FPP police carried out around one hundred search warrants issued against Hells Angels members from north to south of the country, in Porto, Lisbon, Almada, Setúbal and Faro, coordinated by the PJ’s National Counterterrorism Unit (UNCT).
It was the biggest operation ever launched against the chapter. Some of the targets were foreign residents in Portugal, mainly living in Lisbon and Faro.
Around 450 detectives were involved in the operation, considered to be of high-risk, at the root of which are crimes of criminal association, attempted murder, and grievous bodily harm.
The Hells Angels have been on the PJ’s radar for several years and an investigation really began to gain flesh in 2016 when UNCT detectives started collating various cases of violence involving members of the group.
The investigation accelerated last March when a group of around 40 of the bikers – all of whom were identified in this latest swoop – stormed a restaurant in Prior Velho armed with crowbars, clubs and knives, to attack a rival group, the Bandidos. Among the rivals was the infamous extreme-right leader, head of the Portuguese Hammerskins, Mário Machado.
Both groups of bikers have links to the violent extreme right, with ostentation of neo-Nazi symbols by some of their members.