Sylvain Boulanger,signed a contract that will see him paid a total of $2.9-million over the course of the agreement

Sylvain Boulanger, 45, a retired member of the gang's Sherbrooke chapter who decided to begin giving evidence to investigators with the Regional Integrated Squads, signed a contract that will see him paid a total of $2.9-million over the course of the agreement, The Montreal Gazette has learned. It is believed to be the largest contract awarded to an informant in Quebec.Details of Mr. Boulanger's 19-page contract came from a source familiar with the Operation SharQc investigation and were confirmed through similar sources.Madeleine Giauque, the lead prosecutor in Operation SharQc was unavailable for comment Wednesday.Mr. Boulanger was recruited by police in 2006 and agreed to officially co-operate with investigators by June 12, 2006. The contract was signed on Sept. 21, 2007, and Mr. Boulanger received $300,000 upon signing. The contract called for him to be paid another $600,000 when more than 120 gang members and associates were rounded up last week. Almost the entire membership of the gang's five chapters in Quebec face charges in the investigation. As of Wednesday afternoon, 24 full-patch members and another three gang associates were still being sought. In all, 156 people face charges in Operation SharQc. Mr. Boulanger is also scheduled to receive four annual payments of $400,000 each over the next four years, during which he would be expected to testify in trials that emerge from Operation SharQc. A fifth payment of $400,000 will be paid out once all the court cases are settled.Mr. Boulanger's contract would pay him significantly more than the $1.75-million promised to Dany Kane, a Hells Angels underling who worked undercover while under contract with provincial police. As a member of the Rockers, a now-defunct Hells Angels affiliate gang, Mr. Kane was able to provide investigators with inside information during Operation Springtime in 2001. Kane signed the contract on March 14, 2000 but took his own life months later.At the time, Mr. Kane's contract was believed to be the largest agreed to with an informant in Quebec. However, the details behind such contracts are rarely made public.Because of the trials expected in the near future, representatives from the Regional Integrated Squads are unable to comment on Mr. Boulanger's contract.But a police source familiar with investigations into organized crime said using informants is necessary."It takes something very special to infiltrate a group like the Hells Angels. The police can't do it because during the investigation an informant might be expected to commit certain crimes. We can't place our own people in a gang like that," he said.
According to various sources, Mr. Boulanger has given investigators in Operation SharQc access to the details of meetings the Hells Angels held in July 1994, when membership across the province voted in favour of the gang war that followed. Mr. Boulanger became a full-patch member in 1993, a year before the vote was taken.
The gang's Montreal-based Nomads chapter fought a bloody war with an umbrella group called the Alliance, over control of drug turf in Montreal and Quebec City for roughly eight years. The indictment filed in Operation SharQc last week includes 22 counts of murder involving homicides carried out within the context of the war. The Crown's case will focus in part, on a section of the Criminal Code that covers parties to an offence who "form an intention in common to carry out an unlawful purpose and to assist each other therein."
As sergeant-at-arms for the Sherbrooke chapter, Mr. Boulanger had access to how every other chapter voted at that crucial moment. He reportedly retired from the gang in 2001. During the investigation, Mr. Boulanger gave investigators 23 videotaped statements and supplied piles of written statements.