dialed the number and handed him the
5391phone. It bothered me that he was so hesitant.
5392“Tell your mother you’re alive and you’re all right, you dumb
5393fuck!”
5394There were now three dead guys in his house, and we all knew
5395the cops would want to question him.
5396“One thing, man. Don’t tell the cops you were with me,” I told
5397Rounder. If he mentioned me, then I figured the cops would want
5398to talk to me. Since I had kidnapping and illegal-weapons charges
5399hanging over my head, I didn’t need to talk to any fucking cops
5400Hell’s Angel / 137
5401about nothing. Rounder was pretty shook up, not knowing what to
5402do.
5403Two days later, the cops picked up Rounder to question him about
5404the killing of Severo Agero. The cops concluded that Agero was
5405supposedly shot with the same gun as the people in the house on
5406Sol Street.
5407I was home sleeping when the murder occurred, and I figured
5408that Rounder probably wasn’t involved in the Agero bathtub murder
5409either. If Agero was murdered on the same day with the same gun
5410as the trio on Sol Street, and if Rounder was with me, he couldn’t
5411have done it…. Somebody dropped him off, and to this day I don’t
5412know who it was.
5413The cops were getting more and more curious. They wanted to
5414know what Rounder knew about Agero. Rounder claimed he knew
5415nothing, that he had never even been to the house on Mountain
5416Boulevard and that he had no idea who had killed Agero and lit the
5417house on fire. The fire had destroyed all the fingerprint evidence in
5418the house, but the police did find a sack of garbage and beer cans
5419outside the door with prints.
5420Rounder was obviously sweating. He claimed he hadn’t killed
5421Agero. Instead he fingered Whitey, Sergey, Gary, and me and told
5422them we were in the house with him. He said I shot Agero with a
5423pistol with a silencer, disguised in a wig. Hell, he’d even seen smoke
5424coming out of the gun barrel.
5425Not only did I not kill anyone, but also with smokeless cartridges
5426the norm at that time, I knew that there was no proverbial smoking
5427gun.
5428The cops dragged Rounder before a judge, and without putting
5429him under oath and without telling the judge that he’d already
5430spewed different versions of his story, they issued an arrest warrant
5431for Gary, Whitey, Sergey, and me. Rounder became an informant
5432and their potential star witness.
5433On the day Rounder fingered us I had gone to my sister’s daughter’s
5434wedding. When I got home, Sergey and Anita Walton and Gary
5435Popkin came over to visit. Sharon had just finished sewing a patch
5436for one of our members. I was getting ready to go to bed.
5437Whoever had left the house last hadn’t locked the gate properly.
5438We were all watching an old rerun of Annie Oakley on television
5439when we heard a knock on the door, a pounding noise much louder
5440than usual. Something weird was going on, all right. Thirty-nine
5441138 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5442law enforcement officers outside surrounded the house with bullhorns
5443blaring.
5444“Come on out. We have a warrant.”
5445I had no idea how serious things were getting. I told the cops to
5446slide the warrant under the door. They weren’t exactly amused.
5447When I saw that it was a murder warrant, at first I thought it might
5448have been for someone we beat up. You never knew. I had no clue
5449what was going down, so I opened the door. The cops pointed their
5450guns at us and ordered us to sit on the living-room couch as they
5451began tearing the house apart.
5452Rounder told them about my darkroom, where there were drugs,
5453weapons, and photos of weapons, and now photos of murder victims.
5454It took the cops a while to find it because I had it so well camouflaged.
5455Had Rounder not known about the darkroom, the cops
5456would never have found it. It was neatly paneled and seamlessly
5457hidden. Inside the darkroom were photos of Rounder, Kemp, this
5458dead guy Kelly Patrick Smith, and names and ID stats, as well as
5459pictures of Gary, Sergey, Whitey, myself, and others—an assortment
5460of murdered Sol Street people along with a lot of Hell’s Angels. The
5461cops filed out the back door with everything they found in the house
5462and darkroom. Stuck on the couch, we didn’t know what they were
5463taking out as evidence.
5464I was in deep shit by now, or so it seemed to the cops. Sergey,
5465Anita, Gary, and I were carted off while Sharon was left behind to
5466sort through the mess. I had about two thousand dollars in cash lying
5467around. The law was that if they found cash in the house, they had
5468to count it all in front of you. As the cop tried to count out the money
5469for Sharon, Sharon kept nodding off. For good measure, the cops
5470went through the couch and pulled out more dope and guns. At
5471that point, Sharon was taken off to jail separately and her bail was
5472set at $16,000—pretty steep for 1972.
5473Our plan was to bail Sharon out first. She could work with an investigator
5474and help get the case ready for trial. The rest of us were
5475fucked. Bail was set at $150,000, way too high for any of us to raise
5476the dough to get out. We were booked in Alameda County Jail for
5477the foreseeable future.
5478Since Sharon’s was a drug beef, the cops wanted to sever her from
5479the other four of us in the murder case. At first I refused to let that
5480happen. Although she risked a conviction, we felt it might look
5481better for the other four if she stood trial alongside with us. It could
5482throw the jury off. Sharon was certainly game. Finally, I decided
5483Hell’s Angel / 139
5484against it. The risk was too great. They severed both Sharon’s and
5485my drug case from the murder rap. We would be tried together later
5486for drug possession and sale following the murder case.
5487Prosecutors claimed we’d doused the Oakland house with gasoline
5488after a cocaine deal with Agero went awry. A pilot light in the kitchen
5489set off the explosion and the fire. Yet none of us had any burn marks
5490on our bodies. According to Rounder’s testimony, Agero kept cocaine
5491in a blue suitcase. An identical blue suitcase turned up at my house
5492when we were raided and arrested.
5493Then things took an even stranger turn with a fifth killing! It became
5494the prosecution’s motive. A woman was found murdered—her
5495body had been stuffed inside the trunk of an abandoned car. The
5496press later reported that the dead woman was Sergey Walton’s
5497cousin! In the case against Sergey, Whitey, Gary, and me, the prosecutors
5498claimed a motive for the Agero murder was related to a $90,000
5499cocaine sale and the triple murder was a Hell’s Angels revenge
5500killing in reaction to the woman’s slaying. All of the stories Rounder
5501told the police happened three, four, and five days after the original
5502four murders. We were in custody before we even learned of the
5503fifth death. While the newspapers intimated that we killed the three
5504guys on Sol Street as revenge, to this day I don’t even know if it was
5505true that the murdered girl was actually Sergey’s cousin.
5506Before the trial began I thought about my defense. What did I do?
5507I was heavily involved, I was a Hell’s Angel, and they were gonna
5508get me for something. I decided to tell the jury that I dealt heroin,
5509but killed nobody.
5510The trial was a circus right from the start. By trying us together,
5511the district attorney’s office figured it would make us look more
5512threatening to the jury—a scary pack of killers.
5513An informant in the county jail claimed I had written some notes
5514to Sergey that could possibly damage our case. My lawyer leaned
5515over and asked me why I hadn’t told him about any notes. Actually,
5516I had written only one note to Sergey. But the prosecutor had a stack
5517of notes inches thick. When we examined the notes, I noticed they
5518weren’t even in my handwriting.
5519The one note in my handwriting had to do with the guns we traded
5520to some Oakland police. I testified that we traded the guns with the
5521hope of getting reduced bail for Angels in jail.
5522Although a police witness denied a concrete arrangement, the
5523judge was still pissed off when he found out about our gun deals
5524with the cops. No court, he said, should grant bail under such cir-
5525140 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5526cumstances, and he wanted to know who in law enforcement was
5527involved.
5528Another government witness was so scared he was literally
5529shaking on the stand. The judge looked down from the bench and
5530asked, “Son, are you scared?”
5531“Your honor, I’m scared to death.”
5532“Have you been threatened by anybody in this courtroom?” The
5533judge looked over at us four Hell’s Angels.
5534“Yes sir, I’ve been threatened.”
5535“Threatened by who?”
5536“By a sergeant at the sheriff’s department, your honor. If I don’t
5537say exactly what he wants me to say, he told me I’ll end up in prison
5538for the rest of my life.”
5539The judge took the guy off the stand.
5540The trial proceeded for four months, misfire after mishap. They
5541never found the actual murder weapon, but identified it as a pistol
5542built in England for the CIA with a left-hand-threaded barrel, apparently
5543a rare gun. Instead of the bullet spinning out through the barrel
5544clockwise, it spun out counterclockwise. Rather than introduce the
5545actual murder weapon into evidence, the prosecution wrote to the
5546Smithsonian Institution, which shipped out a copy of the gun to
5547show the jury. I never owned such a gun.
5548Other circumstantial evidence was the blue suitcase, which Kemp’s
5549friend had used to bring dope over to my house. They claimed I had
5550a key that matched the keys on the Agero body that could open the
5551suitcase. My attorney brought in dozens of keys that also opened
5552the blue suitcase. He argued that somebody in the courtroom probably
5553had keys on their person that could open it too. The jury seemed
5554convinced.
5555When the jury finally went off to deliberate, they took an initial
5556vote to see where everyone stood, and immediately found us innocent.
5557They stayed out for another few days discussing the case before
5558emerging with the final verdict. They probably thought that if they
5559found us innocent too fast, we could be retried.
5560Gary, Whitey, Sergey, and I were found not guilty of murder.
5561When I was pronounced not guilty, I wiped tears of relief from my
5562eyes and personally thanked the jurors. The judge was visibly angry.
5563The prosecution was so pissed off about the murder acquittal they
5564were out for blood. Since a large part of my defense included candid
5565admissions of what trouble I’d been up to during my cocaine years,
5566after the acquittal they immediately went after me based on my
5567Hell’s Angel / 141
5568drug-dealing admissions on the stand. The judge took on my drug
5569trial immediately.
5570I knew I was in serious shit. Man, I had a lot of stuff pending, a
5571laundry list of beefs. You about needed a calculator to add it all up.
5572I now had to stand trial for drug charges as well as the car chase
5573kidnapping case. On top of that, I was recharged by the feds on the
5574three gun charges. I was fucking boxed in. It was time for Let’s Make
5575a Deal, Sonny Barger style. Here are the sentences and the deals we
5576brokered. Talk about complicated.
5577I was found guilty of possession for sale of thirty-seven grams of
5578heroin, which carried five to fifteen years in California. With my
5579marijuana prior from 1963 (possession of nineteen joints), I was
5580bumped up to ten to life, which meant I had to do a minimum of
5581ten years before I would be allowed a parole hearing. Possession of
5582a gram of cocaine carried a six-month-to-five-years sentence, but
5583with the same marijuana prior, that was expanded to five to fifteen
5584years, with a requirement that one serve the five before parole.
5585After I was found guilty on the drug charges the judge ran the
5586heroin, marijuana, Seconal, and cocaine beefs at a grand total sentence
5587of fifteen to life. The kidnapping charge was busted down to
5588false imprisonment, and federal and state gun charges were reduced
5589to two-year sentences running concurrently—that is, the charges
5590were stacked on top of the others as opposed to my having to serve
5591each separate sentence one after another.
5592The feds, thinking I was a goner and would never see the open
5593road on a motorcycle again, went along with the concurrent sentences.
5594In their minds, I would have to serve fifteen fucking years
5595before my first parole board hearing. I was told that the earliest I
5596could expect to be released was after serving thirty years—in the
5597year 2002.
5598They really thought they had me. The law enforcement community
5599royally patted itself on the back and the ass in 1973. They celebrated
5600the news that I, the founder of the Oakland Hell’s Angels Motorcycle
5601Club, was going to prison and would probably spend the rest of my
5602miserable life in a maximum security cell. Word spread quickly that
5603I was up the river for good. Chances were I would spend the rest of
5604the century locked up. For the first time in my life, instead of county
5605jail, I was headed for the state lockup.
5606142 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
560711
5608LOCKED UP
5609AND LOW DOWN—
5610ANGELS ON ICE
5611The first time I ever got thrown in jail was in 1957. I was on my
5612motorcycle leaving a party in Alameda headed back to Oakland and
5613I was pretty drunk. I hit a parked car. The guy whose car I hit was
5614an okay dude. He came out of the house trying to help me, but unfortunately,
5615I was so drunk, I blamed him for parking his car where
5616I could hit it!
5617I woke up the next morning in the can.
5618I’ve only been drunk like that three or four times in my life, and
5619each time it’s been a bad experience. I was sitting in my cell the next
5620morning and a cop came in and asked, “Hey, are you Sonny and do
5621you have a sister named Shirley?”
5622“Yes.”
5623He stuck me inside a puke-green-colored room with a phone.
5624“Here, call your sister.”
5625Several times the night before, Shirley had called the jailhouse
5626and the desk people told her they couldn’t bring me down to the
5627phone. I was too drunk to make any sense anyway.
5628When I was arrested, the cops hauled my bike away and impounded
5629it. With only a few bucks to spare, Shirley knew to bail out the
5630bike first, and leave me in jail. She knew that once I sobered up, I’d
5631eventually get out.
5632I was released after a couple of days, and I ended up in front of a
5633judge on a drunk-driving beef and a firsthand lesson on how nutty
5634the courts can be. The guy just ahead of me was in the Navy and
5635was fighting a similar charge. He pled guilty. The judge handed
5636down a suspended sentence, then let him go. Hell, I figured I’d get
5637the same treatment, so I went ahead and pled guilty too. I wasn’t so
5638lucky; I got ninety days and a $250 fine. The judge suspended sixty
5639days toward probation, but I still had to do the thirty. They were
5640supposed to haul my sorry ass to Santa Rita.
5641Santa Rita was not too far from Oakland, where the suburbs are
5642now, off old Highway 50, now Interstate 580. It was part of the
5643Alameda County Jail system, a minimum-security operation housing
5644both male and female prisoners. It’s best known as the destination
5645for students busted on the UC Berkeley campus during the Free
5646Speech Movement riots. A lot of Hell’s Angels have also passed
5647through Santa Rita’s doors.
5648On my way to Santa Rita, we stopped at the Alameda County
5649Courthouse in Oakland, where, after a cop fuckup, I spent two days
5650in a special county jailhouse unit. They didn’t usually keep someone
5651like me—a first offender—in such a facility. But there I was, an
5652eighteen-year-old in a four-man cell with two other dudes, both
5653charged with double homicides. One was a black guy who was on
5654his way to the gas chamber. He had killed his girlfriend and her
5655boyfriend. The two killers asked me what I was in for. When I told
5656them about my drunk driving ticket, they didn’t believe me. That’s
5657what I mean about a nutty system.
5658Fifteen years later, in 1972, I ended up at the very same jail complex
5659in Alameda County. I was in for the Agero murder, and there
5660were two other guys in my cell in for murder raps as well.
5661Then they brought in this kid about eighteen years old. I asked
5662him what he was in for. He had stolen his girlfriend’s mother’s
5663credit card and taken off to Hawaii. He asked me what I was in for.
5664“Murder,” I told him.
5665“Murder?”
5666Just like me earlier, this kid did a double take and tried to hide
5667that he was scared. In fact, he was so scared, if they had let him go
5668the next day I don’t think he would have ever been in trouble again
5669for the rest of his life. But the judge gave him ninety days observation
5670in Vacaville. I was still in the same jail when he came back three
5671months later a fucking gangster. If only they had let him go, those
5672ninety days of prison wouldn’t have turned him into a thug. But
5673once you’ve been to prison, done your time, and adapted to the
5674system, they can’t scare you anymore.
