Hells Angels Leader ‘Baffled’ By Formal Intimidation Charge
The president of the Spokane chapter of the Hells Angels is being charged with intimidating an associate of the rival Ghost Riders who testified in a recent murder trial.
Richard “Smilin’ Rick” Fabel, 39, appeared Thursday in Superior Court, where he was formally charged with intimidation of a witness.
He remains free under a $10,000 bond.
“I’m completely baffled at all this,” Fabel said later.
He and five other Hells Angels and their friends were arrested June 11 when police conducted simultaneous raids at five locations in Spokane.
Those arrested face charges of intimidating the prosecutor or witnesses who testified in the murder trial of Hells Angels member Timothy Myers. He was acquitted of murder, but was among those arrested on witness intimidation charges.
Fabel initially was arrested on charges of intimidation of a deputy prosecutor and possession of drugs.
Special prosecutor Rocky Treppiedi said Thursday the investigation leading to the newest charge against Fabel was completed last week on the day he was arrested.
Court documents allege that Fabel, formerly of Anchorage, Alaska, went to the home of Yolanda Fisette, who lives in west Spokane with her husband, Kenneth “Maggot” Fisette.
He has a long affiliation with the Ghost Riders, a rival outlaw motorcycle gang, and has been the club president.
The Fisettes were involved in beating Myers and stealing his Hells Angels colors in a Hillyard bar brawl that led to the fatal shooting of another Ghost Rider last December.
A Superior Court jury acquitted Myers in the shooting in early May and ruled that he acted in self-defense.
On April 29, the day the Myers murder trial began, Fabel allegedly drove to the Fisette home on Inland Empire Way.
Court documents allege Fabel jumped a neighbor’s fence and stood on the property line, “watching” the Fisette residence for 30 minutes with his arms crossed, but said nothing.
Police allege the “non-verbal contact” by the Hells Angels is a customary way of intimidating witnesses.
Fabel denied going to Fisette’s home and said others affiliated with the local Hells Angels chapter didn’t intimidate anyone.
“We might have walked into a bar where somebody else might have been, but we didn’t intimidate anybody,” Fabel said. “Everybody knows this isn’t true.”
The Hells Angels president again renewed his offer to take a lie detector “if the prosecutor and the others who say we’re intimidating them also take a lie detector test.”
“It’ll prove our innocence,” he said.
, DataTimes