President of Bandidos gets 20-month term

SEATTLE – The president of the Bandidos motorcycle club was sentenced to 20 months in prison Friday in a deal that will allow him to retain his position in the organization.

George Wegers, 54, was one of 32 people in Washington, Montana and South Dakota who were indicted in U.S. District Court last year as federal officials raided the Bellingham-based gang.

Members were accused of conspiracy to commit murder, witness tampering, violent crime in aid of racketeering, and drug and weapons offenses, but Wegers pleaded guilty in May to just one count of conspiracy to engage in racketeering. In the agreement, which saved the government an expensive trial, he acknowledged encouraging his co-defendants to tamper with a witness and traffic in stolen motorcycles.

U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour handed down the sentence, splitting the difference between the 24 months requested by the U.S. attorney’s office and the 15 months requested by Wegers’ lawyers. Several heavyset and bearded bikers attended the hearing.

Wegers has already served 15 months since his arrest in June 2005. When he is released, he will face a $10,000 fine and three years of supervised release – during which he will be allowed to attend Bandidos events, but cannot live or work in Whatcom County. He also cannot have contact with any co-defendants, and standard supervised release conditions require that he not consort with other known felons.

After sentencing, one of Wegers’ attorneys, Jeffery P. Robinson, argued with Ye-Ting Woo, a federal prosecutor, outside the courtroom about whether the government waived that release condition when it wrote in the plea agreement that Wegers could attend Bandidos events. Woo said the government did not waive the condition, but the matter was expected to be the subject of later court filings.