5675When I finally got to Santa Rita, the captain called me into the
5676office and told me that just because I was a Hell’s Angel, they weren’t
5677going to treat me any different from any other prisoner. So I asked
5678him, “Do you call every prisoner in here to tell him that?” He said,
5679144 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5680“No.” “Well then,” I said, “you’re treating me different right out the
5681gate.” That pissed him off.
5682My first jail term at Santa Rita wasn’t so bad. I worked in the
5683motor pool, and since I knew about bikes, I serviced the motorized
5684lawn mowers. The system didn’t turn me into a gangster because I
5685was already pretty set in my ways; I just wanted to ride motorcycles
5686and have fun. Still, in 1957, being in jail marked me with the straight
5687world. But I was riding motorcycles with the freewheelers, the kind
5688of guys who worked a little and earned just enough to have a good
5689time. I was running around with guys who couldn’t give a fuck what
5690anybody else thought of them, let alone whether or not I’d been to
5691jail.
5692I’d been in and out of jail for lots of things, but jail had never
5693shaken me. It wasn’t until I was sentenced to prison after admitting
5694to selling drugs during the Agero trial that the prison system swallowed
5695me up. I found the prospect of spending the rest of my life
5696in prison a tough, though not impossible, pill to swallow.
5697After conviction and sentencing, I was transferred to Vacaville
5698Correctional Facility. Vacaville is a prison “guidance center,” a
5699California Medical Facility stopping point. If you’re from Northern
5700California, that’s where they classify you and decide which facility
5701they’ll send you to next.
5702For some reason, Vacaville housed more “girls” than any other
5703joint in California. Although I was thirty-two years old, I did a double
5704take when I first saw a bunch of transvestites locked up there. Man,
5705I’d thought I had seen it all, but these guys looked exactly like women.
5706It was too weird.
5707I was prepared to take whatever punches they threw at me. I
5708considered myself a tough bird. Being in prison isn’t the worst thing
5709in the world. They can lock you up, but they can’t take away the
5710freedom in your mind. My mind could adjust to anything. I couldn’t
5711sit around crying, missing my bike. Besides, you never knew what
5712might happen. One day you might be doing life, the next day you
5713might be free. I knew how to fight in court just like I did in the biker
5714bars.
5715Then I ended up in Folsom Prison.
5716They call Folsom “the Warehouse.” If you’re stuck in Folsom
5717Prison, it’s usually because you’re in serious trouble. Practically
5718everybody in Folsom is doing life and hard time, and inmates rarely,
5719Hell’s Angel / 145
5720if ever, are paroled out early. If you’re doing only five or ten years,
5721chances are you worked your way through other penal systems and
5722no other prison would take you. Because they wanted to maintain
5723the notoriety of Folsom, the state prison establishment dubbed it
5724“the Last Stop.”
5725Folsom is California’s second-oldest prison, originally built on
5726land furnished by the railroad. Its original granite walls are worldfamous,
5727surrounding five general population cells. Its location was
5728selected because of the amount of native rock in the area, which the
5729early inmates broke into small pieces for the wall’s construction.
5730The American River not only offers a water supply but serves as a
5731natural boundary. The prison was originally designed to hold “inmates
5732serving long sentences, habitual criminals, and incorrigibles.”
5733Folsom’s best-known industry is its license plate factory.
5734I was now a confirmed fifteen-to-lifer in the California state prison
5735system. I hung in Vacaville for a ninety-day stretch, during which
5736I was in seventeen-hour lockup. I was president of the Hell’s Angels;
5737I was headed for Folsom’s maximum security.
5738During my first week in Folsom, the indictments continued to roll
5739in. The feds indicted me on income tax evasion and three more gun
5740charges. I pled guilty and made a deal, and the judge offered to run
5741those extra sentences concurrent with my state prison term, which
5742the federal prosecutors also agreed to. If I served a certain amount
5743of years on the state crimes, that would take care of my federal beefs
5744simultaneously. In the long run, that turned out to be a big break
5745for me. The feds don’t usually go for that kind of arrangement, but
5746they figured I was in for good. All my guilty pleas saved them a lot
5747of court time.
5748Up until Folsom, I’d never done a day of prison in my life. Only
5749county jail. In county I was in a cell twenty-four hours a day, seven
5750days a week. To me, prison had to be better than county time. I’d
5751been in the Army, so prison became just another experience full of
5752rules and commands. Being a Hell’s Angel was a heavy part of my
5753prison life. The state of California rode tough on bike clubs, so I
5754probably knew a hundred inmates in Folsom and there were probably
5755fifty to seventy-five hard-core bike riders inside at any one time,
5756and we stuck together.
5757The security level of a prison defines the movements of its inmates.
5758Prisoners in San Quentin are out of their cells at different intervals
5759throughout the day. Folsom had no night movement, zero. At eight
5760146 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5761o’clock in the morning you could be out on the yard, but by three
5762in the afternoon it was lockup, and that marked the end of your day.
5763Folsom was the only maximum-security prison in the state at the
5764time. San Quentin, although it was a prison, wasn’t a max, though
5765they had other ways of dealing with screw-ups. If you were a
5766troublemaker at Q, they’d keep you inside your cell by welding the
5767door shut. Months later, maybe they’d grind it open.
5768I mostly hung out with the motorcycle riders in the joint. Out of
5769all the bike riders, the most Hell’s Angels that were at Folsom at any
5770one time was five or six of us. Having other Hell’s Angels inside
5771helped a lot. You hate to see your brothers inside, and you’re glad
5772to see them go home, but it’s fun having them there. We’d see each
5773other every day, except during lockdowns. There was Fu, Marvin,
5774Grubby Glen, Whitey, and me. Doug the Thug was in and out,
5775shipped back and forth from San Quentin. Other bikers like Billy
5776Maggot and Brutus also came from San Quentin. It was called “bus
5777therapy.” When there were problems—race hassles, drugs, violence,
5778whatever—in San Quentin, they’d grab everybody and ship ’em
5779out, keeping their actual location in bureaucratic limbo. “Bus therapy”
5780was another name for moving the problem rather than solving
5781it.
5782Motorcycle riders consisted of both club members and regular
5783riders. There were lots of clubs inside: Satan Slaves, Gypsy Jokers;
5784whatever club that was around had someone inside. In prison, different
5785club members knew it was time to get along. In prison, we
5786didn’t have rival clubs.
5787After three o’clock in the afternoon, the only time you were let
5788out of your cell was when they needed you to be somewhere. Even
5789then you were under escort, since nobody was allowed on the yard
5790alone after three o’clock.
5791When I first got to Folsom, there was a big confrontation between
5792whites and blacks on the yard. The bullets started flying. I didn’t
5793know who or what the fuck they were shooting at, so I hit the dirt,
5794hoping I wouldn’t get shot. I soon learned. When you see two opposing
5795groups separated on the yard, and if they start walking toward
5796each other, either jump into one of the groups or get on the fucking
5797ground.
5798Anybody out on the yard at night alone was shot. If you ran in
5799the yard, you were shot. If you fought in the yard, both of you were
5800shot, no warning. When shit happened in Folsom, they’d kill you
5801Hell’s Angel / 147
5802on the spot, then sort things out later. It was part of the joint’s meanass
5803rep.
5804In 1973, you still couldn’t have Playboy magazines. No televisions
5805were allowed. Small radios with earphones were okay as long as
5806they were battery-operated. In One Building, where I lived, there
5807was no hot water. Every morning you were issued hot water in a
5808bucket to shave with.
5809By the summer of 1975, things began to relax a little. Dress codes
5810and magazine restrictions were loosened, and even TVs were allowed.
5811Well! You won’t believe this: Long hair and mustaches are in
5812at Folsom. I sure wish my hair would grow faster, but I know
5813one thing for sure: no more haircuts while I’m here!!
5814—7/8/75 letter to Sharon
5815Because I had been the president of the Hell’s Angels, the cops
5816treated me different. They talked to me a little nicer. There was a
5817rule that no more than five people could hang out as a group. One
5818time we were on the yard and there were eight or ten of us lying on
5819the ground, shooting the shit. The cop came over and took all our
5820ID cards. I got in the cop’s face a little bit about it. He eventually
5821came back and give us all our cards back.
5822A friend of mine worked at the detail office, where the cons and
5823the staff conducted business. He asked me if I knew why we got our
5824ID cards back so fast. I learned later that the cops were ordered not
5825to confront me in front of other inmates on the yard. Supposedly
5826because of my “influence” with other prisoners—I could start a riot.
5827I guess you could say that even though I was playing it cool, I was
5828still a leader of sorts.
5829Once in the hobby shop, I made a silver club ring. I was wearing
5830it on the yard when one of the gun towers spotted a glint of metal
5831on my person. He radioed down for the cops to grab me. Rather
5832than confront me on the yard, they called me into the detail office
5833and searched me for a knife. They wanted to take the ring, but I refused
5834to give it up without a receipt. The only person who could
5835give me a receipt was the captain, so they would have to write me
5836up for an infraction for wearing a club ring. Later I took it up as a
5837grievance in front of a staff hearing. My case was they sold me the
5838stuff, let me make it in the hobby shop, and there was nothing in
5839the regulations preventing me from wearing it. Rather than destroy
5840148 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5841it, they would keep it with my personal property until my release.
5842I felt I’d won at least one battle.
5843I never had to piss in a bottle until I got to Folsom, even though
5844I was jailed in county on drug charges. They claimed they administered
5845urine tests randomly, but my name seemed to come up at
5846least twice and sometimes four times per month. Hell, I didn’t care,
5847I was clean. I kicked my cocaine habit cold turkey in county. If they
5848wanted to keep testing me, fuck it, that only meant somebody else
5849inside got away being dirty.
5850Race problems in Folsom weren’t as bad as in San Quentin and
5851Soledad. There may have been a few scrapes here and there, but
5852everybody was doing life or long stretches, making do and getting
5853along. We served time minding our own business. There were
5854groups: white gangs, Mexican gangs, black gangs, and bike riders;
5855groups like the Aryan Brotherhood, La Familia, and the Black
5856Guerrilla Family (BGF). While I had friends in every group, unfortunately
5857in prison it all comes down to race and you have to go with
5858your own. That’s the problem; you can’t stay neutral.
5859I handled the everyday boredom of prison by reading. I learned
5860how to type and play the guitar. I had a single cell to myself the
5861whole time I was inside. My attitude was, if you incarcerated me,
5862you took care of me. When prison regs permitted men’s families to
5863bring them shoes and clothes from home, I insisted on wearing the
5864sloppy clothes that the system furnished me. While most of the
5865other prisoners’ shoes were spit-shined military-style, I wore my
5866brown scuffed-up shoes from the institution.
5867Breakfast was at six o’clock in the morning. Then it was back to
5868your cell. At eight o’clock, they racked the gates. Guys working in
5869the license plate factory reported in. You needed minimum custody
5870status to work outside in the yard or out in the front grounds. There
5871weren’t a lot of gigs available, and to work a paying job, you needed
5872a pay number, which I never had the whole time I was in Folsom. I
5873didn’t need one.
5874My luck was that I knew an old convict called Zeke.
5875I met Zeke in county and we got along great. Zeke was a hardcore
5876fucking criminal. The last time I saw anything on him was on
5877the television show America’s Most Wanted. He was on the run again.
5878Zeke was in and out of the system quite a bit, but when I got to
5879Folsom, there he was.
5880Zeke gave me a quick matchbook education on how to live and
5881exist in the big house. He went to the clerk and set me up with the
5882Hell’s Angel / 149
5883job of jobs: working on the trash truck. Rather than being cooped
5884inside stamping out plates, making stop signs, doing time in the tool
5885and die, or working the metal shop, I spent time outside, a primo
5886situation, especially within the tense restraints of Folsom. It was the
5887coolest gig on the grounds, and somebody had to do it. It might as
5888well be Zeke and me.
5889Each day everybody took the litter out of their cells. Then it was
5890the job of the “tier-tenders” to clean up the front of the tier and pile
5891up the trash. Then another set of guys threw the piles of litter into
5892large bins—three feet wide and eight feet long—rolling them out
5893for the trash truck. There were also fifty-five-gallon containers, which
5894the large bins were emptied into. Once the trash truck pulled into
5895the yard, Zeke and I would lift the fifty-five-gallon drums up and
5896into the truck. The guys on the truck would empty the drums and
5897hand them back down to us. That was it. Our gig was done in
5898minutes.
5899The thing about trash truck detail was that it had perks. During
5900rainy-day lockups or if the fog rolled in, everybody was locked down
5901unless, like us, you worked outside with a “fog clearance.” Thanks
5902to my fog clearance, I could still go to the weight yard and do my
5903exercises after loading the truck.
5904Perks meant a lot in Folsom Prison. In the summertime, during
5905droughts, showers were kept to a minimum. But because I worked
5906trash truck detail, when I was through with my ten-minute job, I got
5907to take a shower. After a while, I earned a pretty good clearance.
5908Another bike rider friend of mine, Scottie the Treeleaper, was sent
5909to Folsom. He was a well-known armed robber and used to rob
5910people in Golden Gate Park during the Summer of Love. Scottie
5911would sit up on a tree branch and when anybody walked by, he
5912would jump down out of the tree and steal their money. I got Scottie
5913permission to work the trash truck detail with me.
5914When the death penalty got overturned in California, ninety percent
5915of those on death row ended up in Folsom, usually in the general
5916population. I actually found murderers to be okay people. Like
5917two black dudes named Death Row Slim and Motormouth. They
5918were both pretty nice guys, even though they killed a convict in
5919Folsom, a prisoner who was probably one of the toughest convicts—
5920another black—in the prison system. He was a notorious informant
5921and a homosexual. He would spit in people’s faces, saying
5922if he was a fucking rat, what the fuck were they going to do about
5923it? He would get stabbed, take the knife away, beat up the perp, and
5924150 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
5925carry him into the detail office and rat him out. He was one bad
5926motherfucker. He was so hyper, he used to mow the lawn running.
5927But he disrespected Slim and Motormouth, so they waited behind
5928a doorway one day with baseball bats. They broke his fucking knees
5929and beat him to death. They wound up on death row, and when the
5930death penalty was overturned, Slim and Motormouth ended up back
5931in Folsom. They both worked with me on the garbage truck and we
5932became good friends.
5933Because I was a veteran, I still had VA rights for extra education
5934benefits. Volunteer teachers from the Cordova Adult School District
5935were brought in to instruct prisoners, technically (I felt, anyway)
5936making us eligible for GI benefits. So I applied for GI Bill benefits
5937and the state of California fought vigorously against me. I won. I
5938received $350 per month in prison to go to school. I sent the money
5939to Sharon, who was struggling on the outside.
5940When it came time to sign up for school, the high school equivalency
5941class was filled, while the elementary school was still wide
5942open. I progressed from the fourth grade through junior college in
5943two years—eventually gaining my AA degree from the Sacramento
5944City College system—while getting my GI benefits! Life could have
5945been a heck of a lot worse.
5946This coming week I’ll have finished my U.S. History, U.S.
5947Government, and English 1-A classes. I don’t think I got less
5948than a B in any of them but won’t know for sure until the end
5949of the week. I’ll let you know when I receive my grades. I’m
5950going to take California History, Cal. Government, and English
59511-B for the next set of classes. I guess I’m coming along all right
5952in the classroom.
5953The guitar books you sent are helping me a lot, too. The Dylan
5954book was a little too heavy for me at the present stage of playing
5955I’m in, but will come in handy later. The other two were just
5956right. I’ve learned a few of the songs and how to play a little
5957as a result of having them.
