The alleged gang leader charged in a brutal and public Langley murder is back in Canada to face a judge.
The Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit (CFSEU-BC) announced Friday, March 22 that Conor D’Monte has been returned from Puerto Rico and is now in a pre-trial facility on this side of the Canadian border.
“CFSEU-BC and our police partners from around the globe spent many years looking for Conor D’Monte,” said RCMP Assistant Commissioner Manny Mann, head of CFSEU-BC. “Just like other fugitives, including Rabih Alkhalil who is also one of Canada’s ‘Most Wanted’, CFSEU-BC and police will not stop until we catch those wanted for violent crimes.”
D’Monte, identified by police as a high-level member of the UN Gang, disappeared in 2011 after he was charged with first degree murder in the 2009 murder of Kevin LeClair.
LeClair was gunned down in a pickup truck in a Walnut Grove shopping centre parking lot. A hail of gunfire hit the pickup, with bystanders scrambling for cover.
D’Monte is also facing charges of conspiracy to murder the Bacon Brothers, a trio who were also heavily involved in the gang conflict that saw numerous shootings around the Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley.
Persons charged with a criminal offence are considered not guilty until the charges are proven in court.
D’Monte could have gone through an extradition hearing and fought being returned to Canada to face trial, but in January he agreed to return without a hearing.
After D’Monte disappeared in 2011, there was no trace of him for more than a decade, until American law enforcement found him living in rural Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory in the Caribbean.
D’Monte had been working with a non-profit called Karma Honey Project and had been working on local projects like a Christmas toy drive and efforts to save honeybees.
Through his lawyers, D’Monte released a public statement that referred to “lies” being spread about him on social media, and claimed he had run from Canada “not to avoid trial and run from this allegation, but to escape certain threats, putting the lives of my young children and family in extreme danger.”
One man has already been found guilty in the LeClair murder. Cory Vallee is spending life in prison with no possibility of parole for 25 years after his first degree murder conviction. Vallee was the shooter in the attack on LeClair.
READ MORE: Accused Langley killer gives up fight against extradition from Puerto Rico
READ MORE: Life sentence for killer who gunned down gang rival in Langley parking lot