5958—1/2/75 letter to Sharon
5959Like I said, Sharon struggled hard on the outside just to get by.
5960Since she was considered my partner in crime, her visitation requests
5961were routinely turned down. I had a few bucks set aside for her, but
5962the money soon ran out, so Sharon did odd jobs and cleaned motel
5963rooms at a place my friend owned—anything to keep going. One
5964Hell’s Angel / 151
5965time when the phone company shut off the telephone, the guys from
5966the club installed a pay phone at the house.
5967You know what? I watched the Miss America Contest the other
5968night, as I have every year since I’ve been here. It is really too
5969bad that I interrupted your career as I haven’t yet seen a girl in
5970any of the contests that you couldn’t beat, hands down!!! The
5971postcard of you posing for the Santa Cruz advertisement puts
5972every one of the contestants to shame.
5973—5/19/75 letter to Sharon
5974Prison is a very, very noisy place. The noise level is always up.
5975It’s when it gets quiet that you know something’s either going to
5976happen or something just did. County jails. City jails. Prisons. Every
5977jail I’ve been in sounds exactly the same: a combination of machinery
5978running, people talking, noise traveling through the ventilation
5979system, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. When that
5980stops or if the pitch changes, and the human voices are gone but the
5981machinery is still running, look out. Everybody knows something’s
5982about to pop.
5983In 1977 somebody managed to sneak a gun onto the grounds. It
5984was almost like the movies. They used a six-year-old kid to help get
5985the piece inside. A clerk helped run the front gate when supply
5986trucks came in through the front gate to the canteen for deliveries,
5987which were unloaded inside, a short distance away from the visiting
5988area. Cons were never allowed near the delivery trucks, but a visitor
5989carrying a pistol sent the kid over to the idling truck with the gun.
5990Since he was a little kid and nobody was paying attention, he managed
5991to sneak underneath the truck and lodge the gun under the
5992chassis. Once inside, the kid ran back under the truck and grabbed
5993the gun.
5994The hot piece was passed from one inmate to another until one
5995guy, who had killed a couple of highway patrolmen, took possession.
5996After killing two policemen, he knew he was never going to get out
5997of Folsom. One day during the count he told a guard, “I’ve got a
5998gun in here and I want to surrender.”
5999The guard blew his whistle and the screws stormed in with. 30/30
6000rifles. He was a no-good motherfucker, but he was set up for a
6001transfer out of state, no longer safe inside the California system.
6002What he left behind was a lockdown and absolute chaos for the rest
6003of us.
6004The lockdown procedure went down full-tilt and the cops went
6005152 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6006through every bunk in the prison, every scrap of paper inside each
6007and every cell. They threw tons and tons of paper and trash away,
6008and of course somebody had to load the trash truck.
6009I’ve been getting outside for two or three hours each morning
6010during lockdown. They take me and Scottie the Treeleaper out
6011each morning at 8:00 a.m. to load the trash truck, but it don’t
6012get here until 10:00 or 11:00 a.m., so we get to lay on the grass,
6013soaking up the sunshine until it arrives. It is really nice to get
6014out of the cell, even for a few hours. They even feed us lunch
6015because we are outside workers. Nobody else gets fed a lunch
6016during lockdown. I’m also getting a lot of guitar practice during
6017the lockdown.
6018—7/20/77 letter to Sharon
6019It was a warm summer day and the prison was in an uproar. The
6020commissary was closed; nobody had privileges for two weeks. After
6021trash detail, Scottie and I were out on the lawn. I saw the warden
6022walking toward us with a group of state officials from Sacramento.
6023The gun incident was a major hassle, as the screws were mad as
6024motherfucking hornets, looking for anybody to step out of line. As
6025the officials toured the grounds, here we were lying out in the sun,
6026eating barbecued beef sandwiches. I acted like I didn’t see the warden
6027and spoke out loudly:
6028“Yeah, and when I write my fucking book about the 1977 lockdown
6029it’ll be about how they had us in solitary confinement,
6030stretched out on the racks, beating the shit out of us to find out if
6031there’s any more guns…”
6032The warden stopped and looked over at me.
6033“And you know, Barger, they’re probably going to believe it too.”
6034Twenty-one months after I entered Folsom, Sharon was finally
6035permitted to visit me. She got into trouble immediately when the
6036guards found a handcuff key on her key chain. Actually she used a
6037set of handcuffs to lock up her bike. Shirley also got in trouble because
6038of an old trunk key on her key chain. The cops figured it might
6039open a set of leg irons. Sharon’s visiting room privileges were suspended.
6040In 1976, Folsom Prison started up a conjugal visits program. The
6041waiting list was very, very long. Finally there was an opening on
6042the schedule. Sharon was living with her brother in Santa Cruz when
6043Hell’s Angel / 153
6044she received the frantic morning call from my lawyer. Sharon drove
6045a white Econoline van, which doubled as a traveling legal office to
6046help fight my appeal cases. She had a little desk bolted in the back
6047to write up subpoenas and study documents.
6048On the drive to Folsom, Sharon crushed up her Benzedrine tablets,
6049spiked her Coca-Cola, and drank it down before reaching the prison
6050grounds. A piece of sexy lingerie hung on the rearview mirror. The
6051prison maintained a small trailer for the conjugal visits, not exactly
6052honeymoon conditions. While we were together inside, a school bell
6053would go off inside the trailer, which meant I had to go outside for
6054a count by the guards. It was sort of humiliating, but Sharon and I
6055made the most of it and spent an entire weekend together. Afterward,
6056I arranged for her to visit me more often.
6057When Sharon was able to visit again regularly, she would bring
6058messages to ask me what to do about club business. My answer was,
6059“I dunno. I’m in here; you’re out there. Figure it out!” Folsom proved
6060to be an ultimate test for both Sharon and the Oakland club members.
6061I missed over half of the seventies being inside.
6062Sure I thought about escape. I was serving a life sentence. I figured
6063I owed the man five years for what I’d done. Once I got the five years
6064in, I knew I was getting out. I didn’t know when or how, but I knew
6065I’d eventually win. By behaving myself, I worked toward getting
6066my custody lowered. Going in, I was at max custody. Before I left,
6067I was at the lowest custody. By lowering my custody, I could get
6068shipped to a lower-level prison. I could soon be transferred to a
6069minimum-security facility where I just might be able to walk away,
6070Timothy Leary style.
6071But I never had to plan my escape. All I had to do was jiggle the
6072system and soon it would come apart in tiny little pieces.
6073Still pushing on the outside, Shirley and Sharon decided to contact
6074San Francisco’s most famous attorney, Melvin Belli, to try and spring
6075me. They looked up the number in the San Francisco phone book
6076and telephoned his office. A lawyer named Kent Russell worked in
6077the Belli office at the time, and his job was to handle the unusual
6078civil rights and criminal stuff. Belli took one look at the Hell’s Angel
6079info and decided this one was right up Kent’s alley.
6080The fact that I was recharged and sentenced so quickly after
6081beating the Agero murder rap seemed fishy to him. While I was
6082eligible for parole after doing fifteen years of my sentence, that didn’t
6083mean they had to let me out until they were damned good and ready
6084154 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6085or until I finished at least thirty years time. They could hold me into
6086the next century.
6087The entire time I was in Folsom we fought the effect of the
6088marijuana prior. My 1963 felony marijuana beef was the foundation
6089for the rest of my felony convictions. But Russell abandoned the
6090previous tactic of attacking the consecutive sentences I received. We
6091needed another angle to knock out the marijuana prior.
6092Russell did some research, and the records showed no evidence
6093of what’s called a “Boykin-Tahl waiver,” which means that the defendant
6094has to show he understands the consequences of his plea.
6095The court, when it took my plea on the prior, did not read the waiver
6096into the record. Now Russell saw a way to attack the underlying
6097marijuana conviction. When I was convicted of marijuana possession,
6098it represented the prior felony. But in the early seventies, it wasn’t
6099even a misdemeanor. The marijuana conviction was now a weak
6100foundation charge, and the other sentences would soon crumble
6101along with it.
6102With the passage of SB42, California state law banned indeterminate
6103sentences. In response to the public’s call for “tougher” sentencing
6104procedures, Senate Bill 42 was passed calling for “determinate
6105sentences,” meaning judges no longer had the leeway to give five-,
6106ten-, or fifteen-to-life sentences.
6107The prosecutors were in a big-time jam. Possession of nineteen
6108joints was no longer as serious in 1977 as it had been in 1963, so if
6109the federal court eventually removed the marijuana prior, that
6110knocked out the weapons violations, because I was no longer a felon
6111when I had them. Instead of the parole board, I was taken in front
6112of the community release board to be resentenced, as if I were sitting
6113in a courtroom.
6114All my sentences combined now totaled less than the five-plus
6115years I’d already served.
6116The government sensed that we had a compelling legal argument
6117and that we were going to win our appeal to overturn my 1964 grass
6118bust. With little fanfare, the government folded up and pulled out
6119of the case. According to the decree of the community release board,
6120I could be released within 120 days, since my sentence was essentially
6121served. I returned to my cell.
6122An hour later, Lieutenant Buchanan told me I had to report immediately
6123to the prison counselor’s office. While I was there, I asked
6124him if I could call my wife to arrange for some release clothes should
6125I be let go. The counselor told me I didn’t have time. He told me to
6126Hell’s Angel / 155
6127call Sharon now and tell her to be at Folsom by eight o’clock the next
6128morning—by herself—and they would release me.
6129I swallowed hard. In one day, I had just gone from a life sentence
6130to going home the next morning.
6131Normally they shut down all inmate phone calls coming in and
6132out of the prison if something hot—like my release—was going
6133down. As I walked out of the counselor’s office, stunned, an inmate
6134friend of mine named John was pissed off.
6135“I don’t know what’s going on, but some asshole is getting out in
6136the morning, so they won’t let me make my phone call.”
6137It was me.
6138I agreed to be quietly released the next morning—November 3,
61391977—and that Sharon would pick me up alone, minus the roar of
6140a hundred Hell’s Angels on wheels. After my five years in Folsom,
6141I didn’t really mind being released without fanfare. Getting out immediately
6142sure beats counting down another 120 days, the last mile
6143being the toughest.
6144Sharon picked me up in a brand-new Corvette, and she sure looked
6145good. We left Folsom and never came back; it’s considered bad luck
6146among ex-cons to revisit any prison you’ve done time in.
6147All in all, I figure when I’m too old to ride a motorcycle or go to
6148bed with a pretty girl, rather than retire to an old soldiers’ home, I’d
6149just as soon go back to prison. In prison, they treat the old convicts
6150with respect. They buy you cigarettes and ice cream and listen to
6151your stories. That sounds like a helluva lot more fun than playing
6152Scrabble with the geriatrics.
6153When I walked out of Folsom a free man, I could only imagine
6154how pissed off and frustrated the feds were to see me back on the
6155streets riding my motorcycle and wearing my colors. Within a year
6156the federales secretly geared up for round two. They had a brandnew
6157weapon aimed at shutting down the Hell’s Angels MC in one
6158fell swoop. It was called RICO.
6159156 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
616012
6161RICO MY ASS—
6162THE LAW WITH
6163THE FUNNY NAME
6164There once was a cop in the Solano County sheriff’s office named
6165William Zerbe. Working closely with the DEA and the FBI, he took
6166to acting like an FBI agent, sometimes tailing our Oakland members.
6167Zerbe and I never crossed paths, but while working with all his
6168federal friends in February of 1978, Zerbe locked horns with a Hell’s
6169Angel named James “Jim Jim” Brandes. Worried about the dangerous
6170complications stemming from his work, each day Zerbe would come
6171out of his house and walk over and stand at a certain spot to start
6172his car by remote control.
6173Zerbe was one careful cop, except one morning, the day he was
6174on his way to the Solano County court to testify against Jim Jim over
6175drug and weapons charges. He was standing at his usual spot,
6176working the remote. Instead of the car blowing up, there was an
6177explosion near the spot where he stood. Although seriously injured,
6178he barely escaped death.
6179At the same time, down the road in San Jose, a police sergeant
6180named Kroc was also injured by a bomb. Kroc had also arrested Jim
6181Jim.
6182By the spring of 1978 a grand jury investigation was put on the
6183Zerbe bombing. Around this time, I was finishing up four months
6184in county jail for parole violation. I was taken to Solano County to
6185testify before the grand jury. I didn’t know they were interested in
6186the Zerbe bombing. All I knew was the law had sent me somewhere
6187against my will, so when they asked me my name, I told them, “Fuck
6188you.”
6189The DA was angry. Another comment like that, he warned, and
6190I could be “further incarcerated.” I had leg irons with a waist chain,
6191and handcuffs, and I was chained to the chair. Being a Folsom Prison
6192graduate, I asked him, “What are you gonna do, put more chains on
6193me?”
6194Even the fucking DA laughed.
6195They dragged my ass in front of a judge, who ordered me to talk
6196or they would hold me in contempt. I told him my middle name
6197was Contempt and said he had no reason to hold me. I’d been kidnapped
6198out of county jail, my lawyer didn’t know where I was, and
6199I wouldn’t be saying anything, since I didn’t recognize this court.
6200“Stick the whole fucking system up your ass” was my comment.
6201The judge cited me for contempt and had me hauled off to a nearby
6202jail. Word spread that I was in the grand jury room, because there
6203were other club members and friends subpoenaed too. They had
6204seen me chained, led down the hallway into the jury room. The cops
6205still wouldn’t tell my lawyer, Kent Russell, where I was, so he went
6206to another judge to file a missing person report. The next day, I was
6207back in Alameda County Jail with no contempt charge. Officially,
6208I’d never left county jail.
6209While there were never any indictments on the Zerbe bombings,
6210it hit too close to home for law enforcement people to ignore. The
6211state and local cops had been coming down regularly on the Hell’s
6212Angels for drug and weapons charges, and more often than
6213not—armed with our lawyers to battle the system—we walked away.
6214The law was getting pretty frustrated with our cat-and-mouse games.
6215The government was also pissed off that I would not break my
6216association from the club after I got out of jail, but I refused to play
6217their game. Many prison parolees would have bent to the government’s
6218will and erred on the side of caution and kept their distance
6219from a highly publicized group like the Hell’s Angels. But even
6220though I was no longer officially an officer of the Oakland chapter,
6221many people perceived me as being a figurehead of the organization.
6222If a club member went to jail, we tried to find a way to have his kids
6223and family taken care of. The clubhouse was a place to go for
6224Thanksgiving dinner. These were routine aspects of the club that
6225law enforcement didn’t want to think about.
6226Since the cops couldn’t dismantle the club through arrests and
6227trials, the government needed a new way to attack the Hell’s Angels
6228structure as a criminal organization. That way they could get at
6229members who hadn’t committed criminal acts per se, but were
6230merely hanging out with people who had. Since the government
6231was convinced, for instance, that the Hell’s Angels controlled
6232methamphetamine labs and had a direct kick in all the profits, they
6233158 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6234needed a way to bypass traditional conspiracy evidence and just
6235show that being a part of the club was enough to get us.
6236Then came RICO.
6237RICO, which stands for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations,
6238is a federal statute that was part of the Organized Crime
6239Control Act package passed by Congress in 1970. RICO was a variation
6240of traditional conspiracy laws and anticrime legislation that
6241grew from racketeering laws of the 1950s. It came from the complaint
6242that organized crime groups were becoming too profitable and
6243powerful. Law enforcement experts felt that gangs or groups of
6244criminals had become far too dangerous to society and that through
6245their leadership hierarchy and conspiracy tactics, criminals could
6246distribute risk and profit among bosses and their followers.
6247RICO focused not on individual criminals but on federal prosecution
6248of a group of people. In legalese, such a group is called “the
6249enterprise.” Any group—even if it’s a legal organization like a labor
6250union local, a political group, or a motorcycle club—could be labeled
6251as an “enterprise,” targeted by the government.
6252The earliest RICO cases were aimed at Mafia-type organizations,
6253and the federal and state police enforcement bodies banded together
6254with their new powers. An entire law enforcement industry was
6255born.
6256Federal prosecutors, with the help of the FBI, the DEA, and California
6257law enforcement, decided that there was a criminal enterprise
6258called the Hell’s Angels motorcycle “gang” and that the activities
6259of all its members constituted a criminal conspiracy. Under RICO,
6260individual crimes could be combined to show a “pattern of racketeering”
6261that violated state and federal laws. The feds could take past
6262crimes (even if they were already adjudicated) and make a case for
6263group conspiracy charges. Such prosecutions treaded dangerously
6264on double-jeopardy and statute-of-limitations safeguards. Any
6265criminal activities that we would be convicted on under RICO could
6266carry as much as twenty years prison time for each count.
6267One of the local television news reporters called RICO “the law
6268with the funny name.” Now it was the government’s big trump card
6269against us, the Big Red Machine, the Hell’s Angels.
6270A carefully staged mass raid by the feds was originally scheduled
6271for the dawn of June 14, 1979, but, fearing a local leak, the feds moved
6272it up to the previous evening. That’s when the fireworks began.
6273Hell’s Angel / 159
6274Everybody in the club was scheduled to meet at the Oakland
6275clubhouse at eight o’clock on June 13. We were all there to ride to
6276dinner at a restaurant in Alameda to celebrate Michael Malve’s tenth
6277anniversary as an Oakland Hell’s Angel. For everyone to arrive at
6278the clubhouse by eight o’clock meant we’d leave our houses between
6279seven and seven-thirty. As we all got down to the Oakland clubhouse,
6280the cops started hitting our houses. First they kicked in Jim
6281Jim’s glass door. Since they had watched him leave, they already
6282knew there was nobody in the house. The raids were performed in
6283front of the television camera crews for the eleven o’clock news.
6284They put on a valiant show, yelling into the empty house as an agent
6285stuck his boot through Jim Jim’s glass windowpane. It was all staged
6286cops-and-robbers stuff.
6287To this day, the cops swear we were tipped off in advance by the
6288OPD that the raid was coming. But there were no Oakland police
6289officers participating in the raids. In fact, the feds didn’t even notify
6290the Oakland police because they felt we had an informant deep inside
6291the OPD.
6292We got the first phone call while we were waiting at the clubhouse.
6293The feds had raided Sergey Walton’s house. He wasn’t there and he
6294wasn’t with us. Then another call came: they were raiding Mouldy
6295Marvin’s house in front of TV cameras. He was gone too. Soon,
6296everyone began calling home. If the feds answered your phone, you
6297took off. When I called home, nobody answered, so I didn’t take off.
6298Those of us who were left decided to proceed to Malve’s dinner. I
6299had Michael’s ten-year belt buckle and the $700 we had collected
6300for the dinner tucked into my jacket pocket.
6301We only made it about three blocks from the clubhouse when the
6302feds caught up with us. A bunch of marked and unmarked cars
6303swarmed around us. Guys jumped out, some wearing blue jackets
6304with bold yellow type—FBI—on the back. I couldn’t believe how
6305the cops were taking this so seriously, sporting their battle fatigues
6306and flak vests and pointing their weapons at us. We were placed
6307spread-eagle across the chain-link fence with officers posted every
6308few feet aiming shotguns at our backs.
6309“Put your hands in the air and don’t move!”
6310“What the fuck do you want me to do?” I answered. “Not move
6311or put my hands in the air?”
6312The feds were not amused.
6313Sharon and I were handcuffed and shoved into the backseat of a
6314white, unmarked Impala. Instead of going straight to the Federal
6315160 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6316Building in San Francisco, we were driving aimlessly around the
6317Oakland Estuary area. I actually began to think that these motherfuckers
6318might finally have enough balls to kill us. My hands were
6319handcuffed behind my back, and I was trying to figure out how I
6320could move over toward the driver and bite his jugular vein.
6321As I was thinking about whispering my plan to Sharon, the driver
6322turned around and asked, “Hey, Sonny, how do you get to Government
6323Island?”
6324The fucking feds were lost!
6325They eventually brought us to an Alameda Island facility, where
6326they set up a makeshift cop shop to book us. Sharon and I were
6327pulled out of the car and led into an open area that resembled military
6328barracks. The others who had been arrested arrived in groups.
6329They put all of us in chairs against the wall around the perimeter of
6330the room.
6331A bunch of police officers who wore flowered Hawaiian shirts
6332took pictures of the various people in the room—some I hadn’t seen
6333in years, some who used to hang around the club and got pulled in
6334with the rest of us.
6335Everyone was asking me what was up and what we were charged
6336with, but aside from the various charges they had told me when
6337they booked me, I couldn’t figure out why the hell we all were there.
6338After they had fingerprinted everybody and taken a lot more
6339pictures, they moved all of us in one big group across the Bay Bridge
6340to a federal holding cell high atop the San Francisco Federal Courthouse.
6341Men were put on one side, women on the other. We sat there
6342wondering what the fuck was up.
6343The next day the evening news—which we watched on the television
6344in the dayroom—opened with our story, showing the feds and
6345their assault the night before. I hadn’t realized how intense the raid
6346had been, how many Oakland Hell’s Angels houses had been broken
6347into, and how my house had been broken into too. On TV, authorities
6348were shown carrying out boxes of my things as evidence. All of my
6349stuff, flags, posters, plaques, and even gas tanks that had the death
6350head insignia, was being confiscated.
6351The newscasters were accusing the Hell’s Angels of being a
6352criminal organization with me as ringleader. (In reality I wasn’t even
6353an officer of the club anymore and hadn’t been since I was released
6354from Folsom in 1977.) The accusations went on to say that the Hell’s
6355Angels were deep into methamphetamine—manufacturing and
6356dealing speed. We were drug trafficking and also involved with
6357Hell’s Angel / 161
6358prostitution rings. U.S. Attorney G. William Hunter (we used to joke
6359that he was related to Meredith, the victim at Altamont) was interviewed
6360and said, “The club is an umbrella used to perpetuate criminal
6361activity.” Hunter’s allegations went on to include extortion and
6362murder. From the mouth of Jerry Jensen, the regional director for
6363the Drug Enforcement Agency, came: “This operation [referring to
6364the series of arrests the night before] is extremely significant in that
6365it’s not only an indictment of individuals, but it’s an indictment of
6366the organization. The organization of the Hell’s Angels is in business
6367to break the laws of the United States.”
6368The accusations went on and on. We were accused of buying off
6369judges and prosecutors, paying off cops, and supporting a vast network
6370of lawyers and bail bondsmen. We had handbooks listing police
6371officers’ radio frequencies, home phone numbers, their girlfriends’
6372(and boyfriends’) phone numbers, and even unlisted numbers. According
6373to one news anchor, we controlled the supply of
6374methamphetamine and its distribution to the extent that—like the
6375oil companies—we could raise and lower the price based on our
6376stranglehold of the market.
6377When the news was over I realized we were in big trouble. I really
6378didn’t know anything about the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt
6379Organizations laws. I assumed we had all been arrested for blowing
6380up cops and dealing drugs. But this indictment, I was to learn, was
6381different. The government was waging an all-out war to destroy the
6382club once and for all.
6383Wearing my orange jumpsuit, I was interviewed in jail by a television
6384news reporter. “The Hell’s Angels is an organization, a group
6385of people, who get together to ride motorcycles and have fun, go to
6386parties, and do whatever,” I explained. “Just because certain people
6387in the Hell’s Angels have committed crimes in the past does not
6388make the organization a criminal organization.”
6389The dangerous aspect of RICO is how the prosecution can go
6390about proving a “conspiracy of enterprise”—how the members are
6391all partners in crime. Even someone indirectly connected can be
6392pulled in and be connected to the conspiracy. For example, if I sold
6393drugs to one person and let’s say another Angel sold drugs to that
6394person as well and I didn’t even know about it, we would be considered
6395involved in a conspiracy. The government was trying to
6396prove that if one Angel was convicted of, or even if he stood trial
6397for, a murder, we all knew about it and we conspired with him on
6398the murder. They wanted to show—and prove—that we were a
6399162 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6400“gang” involved in criminal activities and that was why we were
6401together. It was a lot of bullshit but it was going to be tricky. A lot
6402of members had committed a lot of random acts of violence over the
6403years. Now was when we were going to really act like a club and
6404stick together. Our First Amendment right to associate was at stake.
6405When the Hell’s Angels went to trial in October of 1979, nobody
6406had ever beaten RICO. Nobody. If you were arrested, it was time to
6407panic, because you were as good as guilty; you couldn’t beat it. The
6408power of a RICO charge generally meant plead guilty and make a
6409deal, fast! The Hell’s Angels were the first to lock arms, stand tall,
6410and go to trial.
6411Our first RICO arrests were based on a number of events—in our
6412case the attempted-murder bombings of Zerbe and Kroc, plus every
6413killing which happened around the club, every drug sale, and even
6414the charges I went to Folsom and did time for. When the government
6415charges you with RICO, they can virtually retry you on anything
6416you’ve ever been arrested for, whether or not you were found guilty.
6417Our RICO case was called United States of America v. Ralph Barger,
6418Jr., et al. (followed by the names of several codefendants). Up until
6419the final weeks before the first raid, I was on top of the list, either
6420by a stroke of alphabetical luck or as a prime leader. Of the original
6421twenty-eight indicted, ten were allowed to plead out on relatively
6422minor charges. One member was arrested with a gun. The deal was
6423that if he pleaded guilty to the gun charge, they’d drop the RICO.
6424We allowed it, since there was no sense in him getting stuck with a
6425forty-year sentence for having a gun.
6426Some of the defendants weren’t Hell’s Angels, including Sharon,
6427Anita Musick, and Burt Stefanson’s wife, Charlene. It was Johnny
6428Angel, Burt, Bobby England, Michael Musick, Al Perryman, Manuel
6429Rubio, and I, all Oakland club members, who stood trial among the
6430eighteen.
6431My bail was set at $1 million, then changed to $2 million. Sharon
6432tried to raise the money from jail; a lot of my friends collectively put
6433up their property. I finally told her to quit worrying about the bail
6434because I knew I wasn’t going to get out. After months and months
6435in jail before trial, I was eventually brought before a magistrate who
6436lowered my bail to $100,000 if I promised not to run around with
6437the club while I was out. I told him to stick his bail up his ass. With
6438all of the Hell’s Angels that were in the county jail, I told him I’d
6439rather go back upstairs and be with them than be out walking. After
6440Hell’s Angel / 163
6441that outburst, the judge told my lawyer, “I knew I shouldn’t have
6442made that offer.”
6443While I was in jail, friends of the club took out a full-page ad in
6444the San Francisco Chronicle warning people about the dangers involving
6445criminal RICO prosecution of the Hell’s Angels. The ad cost
6446ten grand and was done through donations. The government was
6447riding all over our (and consequently your) constitutional rights.
6448They kicked in our doors and windows and hauled us away in
6449handcuffs. Regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum,
6450the ad stated, understand that the government is stripping away
6451your rights in the name of protecting you from so-called subversive
6452groups.
6453We put our lawyers to work, pooling our strategies. Many of the
6454lawyers were scared to death of RICO and contemplated making
6455deals. The government offered us five-year prison terms to avoid
6456trial. But when we held mass legal meetings, we all agreed: nobody
6457pleads guilty and everybody goes to trial. We explained to all the
6458lawyers involved in representing us in the case that nobody was to
6459urge his individual clients to cooperate and make a deal with the
6460feds or speak against any other Hell’s Angel indicted in the case. No
6461lawyer was going to claim his client wasn’t part of the group or try
6462to finger somebody else. As Hell’s Angels we were determined to
6463fight this case and see it through. Either we would win it all or go
6464to prison together.
6465We worked hard preparing our case, keeping up with the status
6466of the motions. I read every shred of paper that came out of the
6467courtroom. I went to court every day there was a session. Occasionally
6468I had problems, even with the other Hell’s Angels on trial. When
6469the judge and federal marshals didn’t want to move all the “in-custodies”
6470on the days when the jury wasn’t there, I still demanded to
6471be present. Sometimes I made the other defendants angry with me
6472by insisting everybody show up for court. We had made a deal and
6473I insisted we all go.
6474The trial soon became a fiasco, and in the midst of it, we tried to
6475have as much fun as we could. With a team of eighteen lawyers and
6476eighteen defendants, a multitier seating system was constructed in
6477the courtroom, and tent cards with names were placed on the various
6478levels of tables. Each lawyer and accused person had to sit in the
6479same place every day, since it was impossible for the judge to
6480memorize everyone’s name.
6481There were so many defendants that an attorney might not hear
6482164 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6483his client’s name mentioned for days. They would sit there for weeks
6484watching the proceedings as if they were at a legal seminar instead
6485of a trial. Then, finally, it would be their turn to dance in front of the
6486jury and cross-examine an informant or a law enforcement agent.
6487A big courtroom was selected, one that was normally used for
6488large assemblies and naturalization ceremonies. If a lawyer had to
6489cross-examine, he or she would have to walk down into the well. It
6490was like being in the Senate. Among the lawyers who spearheaded
6491our defense were Kent Russell, Frank Mangan, Richard Mazer, Alan
6492Kaplan, and Judd Iverson. A team of four assistant U.S. attorneys,
6493headed by Robert Dondero, were our legal adversaries.
6494Expanding metal barriers were put up outside, seats were taken
6495out of the courtroom, and the marshals installed bulletproof partitions,
6496although there was no shield between the defendants and the
6497judge. The windows were covered so nobody could see in from the
6498outside. The government’s security overkill continued. Every
6499morning they marched us through metal detectors right outside the
6500court, and marshals would take each of us aside and search us with
6501metal-sensitive wands. Metal detectors in courtrooms were a rare
6502sight in 1979.
6503Jury summonses were sent out from San Francisco to the Oregon
6504border to potential jurors. Most were let off and excused because of
6505the potential length of the trial. They were also intimidated by our
6506dangerous look. Normally we’d wear civilian clothes to court, but
6507when we really wanted to bring attention to ourselves and piss the
6508judge off, we’d show up in our bright orange prison jumpsuits.
6509During the day, we were held in jail cells on the sixteenth floor,
6510three or four floors above the courtroom. They’d move eight or ten
6511of us at a time before trial, and we’d bounce the elevators up and
6512down until one of the marshals puked. One elevator car broke, falling
6513about a story before the brakes grabbed. We were trapped inside
6514for a few hours when one marshal up from Fresno pleaded, “Could
6515you please not do this? Where I come from, the tallest building is a
6516Fotomat.”
6517Some of the bike chicks would do crazy things to make the guys
6518in jail feel better. When we did time in the Alameda County Jail in
6519downtown Oakland, you could see a certain distance from each tank
6520through a small window. From my cell, I could barely see the front
6521walkway to Laney College. Sharon would take my dog to a certain
6522spot down there and wave. She even had an idea to put a trench
6523coat and a hat on the dog and try to sneak him into the visitors’
6524Hell’s Angel / 165
6525section. Gary Popkin’s girlfriend once rented a rowboat and the girls
6526rowed out to the middle of Lake Merritt, then bared their chests to
6527all their old men who sat staring out the window at them.
6528Although you would certainly never get away with it today, Bobby
6529Durt used to bring a video camera into the visiting area and tape us
6530goofing around in our holding tank. It wasn’t as if he sneaked the
6531camera in. It was a way for everybody to lighten up during some
6532serious and heavy times.
6533The news media headlined our trial THE MOST COMPLEX AND
6534COSTLY TRIAL IN SAN FRANCISCO HISTORY. It was projected to last a
6535long time anyway, but our antics really screwed up the court
6536schedule. Weeks turned into months.
6537When you’re in jail for a long time, you’re supposed to get three
6538hot meals a day. At the beginning of our trial, they would wake us
6539up in the morning and give us a bowl of cold cereal. We would
6540spend all day in court, with sandwiches for lunch. Then when court
6541was over we were brought back to our cells, where our meals of
6542more sandwiches were served on a fucking tin plate, stone cold.
6543After weeks of this, I’d finally had enough.
6544“I want a fucking hot meal at dinnertime, and if you’re going to
6545only give me a lousy fucking sandwich, then I want a bowl of hot
6546soup to go with it.”
6547When they refused, I took to throwing my dinner around my cell,
6548splattering the walls. They shot videos of the walls, showed it to the
6549judge, who warned us that we were lucky we were being fed at all.
6550My argument was if we were going to trial for three days and all
6551they wanted to give us was sandwiches, that would have been okay.
6552But after three months, we needed hot food.
6553Eventually we got soup with our dinner—a small victory, but in
6554jail things like that are important, especially when you’re fighting
6555to stay out of prison for the rest of your life.
6556After a particularly contentious day in court, the judge finally
6557warned me that I had better start acting like a defendant. I told him
6558I would act like a defendant when he started acting like a judge and
6559the district attorney started acting like a real district attorney.
6560“Until then, fuck you.”
6561My lawyer cringed.
6562Someone in the audience clapped, which really made the judge
6563angry.
6564The judge pounded his gavel. “Who did that? I demand to know
6565who clapped.”
6566166 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6567A black bike rider from the Dragons with only one arm raised his
6568hand.
6569Some of the government RICO testimony bordered on the bizarre.
6570One of the prosecutors read a letter that Big Al once wrote to a girl
6571in another prison while he was doing time in Folsom. Big Al is a
6572funny motherfucker. This girl was his blood brother’s girlfriend, but
6573that didn’t stop Albert from trying to pick up on her. He started
6574bullshitting in his letters about having stashed a million bucks.
6575“Baby,” he wrote, “we could have a good time.” He went on to
6576explain all the cool things they were going to buy and places they’d
6577go and the clothes she’d wear. It went on and on. At the end of the
6578letter, it read something like “And to any of you stupid motherfuckers
6579reading this, I’m just funnin’. Signed, Big Al.”
6580That didn’t stop one dumb prosecutor from seriously reading this
6581letter into evidence in front of the jury, who looked at him thinking,
6582Yeah, he’s the stupid motherfucker reading it. Not only that, but
6583when he got to the end of the letter, the prosecutor read, “Signed,
6584Mr. Biggle.”
6585Sometimes at night in the jail, I’d hear Albert yelling, “Chief,
6586Chief, they’re killing me! Help! Help!”
6587The cops would run down to my cell.
6588“Barger, you have to go down there and stop it.”
6589It turned out that a bunch of Angels in the tank were tickling Albert,
6590who was rolling around on the floor, screaming. The cops didn’t
6591know what was going on. I told the deputies to quit bothering me.
6592It was their fucking job.
6593One morning at about five o’clock the jail got deathly quiet, and
6594I mean really, fucking q-u-i-e-t. Usually you’re used to hearing all
6595kinds of talking and yelling, the natural jail ambience. But this time
6596the noise was nonexistent. Then this guy, another inmate—not a
6597Hell’s Angel—shows up at my cell door.
6598“We’ve just taken the jail. You want out?”
6599“No way!” I told him. “And don’t unlock H-Tank either. I don’t
6600care what those guys in there tell you.” That’s how convinced I was
6601that we were winning this fucking RICO case. Jail riot or no jail riot,
6602to me it didn’t matter whether the inmates had taken over or if there
6603Hell’s Angel / 167
6604was a mass escape. We weren’t going to blow our case while we
6605were ahead.
6606Next the escapees dragged a guard down to my cell, kicking and
6607taunting him.
6608“All right, you tough motherfucker. You like to beat people up
6609and kick their asses—take this.”
6610The deputy got a swift kick in the ribs.
6611He was pleading, “Please don’t kill me. I’ve got a wife and kid.”
6612The loose inmates had apparently got some guns inside first, then
6613they held a guard hostage until they got a set of keys, and then they
6614let a bunch of inmates out. I didn’t move, even when the shit was
6615coming down. I lay on my back, head up, listening and relaxing on
6616my cell cot. Then a bunch of guards came running down the corridors
6617and into the hallways, shotguns a-pumping. Everything was on the
6618verge of going crazy. When they passed my cell, they saw me lounging
6619in my bunk and I calmly said, “Good morning. So what’s going
6620on?”
6621One guard looks at me and smiles. “Barger, you’re even smarter
6622than I thought you were.”
6623Back at the trial, it was guns and dope, guns and dope, guns and
6624dope. The government was always wheeling in giant barrels and
6625bins of confiscated guns and illegal drugs. Then a deadpan state
6626agent would provide dry details of each seizure to help establish
6627predicate acts of the cases. We never cared what the state agents
6628said. It was all old news anyway, some cases tried ten years prior.
6629Our lawyers kept asking, “So what? Where’s the connection with
6630the Hell’s Angels as a criminal organization?” There was no proof
6631it was part of club policy, and as much as they tried, the government
6632could not come up with any incriminating minutes from any of our
6633meetings mentioning drugs and guns.
6634The only thing the government did come up with was our nodope-
6635burn rule, back when we printed out our rules and they were
6636leaked to the newspaper. The no-dope-burn rule was something we
6637had come up with that was supposed to keep members honest and
6638straight up. The U.S. attorneys tried to use the old written club law
6639about no dope burns to signify that we were buying drugs as club
6640business, which was extremely flimsy.
6641Another government witness, a DEA chemist, testified that one
6642of us manufactured drugs that were “109 percent pure.” As each
6643168 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6644witness and his testimony went down in flames, the judge warned
6645the government that if they didn’t put more credible witnesses on
6646the stand, he was going to have to throw the case out. It seemed to
6647me that the judge didn’t want the appellate court looking at the
6648videotape that was being made, because it clearly showed some
6649government witnesses with shaky credibility. Halfway through our
6650defense, all of a sudden I felt the press coverage starting to shift over
6651to our side.
6652Sometimes you can tell what the government is about to do—or
6653who they’re about to raid—by what you read in the newspapers or
6654see on the television news. Before our raid, there were lots of stories
6655printed about the Hell’s Angels and our antics with facts supplied
6656not by direct evidence but by informants and “reliable sources.”
6657After a monthlong press campaign, along comes the big raid. As a
6658result, after reading and seeing the “news” stories, the public figures,
6659“Yeah, they finally got them dirty sons of bitches.”
6660It’s certainly no accident when the feds prearrange events and
6661bring the press along to the raids. It all looks good on television; the
6662cops and DAs are doing their jobs, arresting the scum of the world,
6663pleasing an unwary public. The press will often cover dramatic
6664testimony while rarely printing any coverage that rebuts dramatic
6665testimony. That’s why we may seem guilty on television and in the
6666newspapers. The press regularly reports what the rats say, but rarely
6667reports the cross-examination that exposes the inaccuracies of informant
6668testimony with the same energy.
6669After so many unsuccessful government witnesses on the stand,
6670the press began to smell something funny. One television reporter
6671named Mike O’Connor filed a two-part report on the trial for KTVU
6672in Oakland, showing how vulnerable any organization could be if
6673the government went after it and indicted it on RICO.
6674When the government rested their case after having worked
6675through dozens of witnesses, I was set to testify. At first our lawyers
6676did not want me to. Criminal lawyers rarely want their clients to
6677ever take the stand. Kent Russell and Frank Mangan, however, knew
6678I wanted to testify all along. Unlike the government witnesses, I
6679Hell’s Angel / 169
6680would address the jury with an honest and straightforward approach.
6681I held firm: “Fuck yes, I’m taking the stand.”
6682Our lawyers (some of whom were ex-prosecutors) sat me in a
6683room and grilled me and prepared me until I was ready for any
6684question the government could possibly ask. The tension mounted
6685in our defense team, but nothing was going to stop me from going
6686up there and speaking the truth. Our defense team was upset; they
6687felt the government had a weak case and I might only jeopardize
6688things by going on the stand.
6689On the stand I was questioned by my lawyer, attorneys representing
6690my codefendants, and, of course, the government’s prosecutors.
6691A lot of my testimony was based on my personal history, going back
6692to when I was eighteen years old, having founded the Oakland
6693chapter of the club. I denied that the Hell’s Angels had a policy of
6694criminal activity. I stressed that we were more of a club, and less of
6695a gang. We liked to ride motorcycles together, I kept repeating.
6696After five days I walked off the stand and our team realized the
6697show was over. Following my testimony, we never even waged a
6698defense. We veered right into closing arguments. It was now all up
6699to the jury.
6700Some of the final arguments got pretty tricky and far out, because
6701the technicalities of RICO were so confusing. All eighteen lawyers
6702gave a final argument, which made it difficult to keep the jury’s interest.
6703When it was Kent Russell’s turn, he had designed this huge
6704board detailing the supposed drug activities between Sharon and
6705me and a pair of informants. He used a pretty office assistant to flip
6706the charts like an attractive television game-show hostess. By the
6707end, we demonstrated seven conflicting dope deals with seven different
6708stories that nobody could have believed ever happened.
6709After the arguments were heard, the jury was sequestered until
6710they reached a verdict. It wasn’t a lily-white jury by any means. They
6711never seemed to get angry with us. In fact, over the long trial, we
6712all became like a big family. As Hell’s Angels, we behaved relatively
6713well, which contradicted what the jury was supposed to feel inside
6714of a bulletproof courtroom. The jury’s body language day in and
6715day out convinced us that they didn’t see us as the monsters we had
6716been built up to be.
6717In late June of 1980, the jury informed the judge that they were at
6718an impasse in reaching several verdicts. The judge conferred with
6719the lawyers before the other in-custodies and I arrived. The judge
6720wanted to let the jury go. Russell and the team were caught up in a
6721170 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6722stressful situation. Nobody wanted to repeat this yearlong trial ordeal,
6723and usually in criminal law a defense attorney will advise his
6724client that a hung jury can be a positive thing. Without me there to
6725quarterback a decision, Russell and Mangan were in a bind. They
6726asked the judge to send the jury back into deliberations—to the
6727horror of the other defense lawyers.
6728The judge instructed the jury to keep trying. The judge told the
6729jury they couldn’t find me not guilty of the non-RICO crimes unless
6730they found everybody else not guilty as well.
6731The jury came back and acquitted Sharon, Ron Elledge, and me
6732on the RICO charges with a hung jury on the predicate acts. So the
6733judge instructed the jury to X out the not-guiltys on the verdict form
6734for Sharon and me. There were no major racketeering charges levied
6735against us by the jury.
6736The government wouldn’t release me right away. Because of the
6737hung jury, they wanted to retry me along with another set of defendants
6738during round two. Then they said they would release me if I
6739signed a nonassociation with the club.
6740Once again, I refused.
6741On July 2, while I awaited release, Russell spoke to the press. “No
6742Angels have been found guilty of being racketeers. The Hell’s Angels
6743Motorcycle Club has been vindicated. The government failed to
6744prove the club itself is an illegal enterprise.
6745“Conspiracy is easy to prove,” continued Russell, “and the government
6746failed to do it after two years of investigation, millions of
6747dollars, and buying witnesses that we proved lied on the stand.”
6748The legal bills hit both sides hard. Defending ourselves cost us
6749a total of between $1 million and $2 million, while the government
6750spent closer to $3 million to $5 million to prosecute us. At one point
6751I told them if they gave us the five mil, the Hell’s Angels would be
6752good as a group of Christian Boy Scouts and they would never hear
6753from us again. At the time—1979—we were the largest defendant
6754case in the history of the federal government and also the longest
6755RICO criminal trial.
6756The whole ordeal lasted over a year. We were arrested in June of
67571979, the jury was seated in October, and the verdict was delivered
6758in July of 1980. They changed the indictment three times, and the
6759trial lasted nine and a half months.
6760The prosecution was pissed off and wanted to go for round two.
6761Hell’s Angel / 171
6762We staged a press conference to protest the cost and time of this
6763RICO fiasco. Eight Angels were left in jail for the second case, but
6764rather than retry me, they dismissed the predicate acts against me.
6765But Hell’s Angels Burt Stefanson, Alan Passaro, Manuel Rubino,
6766and Ron Elledge were eventually fined and jailed on mostly weapons
6767charges after a smaller second trial. Although I was let go in August
6768of 1980, round two was another big waste of time and money.
6769I probably should never have been included in the original case.
6770As it turned out, they added me in as the guy in the forefront, the
6771guy they wanted to convict. The government gambled. They thought
6772we’d all scatter and rat on each other, which is what had happened
6773in many prior RICO cases that they had prosecuted. Bringing Sharon
6774and myself into the case—especially when we were both found not
6775guilty—helped the rest of the codefendants.
6776After acquittal, I went down to the DMV and picked up a temporary
6777driver’s license. I didn’t want to take any more chances and get
6778pulled over for anything. Here I’d been showcased as the coolest
6779motorcyclist in the country, and I didn’t even have a driver’s license.
6780The news media filmed me riding away on my bike, a free man…a
6781free man with a license.
6782On my first night out of jail, Willie Nelson was playing a big show
6783at the Oakland Coliseum. Deacon and Fu were promoting the show
6784through their own Magoo Productions. The entire club was there. I
6785wore a big cowboy hat and drank from a small whiskey bottle as
6786Willie dedicated “Whiskey River” to Sharon and me. Willie made
6787no bones to the reporters that he was my friend and told the press
6788he was happy to see me finally out of jail.
6789A few months after the whole thing, the news media had another
6790chance to cover the Hell’s Angels when I was invited to a San Francisco
6791restaurant to address a criminal trial lawyers’ association.
6792Normally, the group held luncheons featuring prominent judges or
6793lawyers as guest speakers. I brought Cisco, Deacon, Fu, Mike, and
6794Sharon along for lunch. When we got there, it was a full house and
6795the press was there en masse. One lawyer said, “We haven’t had a
6796turnout like this since F. Lee Bailey came.”
6797Somebody asked me about the recruitment process for new Hell’s
6798Angels. “We don’t recruit,” I answered. “We recognize. When we
6799see somebody that’s us, then they become us.”
6800I spoke to that group of lunchtime lawyers in their coats and ties
6801about RICO. I warned them that the government is never above
6802spreading lies about their targets. “The government gave us a new
6803172 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6804lease on life by charging us. They united us and they looked like
6805fools trying to invent all sorts of conspiracies. Their lies just didn’t
6806work.”
6807Although we beat the case, RICO took its toll on the Hell’s Angels
6808MC. During the trial, we lost over fifty members in California alone.
6809Members who didn’t understand the federal statutes became intimidated,
6810fearing that if they stayed in the club, they might be next on
6811the prosecutor’s list.
6812Anybody who quit the club during RICO was, in my book, a disloyal,
6813no-good chickenshit and not a true brother. I refused to have
6814anything to do with them if they quit. The door swings two ways;
6815you can quit the club honorably, or you can get kicked out dishonorably.
6816The club did let members quit and walk away, but in my
6817eyes every one of those guys who quit then should have been kicked
6818out, as long as loyal friends like Johnny Angel and Big Al Perryman
6819sat in jail with the best of us.
6820What’s the upshot of the RICO trial? I feel that our victory prevented
6821criminal RICO from achieving what the government prosecutors
6822wanted, which was to hog-tie First Amendment rights. In the process
6823the government had plans to put a bunch of unpopular groups in
6824jail and keep people from congregating with whomever they pleased.
6825The criminal RICO side would have certainly gotten out of hand if
6826we hadn’t done what we did and fought back.
6827Hell’s Angel / 173
6828
682913
6830RATS,
6831INFIL-TRAITORS,
6832AND
6833GOVERNMENT
6834INFORMANTS
6835We sat down once and drew up a composite profile of a typical
6836Hell’s Angel rat informant. Most rats are loud-talking bullies who
6837like to push people around and talk tough when the club surrounds
6838them. They thump their chests and yell about how much they love
6839the club and how they’re going to be with us for the rest of their
6840lives. When they do a couple of stupid things and get caught by the
6841cops, rather than fight it out, they rat on their brothers to save their
6842own skins. In an organization like the Hell’s Angels, which is based
6843on brotherhood, freedom, and your word, a rat is the true enemy.
6844Informants always have to be on the fucking winning side.
6845Considering all the time the Hell’s Angels have been around and
6846the number of members we have and have had worldwide, there
6847haven’t been that many defectors. One is too damn many. Assholes
6848like Anthony Tait and George “Baby Huey” Wethern have ratted
6849on the club and written books about it, which really burns my ass.
6850Jim Jim Brandes, the Oakland member who lit the RICO fuse, turned
6851out to be a rat who informed on the club for a few years. When he
6852was finally exposed, Jim Jim hung himself in his cell the night before
6853he was sentenced rather than go back to prison as an informant.
6854Both Wethern and Tait were inducted into the Witness Protection
6855Program. According to what Mafia informants have told me, as a
6856protected witness you’re safe as milk until the cops get tired of
6857babysitting you. Then it’s good luck, fuck off, and go fend for
6858yourself.
6859After shooting his buddy Zorro in the early seventies, George
6860Wethern left the Oakland Hell’s Angels and moved his wife and
6861kids one hundred miles away to the small Northern California town
6862of Ukiah. Even after he left the club, Wethern continued to be a thorn
6863in my side. I had criminal battles of my own to fight. I was in the
6864soup up to my neck. Why did I waste time trying to keep George’s
6865ass out of the joint? What else could possibly go down?
6866Enter Whispering Bill.
6867When Wethern left Oakland in 1972, there was a member named
6868Bill Pieffer, better known in the club as Whispering Bill. Bill had
6869been in the Richmond club before transferring to Oakland and was
6870diagnosed with throat cancer that was so advanced he knew he was
6871going to die soon. Whispering Bill dealt drugs to a guy who owned
6872a large diesel truck, and according to the police reports, the guy
6873owed Bill a huge wad of dough. So the two of them hatched a plan
6874to blow up the diesel truck and collect the insurance to pay Bill off.
6875After the truck blew up, the insurance company got real suspicious.
6876They pressured the guy who owned the rig until he finally
6877broke down and admitted that he owed Pieffer drug money. When
6878they arrested Pieffer, he knew he only had a year, tops, to live.
6879Whispering Bill didn’t want to die in some stinking prison, so he
6880denied his part in the explosion and named me instead. As bad as
6881the cops wanted to believe him, when they continued their investigation
6882his story didn’t match up. It was probably one of the few times
6883the cops actually cleared me of a crime without dragging my ass
6884down to county jail and grilling me first.
6885Whispering Bill finally admitted to what he had done, but in one
6886last desperate maneuver to stay out of jail, he offered the cops another
6887tidbit for a deal. “Let me tell you about these two bodies buried
6888up on George Wethern’s property in Ukiah.”
6889Whispering Bill told the police that two bike riders from Georgia
6890were supposedly buried in Ukiah. According to the newspaper reports
6891I later read—and I didn’t really know any of this
6892firsthand—two bikers were partying in Richmond when one got
6893killed. To keep the act a secret, someone else killed the other guy.
6894After Whispering Bill’s tip, the police descended on George’s
6895Ukiah ranch with bloodhounds and shovels. While searching the
6896house, the cops found a quantity of weed. This put George in a serious
6897bind. The cops told him that a felony grass charge on him and
6898176 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6899his old lady meant that his kids would be sent to foster homes. “You
6900won’t see your wife,” they threatened him. “She’s going to rot in jail
6901along with you, and neither one of you will ever see your kids again.”
6902George panicked and negotiated a secret deal. In exchange for
6903telling them where to find the buried bodies, he would get a lighter
6904sentence. The newspapers up and down California ran two-inch
6905front-page headlines that read HELL’S ANGELS BURIAL GROUND and
6906BODIES FOUND ON UKIAH RANCH.
6907When they arrested George and his wife, I sent Sharon over to
6908help look after their kids, but they treated her as if she were the enemy.
6909Although I thought we were all on the same side, I began to
6910suspect that something was up. I found out Wethern and his family
6911had joined the Witness Protection Program and that both Whispering
6912Bill and George had pointed fingers at me as the guy behind the
6913burials on the ranch.
6914Eventually the case went to court, and with Wethern’s information,
6915a couple of Richmond Hell’s Angels were convicted. They even
6916offered one of them, Rotten Richard, a break if he would implicate
6917me. He wouldn’t do it, and he’s still in prison because of it.
6918Feeling boxed in at county jail and probably guilty about being a
6919fucking rat, George held two sharpened pencils in front of his eyes
6920and drove his head down onto a table, piercing both of his eye
6921sockets. His attempt at suicide failed and George was temporarily
6922blinded.
6923The biggest Hell’s Angels rat of them all, though, was Anthony
6924Tait. Some rats go out on the law enforcement circuit and lecture to
6925police departments about the dangers of “outlaw motorcycle gangs.”
6926Anthony Tait, an “infil-traitor” into the HAMC, tries to picture
6927himself as some hot government commodity who knows more about
6928the innermost secrets of the Hell’s Angels and how we’re run than
6929any other citizen in the world.
6930Tait joined the Alaska chapter in 1982. He ended up as our West
6931Coast rep by the mid-1980s. The club voted him in after he volunteered
6932for the job. He always seemed to have the money to fly down
6933to California or to the East Coast for officers’ meetings. When he
6934became West Coast rep, he bought himself a brand-new bike in Indiana,
6935shipped it out, and stored it on the West Coast. Judging by
6936the way he threw money around, I figured he dealt drugs or some-
6937Hell’s Angel / 177
6938thing. I didn’t know it was the government’s money he was spending.
6939As West Coast rep, Anthony Tait came to my house a lot. He
6940dressed like a tacky drug dealer and wore lots of ivory, gold chains,
6941and rings. Tait rode around on a cream-colored Harley full dresser
6942and wore light-colored cowboy boots so he could be easily picked
6943out of a crowd for police surveillance photos. He usually kept his
6944bike at the Harley shop in Oakland, so when he flew in from Anchorage
6945he would only have to ride a short distance from the airport to
6946the clubhouse.
6947Tait couldn’t handle riding long distances on a motorcycle. He
6948would always get sick and throw up. Once when we traveled on a
6949USA Run together, I remember Tait getting another guy to ride his
6950bike for him. We assumed he was ill for some reason. Looking back,
6951he was probably petrified from riding so fast in the pack. Or maybe
6952he was just scared of motorcycles, period. At the time we didn’t
6953know Tait was a rat working for the federales and just waiting for
6954an excuse to fuck up the club. Tait got his chance when an Alaskan
6955Hell’s Angel named J. C. Webb got himself killed in a bar fight.
6956Before Webb joined Anchorage he was a member of the Outlaws
6957MC in Kentucky. Had we known he was an ex-Outlaw, Webb would
6958never have been voted into the club in the first place. When you
6959bring in a member from one of the big rival clubs, something always
6960fucks up. In J. C. Webb’s case, something major went down.
6961After we held our USA Run in Colorado in August 1986, most of
6962us left the run early and rode straight to Oakland to attend the funeral
6963of a fallen member, Doug “the Thug” Orr. Meanwhile, J. C.
6964Webb and his old lady, Lori, decided to ride off on their own to
6965Kentucky to visit his parents before heading back to Alaska.
6966Webb kept his status as a Hell’s Angel on the down-low, since he
6967was entering Outlaws territory. While drinking in a tavern called
6968Fred’s Broken Spur Bar, Webb met up with a couple of Outlaws
6969from his earlier days. Apparently the three bike riders got into some
6970kind of a beef. Webb’s wife then walked into the bar and sensed a
6971tense situation. The argument continued outside the bar after J.C.
6972had pulled a gun on one of the two Outlaws, a guy named Little
6973Ray Mullen—or Cool Ray, as he was sometimes called. The Outlaws
6974told J.C. to drop his Angels patch on the ground and ride off.
6975“Fuck you,” J.C. said to Cool Ray.
6976Three shots were fired, and one of them hit Webb. The bullet
6977wound was fatal. J.C. tipped over his bike after attempting to start
6978178 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
6979it up, then passed out in the parking lot and died. The Outlaws made
6980their getaway, and Webb’s wife grabbed J.C.’s gun and hid it.
6981I received a call that an Outlaw had just killed a Hell’s Angel, so
6982a few of us flew into Kentucky to investigate. Details were extremely
6983sketchy. Meanwhile the feds, seizing the opportunity, called their
6984man Anthony Tait to get into gear.
6985We still didn’t know at the time that Webb had pulled his gun
6986first. For almost a year, we dealt with the funeral matters and the
6987criminal investigation. Eventually Tait approached me and asked
6988me what the club should do. To be honest, while other club members
6989were pissed, I didn’t share their thirst for revenge. But as always, I
6990made myself available to any member who needed advice. I figured
6991Tait had already taken it upon himself to do something on his own.
6992My response was simple: “If two Outlaws were involved, then shoot
6993two of them and call it even. Shit, it doesn’t matter to me, because
6994you’re never going to get the guys who did it.”
6995Based on the comment I made to Tait, the FBI spread the word
6996that the Outlaws and the Hell’s Angels were close to war. It was far
6997from the truth. Yes, we had personal disputes and all, but it wasn’t
6998a war. The guy who shot Webb eventually pled guilty to what was
6999basically a fair fight. When the smoke started to clear in the investigation,
7000and when we found out Webb had pulled his gun first, I
7001was starting to put it together. It should have been clear what Tait
7002was up to.
7003Tait, meanwhile, traveled across the country, from chapter to
7004chapter. He went to one charter and told them he needed some explosives.
7005Then he hit up another for guns. He bought some speed
7006from some Oakland members. Whenever Tait and I sat down together
7007to discuss club matters he would take his pager off and put it
7008between us on the table. Looking back, I guess that turned out to be
7009his wire.
7010If a big conspiratorial war existed between the Angels and the
7011Outlaws, why did Tait go to individual Hell’s Angels instead of
7012contacting the group as a whole? After all, he was our West Coast
7013representative. I believe the answer is that if he had brought it up
7014as a club issue, nobody would have gone along with it. Since Webb
7015was a fellow Alaskan member, at the very worst somebody from
7016Alaska could have shot one Outlaw and been done with the whole
7017fucking thing.
7018Individuals from various chapters from around the country
7019(Alaska, California, North and South Carolina, and Kentucky) got
7020Hell’s Angel / 179
7021sucked into the government’s trap. By June 1987, the FBI admitted
7022to their rat that they didn’t have enough evidence to arrest me, since
7023I really hadn’t conspired with anybody. I had been telling Tait to do
7024whatever the fuck he felt he had to do all along. Time was running
7025out; the government needed more evidence from Tait to get me.
7026Sharon and I had just gotten back from the drag races in Fremont
7027when Tait showed up at my doorstep one evening. He came into
7028the house and told me he was going to Chicago to blow up the
7029Outlaws’ clubhouse. He had pictures of the Outlaws’ clubhouse
7030with him. As he was leaving, I luckily, or perhaps through instinct,
7031reminded him to take his pictures with him. They could have been
7032used later as evidence against me. He pressed me about his plans
7033in Chicago. He wanted advice, suggestions, something.
7034“If that’s what you gotta do, do it,” I told him.
7035“There might be innocent people there,” he replied.
7036“That’s what they get for hanging around with guys like that.”
7037Then came the final tactic. Tait told me he had registered at a hotel
7038in downtown Oakland, and he asked me to go down and mess up
7039the room for him after he left, to make it look like he’d stayed there.
7040That would be his alibi. The maid could say she made the bed in the
7041morning.
7042“I’ll take care of it,” I said.
7043Tait took off. The FBI planted bugs and cameras inside the hotel
7044room and rented the room across the hall. Problem was, I didn’t go
7045there. Instead, I sent an Oakland club member named Irish O’Farrell
7046to mess up the room and wet the towels.
7047“Look,” I told my good friend Irish, “here’s some money. Take
7048your old lady down there, bring a couple of bottles of wine, order
7049up some room service, and have a good time. Just hang out in the
7050room and then leave.” Irish went along with it. Tait had paid for it.
7051The Outlaws’ clubhouse was never blown up, but I was arrested
7052for conspiracy in interstate bombing. Because I had sent Irish down
7053to the hotel room, he was arrested as a co-conspirator. In another
7054attempt to put me away and destroy the club, the feds decided to
7055try our conspiracy case in Louisville, Kentucky, confident they would
7056be able to convict us there. About thirty-five people, twenty-two of
7057whom were Hell’s Angels, were charged with conspiracy, sparked
7058by the killing of J. C. Webb and based on information Anthony Tait
7059supplied the feds about the supposed bombing. Irish and I were arrested
7060in November of 1987 and taken to San Francisco. The worst
7061charge against us was conspiracy to transport explosives across state
7062180 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7063lines with the intent to kill, maim, or injure people. Usually you can’t
7064be convicted of a federal crime unless it involves interstate commerce.
7065According to the FBI, since the Outlaws’ Chicago clubhouse was a
7066place where members from other states stopped in and stayed
7067overnight, technically the clubhouse was involved in interstate
7068commerce. A bit of a stretch.
7069The whole thing was a fucking joke. I didn’t even bother to fight
7070extradition. I told the magistrate to stick it up her ass and go ahead
7071and send my ass to Kentucky.
7072After five months of trial, of the twenty Hell’s Angels left standing
7073trial, eighteen were found not guilty. That left Irish and me. We were
7074convicted of conspiracy to violate federal law to commit murder.
7075Out on bail, Irish and I returned to California to get our affairs in
7076order. Irish was to turn himself in to a federal maximum security
7077prison in Atlanta; I was to report to a federal penitentiary in Englewood,
7078Colorado.
7079Two weeks before jail time, Irish and I arranged a night for a group
7080of us to hang out and have a final meal together. We got a table at
7081a restaurant and were waiting for Irish when we got a call from his
7082girlfriend.
7083Bad news.
7084Irish had been drinking at a bar all that day and had gotten into
7085a fight with an ex-con he knew. Irish had challenged him to a fight.
7086Evidently they had fought before and the ex-con decided he wasn’t
7087going to let Irish beat him up again. He killed Irish in the parking
7088lot, stabbing him repeatedly in the back, chest, and neck. As Irish
7089lay dying, the ex-con shot him four times in the back with a.25-caliber
7090pistol.
7091As I made my final arrangements to go off to prison, we buried
7092Irish. It felt strange. Another dedicated Hell’s Angel was dead.
7093To this date, visitors to my website, sonnybarger.com, still put up
7094messages like “Fuck Tait” about that asshole rat.
7095I’ll never understand why the cops accommodate these pathetic
7096opportunists. We’ve seen convicted stone-cold murderers get released
7097from jail in exchange for testifying against Hell’s Angels who
7098may be involved in dealing drugs. Where are the government’s
7099priorities? One guy in exchange for his testimony against us was
7100cleared of multiple murder charges (including the killing of a seventy-
7101year-old man during a prison break). Then he was given all of
7102his guns back and paid $100,000 in hundred-dollar bills in a motel
7103Hell’s Angel / 181
7104room the night after he squealed on the stand. Who is worse? The
7105rats themselves or the law enforcement guys footing the bill?
7106Whether it was stiff jail sentences, motorcycle wrecks, or brutal
7107fistfights, like a cat with another life to live, I’ve gotten back up,
7108hopped on my bike, and ridden on. I could handle the hanging
7109judges, informants, and rival bike riders and look them square in
7110the eyes. Then the biggest fight for my life came one day…against
7111an invisible enemy from within my own body.
7112182 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
711314
7114TAZ KICKS
7115THE BIG C
7116I’ve had my share of battles: cops, old ladies, prison, the government,
7117rival clubs, informants. But no battle was bigger than the one
7118I was facing in 1982. My forty-fourth birthday was coming up when
7119it all came down.
7120I went back to Cleveland that year when a club member named
7121Jack was on trial for murdering a member of the Outlaws. I had a
7122bad sore throat throughout the trial, but it was snowing and I figured
7123it was just the lousy winter weather. After Jack’s trial turned up an
7124acquittal, I decided to stick around for another trial in Akron. A
7125Hell’s Angel named Jimmy got hit with a little bit of jail time on a
7126vehicle registration thing, no big deal. The bad part was he was stuck
7127in prison while his lawyer handled his appeal. I came into town to
7128see if there was anything I could do to correct the situation.
7129Akron was Outlaws territory. During Jimmy’s appeal hearing, I
7130stayed at a Hell’s Angel safe house, and I arranged for Sharon to fly
7131out and meet me. She came to the safe house right from the Cleveland
7132airport. As she walked up to the front door, guns poked out of every
7133window. Her first reaction (and a smart one) was to rush inside to
7134avoid being in any possible line of fire. She burst through the front
7135door. I was sitting at the bottom of the stairs, miserable and holding
7136my ear.
7137Sharon was righteously pissed.
7138“Which chick am I supposed to be angry with for not feeding you
7139and letting you get sick like this?” she asked.
7140Our flight back to California a week later only made my throat
7141and ear problems worse. I spent five months feeling like shit. No
7142more traveling for a while, I thought. I had some huge growth
7143blocking my throat, and I refused to see a doctor about it. I drank
7144two bottles of Chloraseptic every day just so I could speak. I would
7145lose my voice after club and presidents’ meetings. Sharon stayed
7146out of my way and kept busy around the house, trying to keep the
7147new puppy I brought back with us quiet and out of my way. My
7148mood swings, as a result of the way I was feeling, were becoming
7149dangerous.
7150For example, we had a new bathroom cabinet made and Sharon
7151asked a couple of members to come over to the house and install it.
7152When they were through, I went in to take a look and decided it was
7153too close to the pipes. In a blind rage, I jumped up, grabbed a hatchet
7154out of the garage, and chopped up the whole cabinet and threw it
7155on the front porch.
7156Another time Sharon came home and found all the kitchen
7157drawers turned upside down on the floor. Silverware and kitchen
7158stuff was strewn all over the place. I had opened a drawer to look
7159for something and found things were a little messy and disorganized.
7160I emptied them Angels-style. Sharon had those nice ceramic covers
7161for the stove burners. In the same fit of rage I took a sledgehammer
7162to them, busting them into pieces. Then I went ahead and destroyed
7163the stove while I was at it.
7164Something terrible was eating at me. I was one bad Angel from
7165Hell, fit to be hog-tied and impossible to live with. I still refused to
7166go to the doctors because I was sure that eventually I would get
7167better. The truth was I was only getting worse.
7168A pharmacist friend of Sharon’s let her read through his medical
7169books. They conferred and both suspected I might have throat cancer.
7170After all, I had smoked Camels for thirty years straight, three packs
7171a day, no filters. Sharon tried to speak with some doctors on the
7172phone.
7173“He won’t go to the doctor,” she told them. “Can’t you at least
7174talk to him on the phone and listen to his voice?”
7175They thought she was nuts. “Just bring him in,” they told her.
7176Sharon tried everything to get me to just see a doctor. She brought
7177club members like Jim Jim and Tom over to try and convince me to
7178go to the doctor. While they meant well, they would say crazy stuff
7179to me like “Well, you know, Sonny, we’re going to be really mad if
7180you end up with cancer.” Then they would leave, which only made
7181me feel worse.
7182Sharon and her friend Linda finally opened the phone book and
7183picked out an ear, nose, and throat specialist close to the house and
7184made arrangements to take me in, even if they had to trick me into
7185going. On the day of the appointment, Sharon got dolled up in a
7186sexy little outfit, then told me to get dressed because her friend Linda
7187184 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7188would be pulling up in her Cadillac any minute to take us somewhere.
7189Her friend Linda was a fox and Sharon was looking ready,
7190willing, and able, so I got up and put some clothes on—real fast.
7191I thought we were headed to her friend’s house for a little action
7192when we pulled into a doctor’s office parking lot. Since we were
7193already there, I gave in. When I saw the look on the face of the doctor
7194who was looking down my throat, I immediately knew I had a
7195problem. I had been in deep denial. Like, who the fuck wants to be
7196sick?
7197The next day they took me to an outpatient clinic, where the doctor
7198performed a biopsy. I had to wait two weeks for the results. Two
7199long fucking weeks.
7200My worst fears were confirmed.
7201The doctor told me I was in the late stages of cancer of the larynx.
7202That was why my ear hurt so much. The cancer had progressed
7203pretty far and had apparently already spread to the top and bottom
7204of my throat.
7205“Why didn’t you see a doctor earlier?” he asked.
7206“I suspected something serious,” I confessed, “but my idea of
7207cancer was that it was worse to have an operation, causing it to
7208spread to the rest of my insides. Then I would surely die.”
7209The doctor referred me to the University of California Medical
7210Center in San Francisco, which had a ten-doctor board serving as
7211tumor specialists. My doctor at UCSF moved quickly. My situa-tion
7212was so grave they made immediate arrangements for an operation,
7213explaining I could pay on a sliding scale, depending on what I could
7214afford. Sharon explained that I was a veteran, which made me ineligible
7215for their sliding scale. They told her I needed to work through
7216the Veterans Administration instead. The operation would cost
7217$100,000, so they stopped everything and transferred my files to the
7218Fort Miley VA hospital in San Francisco’s Presidio district.
7219When Sharon broke the news to me that I was being transferred
7220to a VA hospital, I argued against it. My idea of a VA hospital was
7221a dark building with amputees sitting around in wheelchairs, a place
7222where old soldiers came to die. Sharon met with the doctors at Fort
7223Miley and warned the hospital staff to beware of my nasty behavior.
7224I left UCSF and visited the VA hospital. After another biopsy, they
7225suggested I just go home for a couple days. Cool out and have a
7226good time.
7227“Should I quit smoking?”
7228“Don’t bother now.”
7229Hell’s Angel / 185
7230From the looks of things, I was expected to die within a few weeks.
7231I got really pissed off. Here I am about to die, with little or no time
7232to go out and kill everybody in the world I didn’t like.
7233When I checked into Fort Miley, the news had leaked to the media.
7234HELL’S ANGEL SONNY BARGER HAS CANCER. The feds were already
7235snooping around the hospital trying to get into the administration
7236center to gather as much information as they could about me. Television
7237reporters showed up with camera crews. Finally the director
7238of the hospital had had enough and told the media and the feds to
7239get out. The VA respected my privacy and closed my files to the
7240outside.
7241My doctor explained the operating procedure and said that if he
7242had to take out my larynx, then he was going to try like hell to preserve
7243the muscles in my neck. He told me that after I recovered—if
7244I recovered—I probably wouldn’t be able to raise my arm over my
7245head, much less ride a fucking motorcycle, because of the damage
7246to the muscles in my throat and shoulders. With a throat like
7247mine—badly damaged by advanced cancer—my doctor figured the
7248lungs were probably long gone too. When they operate on throat
7249cancer victims, they rip everything out of one side, sew you back
7250up, wait a week, and then proceed to rip out the other side.
7251I spoke with the dietitian before the operation, “Look,” I said to
7252her, “I’m a big motherfucker, a weight lifter, and you aren’t feeding
7253me enough.” She put me on double portions. When I walked into
7254the patient area to call Sharon on the pay phone, there was an angry
7255patient yelling into the phone. He was pissed.
7256“The food is inedible, the doctors are intolerable, and when I hang
7257up this phone, I’m leaving. You better be out front to pick me up!”
7258He was flying off the handle, just like I had done the last few months.
7259Watching this guy trying to rip the pay phone off the wall, I
7260thought, man, it’s all in how you look at life. I was suddenly confident
7261with my doctors. They’re going to give me twice the food, they’re
7262treating me with respect, and they’re going to do the best they could.
7263That’s when I decided I was going to beat this monster, the Big C.
7264I worried about being placed under anesthesia, concerned about
7265being all the way under. Some government agent might try to sneak
7266into my room and question me. I got the Oakland Hell’s Angels
7267taking turns guarding my room, twenty-four hours a day, two
7268members at a time. The Angels got along well with hospital security
7269and succeeded in keeping the police, reporters, and government
7270officials away. My medical files were never circulated through the
7271186 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7272hospital. If anybody needed to pick up my files, somebody would
7273have to hand-carry them to each examination appointment.
7274I was smoking a Camel as they wheeled me into the operating
7275room. They kept me under the knife for eight and a half hours, intricately
7276cutting around every muscle in my neck just like they
7277promised, leaving as much as they could intact, removing my vocal
7278cords and lymph nodes. It was my lymph nodes that saved my life;
7279they did their job and absorbed the invading cancer cells. What the
7280doctors thought was a tumor was actually a swollen lymph node.
7281The cancer didn’t get to the rest of my body. My lungs were still in
7282good shape.
7283After the operation, I laid in my hospital bed, unable to talk. Lurch
7284was stationed outside my door on guard duty, so I wrote him a note
7285on a pad of paper.
7286“Hi, Lurch, how are you doing?”
7287Lurch looked down at the pad. Then he licked the end of the
7288pencil and wrote something and handed the pad back to me.
7289“Fine, Chief.” Even on paper, Lurch is a man of few words.
7290I wrote back, “I can hear. I just can’t talk!”
7291Once they cut out the cancer, they sent me back over to UCSF
7292to their radiation treatment center. The radiation office was no walk
7293in the park. I saw little children in the waiting room so fucked up
7294their heads were bald, with X’s tattooed, marking the spot where
7295they were going to get zapped by the radiation treatment. Already
7296a mass of tattoos myself, I only had two small dots etched on my
7297neck, allowing the technician to radiate the identical spot each time.
7298I got thirty-seven radiation treatments. Sometimes the machines
7299would break down and the schedules would back up. I’d sit in the
7300waiting room and listen to the older people bitch and complain while
7301the children who were living on borrowed time laughed and ran
7302around the lobby. It put things into perspective for me once again.
7303I wanted to live again.
7304A life without vocal cords meant relearning a lot of basics: eating,
7305breathing, and communicating. When you swallow food or air, your
7306vocal cords decide which direction the food or air goes, toward your
7307lungs or your stomach. If you take a bite of food, your brain automatically
7308tells your vocal cords to shut off your lungs. When you
7309take a drink of water and you choke, it means the signal wasn’t quick
7310enough to the brain and the water went down the wrong way. When
7311Hell’s Angel / 187
7312you take a breath of air, your vocal cords automatically close your
7313stomach off. When the doctors removed my vocal cords, that left a
7314straight path to both my stomach and lungs. I had to learn how to
7315eat again.
7316I also had to learn a whole new method of communication. They
7317cut a hole in the front of my neck, sewing my windpipe to my neck.
7318When I recovered, they went back in and punched a hole in the back
7319of my windpipe and inserted a plastic one-way valve through the
7320front of my esophagus. When I put a finger over the hole in my
7321throat, air can’t come out, instead going through a one-way valve.
7322I then vibrate a muscle in my throat, making the sound you hear
7323when I talk. I have to replace the valve about every ninety days. It
7324gets worn out.
7325People tell me I sound like Marlon Brando in The Godfather now.
7326Although there’s a shrill harshness to my voice, I can talk freely, and
7327it doesn’t hurt. The only sound I can’t pronounce is h. Communication
7328has turned into a physical reaction now. Over the years, my
7329hand automatically goes to my throat patch while I’m thinking about
7330what I’m about to say. Some people say I’ve developed a certain
7331economy of speech. Wouldn’t you?
7332Nobody bet that I would survive, let alone recover and get
7333stronger. The day I got out of the hospital, I jumped on my motorcycle,
7334feeling fully energized. I had beaten the Big C. Before my operation,
7335I could incline-bench-press 185 pounds for ten repetitions.
7336Once I was out of the hospital and began working out again, I
7337benched over 285 pounds, and I still do.
7338Because of my throat I started wearing a full-face helmet and
7339switched over to a windshield on my bike. A sticker on my windshield
7340alerts people that I’ve had a laryngectomy and that I’m a neck
7341breather. Next to my laryngectomy sticker on my Harley FXRT is
7342another sticker of the cartoon character the Tasmanian Devil. Some
7343of the guys in the club gave me a new nickname: Taz. It’s the raspy
7344voice.
7345Once in a while I’ll see an old clip of myself on television and hear
7346my original voice with that nasal California twang. But believe it or
7347not, the quality of my voice today is better now than just before I
7348was operated on. What saved my life was Sharon and the fact that
7349my head got right and I remained active. Riding a lot and staying
7350outdoors gave me good lung capacity. And that Camel I smoked on
7351the way to the operating room was my last cigarette, period, end of
7352case, finito.
7353188 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
735415
7355OAKLAND IN
7356MY REARVIEW
7357MIRROR,
7358CAREFREE
7359HIGHWAY
7360THROUGH MY
7361WINDSHIELD
7362I was sent to the federal correction institution in Englewood,
7363Colorado, after my bombing conspiracy conviction in 1987. The U.S.
7364attorney in Louisville wrote a letter to the Bureau of Prisons alerting
7365them to the fact that I was “the leader of the Hell’s Angels.” When
7366I got there they didn’t want me. According to the letter, I shouldn’t
7367be allowed a country club atmosphere, which is hardly how I’d describe
7368Englewood. Who wants to be in the middle of Colorado in
7369the dead of winter, up to your ass in snow? I was rerouted to the
7370federal correction institution in Phoenix.
7371I was unsure about Arizona because I didn’t know how my throat
7372would handle desert heat. They gave me a cell with a window, which
7373they let me keep open, with permission to block off the air-conditioning
7374system using a Honda generator to power a moisture machine.
7375As it turned out, I acclimated to the weather very quickly to the
7376point where, to this day, I prefer a hot and dry climate.
7377During my first winter in Phoenix the temperature shot up to
7378ninety degrees. Meanwhile it snowed like a motherfucker in Kentucky,
7379where I had been convicted. Wearing a pair of shorts and
7380sporting a deep tan, I laid on the lawn on a brightly colored beach
7381towel, sipping a can of Coke. A friend took my picture. I turned the
7382picture into a five-by-seven photo and mailed it to Cleveland Gamble,
7383the lead prosecutor of my conspiracy trial, in snowy Kentucky. The
7384photo read: “Dear Cleve: Winter in Phoenix. Thanks, Sonny Barger.”
7385I finished my time inside Phoenix FCI without incident and was
7386out by late 1992. All told, I’d served fifty-nine months. I was released
7387and placed on parole.
7388Harley-Davidson quit making my favorite bike, the FXRT, in
73891992. If you wanted one you had to scramble—they were pretty hard
7390to find. A friend who owned a Harley shop in Central California
7391found one of the very last FXRTs in Los Angeles and brought it to
7392Oakland for me. He added some finishing touches like a Screaming
7393Eagle carburetor, but it wasn’t tuned up right and ran a little rich. I
7394was over at Deacon’s house retuning the carburetor. I called up Cisco
7395at the Oakland clubhouse to let him know I’d be a little late. If the
7396club had already made plans, I told them, maybe they should go
7397ahead without me.
7398“Hell no,” Cisco said. “We’re waiting on you, Chief.”
7399As it turned out, a hundred guys were waiting for me at the
7400clubhouse when I arrived, along with my new FXRT. A big “Welcome
7401Home Sonny” bash, organized by Sharon and my Oakland
7402brother Guinea Colucci, was ready to happen that afternoon in the
7403countryside outside of Hayward. I wish I could say it was a surprise,
7404but I’d seen it advertised in two bike magazines. I got on my new
7405bike and the club all rode up to Hayward together like the old days.
7406The party drew close to five thousand people. I was technically
7407violating my parole, associating with thousands of known felons.
7408But fuck it, I swore I was never going to spend another day in jail.
7409Even the warden in Phoenix called and asked if I could send him a
7410couple of “Welcome Home Sonny” T-shirts from the party. It was
7411a helluva party, the biggest one I’d ever been to. The press was on
7412hand, and so were the cops, camped in an open field across the way,
7413taking pictures, shooting video, and jotting down license plate
7414numbers.
7415I told the club in Oakland that if we ever got a charter in Arizona,
7416I was moving there. The Dirty Dozen Motorcycle Club petitioned
7417to become Hell’s Angels in 1994. They were friends and allies, having
7418ridden in Arizona for over twenty-five years. They had no charters
7419outside Arizona and they rarely traveled out of state as a club. They
7420decided they wanted to go national, and the easiest way was to be-
7421190 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7422come part of a club that already reigned worldwide. And that was
7423the Hell’s Angels.
7424Once the Dirty Dozen became HAMC prospects, I stayed out of
7425the politics. When they officially became Hell’s Angels I put in for
7426a transfer. The Oakland club was shocked when I stood up during
7427a meeting in August of 1997 and requested a letter of transfer. Cisco
7428thought I was joking and asked who else was transferring. Johnny
7429Angel raised his hand. Since I was a member in good standing, they
7430gave me my letter of transfer. Ten days after my sixtieth birthday,
7431on October 18, 1998, I officially became an Arizona Hell’s Angel,
7432Cave Creek chapter.
7433Oakland was now history. I was hauling a forty-five-foot trailer,
7434filled top to bottom, front to back, with my gear from Golf Links. I
7435had sold Golf Links—my home for thirty years—to a club member,
7436keeping it like a landmark inside the Hell’s Angel family.
7437I dig the desert; it’s the new California. It’s wide open and free.
7438The Cave Creek clubhouse isn’t far from my new home. There are
7439Hell’s Angels chapters in Phoenix and Mesa as well as Nomads in
7440Flagstaff. All are former Dirty Dozen chapters. Lots of bike riders
7441means lots of fun.
7442The Southwest is a growing area for the Hell’s Angels, as we look
7443toward moving into New Mexico and Colorado. We’re shaking it
7444up good, because we’re neither East nor West Coast. We’re the
7445Southwest, and our presence—like at the Four Corners Run during
7446Labor Day weekend—represents a new frontier. To spread into
7447Colorado or New Mexico, I feel we have to be present at events like
7448Four Corners in order to make the club grow. We need our own
7449runs and activities to attract new charters, and I’m trying to help
7450make that happen.
7451When I ride my motorcycle around the area where I live, I pass
7452the federal correctional institution where I spent almost five years.
7453Cruis-ing down the Carefree Highway, I can look over to the right
7454and there’s the prison. It’s great to be out.
7455One morning I was riding on the Carefree Highway when a
7456sheriff’s deputy saw my Angels patch and gave me the eye. He
7457flipped on his light and pulled me over. I gave him my license. The
7458deputy looked down at my license, shook his head, and looked back
7459up at me. He muttered something to himself and walked back to his
7460radio.
7461Hell’s Angel / 191
7462Pretty soon a Phoenix cop pulled up. He walked over to me and
7463said, “Show me your California license.”
7464“Officer, I don’t have a California license. I have an Arizona license.”
7465The Phoenix cop took off his sunglasses. “Are you trying to tell
7466me that you, Sonny Barger, are now an Arizona resident?”
7467“I own a house in Arizona, my bike’s registered here, and I have
7468an Arizona license. If that means I’m a resident, then the answer to
7469your question is yes.”
7470He walked back over to the sheriff’s deputy and they exchanged
7471a few words. Then he came back over.
7472“I’ll let you off with a warning this time.” He started to walk off,
7473then turned around and said, “And welcome to Arizona, Mr. Barger.”
7474The press published a couple of articles about my arrival. After
7475the stories ran, the sheriff’s department pulled into my front driveway.
7476A cop leaned out the passenger window and took pictures of
7477my house, garage, and yard. When I phoned the sheriff’s department
7478asking what the hell was up, they claimed it hadn’t happened. I
7479called a reporter from the Phoenix Republic, and after a few phone
7480calls, he got the same story: no pictures were taken, there was no
7481surveillance, nothing ever happened.
7482Looking back over forty years in the club, I can almost break it
7483down by decades. We formed the club in the fifties to party and ride.
7484During the psychedelicized sixties, the Hell’s Angels became a
7485household word. Citizens, cops, and writers wondered and fantasized
7486about the patches we wore. In their whacked-out imaginations
7487they made up their own stories about us. The movies made us out
7488to be the wildest motherfuckers to roam the earth since Genghis
7489Khan and his warriors.
7490The seventies were a gangster era for us. I sold drugs and got into
7491a lot of shit. Other clubs tried to take our rep from us. The blacks
7492and the Latinos didn’t like us; white people were scared of us; hippies
7493no longer dug us; rednecks couldn’t stand us either. Everybody
7494hated us. We became isolated.
7495The eighties were us paying for every motherfuckin’ crime we
7496committed and some we didn’t. With stuff like the conspiracy
7497charges, the eighties were one big blurry court trial. Some of the informants
7498supported by the government were bent and determined
7499to destroy us. It was they who became the smelliest rats.
7500192 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7501In 1998, we celebrated the Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club’s fiftieth
7502year as a club. A massive celebration was held at the birthplace—San
7503Bernardino—as Hell’s Angels from far and wide descended upon
7504the Berdoo clubhouse. Two dozen Oakland Hell’s Angels stormed
7505down a rainy Highway 5. Chapters from as far away as the northeastern
7506United States and Canada rode en masse to party. International
7507chapters flew in, riding cross-country on borrowed bikes. The
7508clubhouse barroom became a museum, with plaques and other gifts
7509spread throughout. Members from around the world downed beers
7510together. A few stray clubs from Greece and Italy—hoping to become
7511future Hell’s Angel chapters—came to show their respect. I posed
7512for many a snapshot, alongside members young and old. Hundreds
7513of Hell’s Angels were present, not including the dozens stopped at
7514the borders or at customs and refused entry. In the rear of the clubhouse,
7515hundreds of motorcycles were parked, with beautifully
7516painted gas tanks and gleaming chrome.
7517Naturally the cops were on hand. The Canadian feds had rented
7518a building adjacent to the party site and set up shop with their
7519notepads and surveillance devices. After fifty years, the cops are
7520still curious about us. Earlier in the year, state and federal authorities
7521raided the Oakland clubhouse. But instead of looking for weapons
7522and drugs, they carted away our computer hard drives and file
7523cabinets.
7524With the coming of the twenty-first century, hell, we’ve come full
7525circle. Riding our motorcycles and partying is still the most important
7526reason to be a Hell’s Angel. And brotherhood. We’ve got a lot of
7527young members who have their shit together and are carrying on
7528the tradition of bike runs and hard partying. Those were the ba-sics
7529upon which we founded the club in the first place. It feels damn
7530good to be home again and on the right track.
7531In 1999, I finally made it overseas for a European Run. I landed
7532in Zurich with Johnny Angel and Joe Richardson, both from the
7533Cave Creek chapter. Johnny is our United States representative to
7534Europe. I guess you could say I was the guest of honor.
7535After partying down with the Zurich chapter we hit the winding
7536European highways on Harley full dressers. We rode the motocrosses
7537and autobahns of Austria, Liechtenstein, and Switzerland. When
7538we crossed the Swiss border into Italy, an Italian border guard tried
7539to stop us—all two hundred of us—detaining the entire pack, holding
7540up traffic for miles. The guard’s supervisor freaked and told him in
7541no uncertain terms to let us cross. We rode off and partied in Milan.
7542Hell’s Angel / 193
7543The Euro pack consisted of Hell’s Angels from all over the world.
7544It showed how little difference there was between American and
7545international members. Whether you ride in California, Scandinavia,
7546Australia, Canada, South Africa, Europe, or the rain forests of Brazil,
7547bikers are bikers, motorcycles are the best, and Hell’s Angels will
7548continue to ride to the ends of the earth. Even law enforcement gets
7549it right in their federal manuals and state attorney general reports:
7550The sun never sets on a Hell’s Angel patch.
7551We rode back to Switzerland, straight up into the Alps. It was the
7552tallest mountain range I ever rode, so steep we were accelerating
7553into the clouds. It was the highest high, the furthest I’ve ever
7554been—body and soul—from the likes of Folsom Prison or a dingy
7555county cell. As I rode, I got to thinking: if I learned anything from
7556being in the club over forty years, it’s that freedom isn’t cheap. I
7557thought about how much I needed the open road, a tight set of
7558handlebars, a firm seat, and an old lady willing to hold on for the
7559long and bumpy ride.
7560My thoughts overpowered the roar of two hundred Harleys
7561gunning through the Alps. I know I’ve paid a terrible price for my
7562freedom. I’ve learned the hard way that to understand my heart is
7563to understand the evil that lurks inside. I can’t hide behind religious
7564tra-ditions and superficial heroes. It’s impossible to be delivered
7565away from man’s constant inhumanity to man. As a warrior, you’ve
7566got to know pain and sadness alongside joy and solitude. It is to
7567those who long to ride—forever free—that I write these words…and
7568the Angels shall be Kings!
7569194 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7570AFTERWORD:
7571THE RAP-UP
7572The following is my “criminal history,” recently abstracted from the
7573authorities. It looks fairly complete, though I’m sure a few minor
7574beefs are missing.
7575Arresting Agency and Arrest Charge
7576Disposition
7577Date of Arrest
7578Alameda Police Drunk driving
7579Department Conviction
7580Three years probation
75814/14/57
7582Oakland Police Drunk driving
7583Department Conviction
75842/17/58
7585Berkeley Police Failure to disperse
7586Department Found not
7587guilty by jury
75883/18/61
7589Oakland Police Narcotics
7590Department Six
7591months probation
759211/13/63
7593Possession of
7594marijuana
7595Oakland Police
7596Department Six
7597months jail
75984/30/64
7599Assault with a
7600deadly weapon
7601Oakland Police
7602Department Convicted of
7603assault with deadly
7604weapon
7605intent to commit murder
76062/13/65
7607Assault with a
7608deadly weapon
7609Berkeley Police
7610Department Discharged,
7611no complaint filed
761210/16/65
7613Assault with a
7614deadly weapon
7615Alameda Sheriff’s
7616Department Six months
7617jail
76183/10/66
7619Possession of
7620narcotics
7621Oakland Police
7622Department Released
76238/30/68
7624Illegal possession,
7625manufacture, or
7626sale of certain
7627weapons, possession
7628of narcotics
7629Norwalk Police
7630Department Disposition
7631unknown
76322/26/69
7633Felony acquisition of
7634firearm
7635ATF
7636Disposition unknown
76376/6/70
7638Possession of
7639dangerous drugs,
7640narcotics for sale
7641Oakland Police
7642Department of Charges
7643dismissed
76446/11/70
7645Possession of
7646dangerous
7647drugs, possession of
7648narcotics by a felon
7649with a firearm
7650Alameda Sheriff’s
7651Department Possession
7652of
7653Disposition unknown
765410/7/70
7655Illegal possession
7656of a weapon
7657U.S. Marshal
7658Disposition unknown
765910/30/70
7660Felon with a firearm,
7661possession of dangerous
7662weapons, carrying concealed
7663weapon, possession
7664of switchblade knife
7665Alameda Sheriff’s
7666Department Disposition
7667unknown
76683/22/71
7669Kidnapping, attempted
7670murder,
7671assault with a deadly
7672weapon, felon in
7673possession of a
7674firearm
7675Oakland Police
7676Department Charges
7677dismissed
76781/21/72
7679196 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7680Assault with a
7681deadly weapon,
7682kidnapping, felon
7683Alameda Sheriff’s
7684Department Convicted of
7685false imprisonment
7686Sentenced to Vacaville,
7687with a firearm indeterminate
7688sentence, concurrent with
7689other charges
76902/14/72
7691Possession of
7692narcotics,
7693possession of
7694marijuana and
7695dangerous drugs
7696with intent to sell
7697California Department of
7698Justice Bureau of Investigation
7699Disposition unknown
7700Criminal records indicate
7701“unable to associate disposition
7702with a charge,” but they
7703do
7704indicate sentences of five
7705to
7706twenty years, two to
7707twenty
7708years, and six to ten
7709months,
7710all concurrent, and ten
7711years to
7712life, consecutive
77133/16/73
7714False imprisonment,
7715possession of
7716firearm
7717by ex-felon
7718California Department of
7719Justice
7720Bureau of Investigation
7721Convicted of false
7722imprisonment
7723Sentenced to six months
7724to ten years and
7725six months to fifteen
7726years,
7727concurrent
7728Paroled to Alameda
7729County
77305/2/73
7731Racketeering,
7732corrupt organization
7733U.S. Marshal
7734Acquitted
77356/13/79
7736Hell’s Angel / 197
7737Arresting agency un- Conspiracy charges
7738known
7739Convicted
7740Served 59 months
77416/20/87
7742198 / Ralph "Sonny" Barger
7743About the Authors
7744RALPH “SONNY” BARGER lives near Phoenix, Arizona, and is a
7745member of the Cave Creek chapter of the Hell’s Angels Motorcycle
7746Club. Visit his website at www.sonnybarger.com.
7747KEITH AND KENT ZIMMERMAN are twin brothers and coauthors of
7748Rotten: No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs, written with the Sex Pistols’
7749Johnny Rotten, a number one bestseller in Britain that was nominated
7750for the Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Award.