In early 2023, Canada’s spy agency tipped off the RCMP that several Quebec City area men had formed an allegedly anti-government militia whose members were conducting tactical military training with weapons and ammunition, newly-unsealed search warrants reveal.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service told the RCMP’s counter-terrorism squad about the group, which called itself “Hide_n_Stalk,” first in a verbal briefing and then in several subsequent secret letters, according to the CSIS letters attached to RCMP search warrants.
After getting the CSIS warning and investigative lead, the RCMP’s integrated national security unit then investigated, tracked and surveilled the four men and others alleged to belong to the group for months before finally arresting and charging four Quebec City suspects in July.
The RCMP search warrants and CSIS letters were unsealed Thursday by Quebec Court Justice Réna Émond.
The judge ordered them made public after a joint legal application by Global News, Quebecor Media, The Globe and Mail, and other news organizations, but ordered some redactions on national security grounds.
The RCMP documents had been sealed since January 2024. That’s when police used them to conduct court-authorized RCMP raids during which police allegedly seized long guns, pistols and ammunition from the suspects.
The same four men were arrested and charged in mid-July, some 17 months later. A Crown prosecutor declined to explain the lengthy delay.
Marc-Aurèle Chabot, 24, of Quebec City; Simon Angers-Audet, 24, of Neuville and Raphaël Lagacé, 25, of Quebec City are accused of taking concrete actions to facilitate terrorist activity and are each facing one charge of facilitating terrorist activity.
They face a maximum sentence of 14 years if found guilty. Lagacé was a civilian instructor with the 630 Royal Canadian Air Cadet Squadron in Beauport, Que., between 2021 and September 2024.
The fourth arrested suspect was Matthew Forbes, 33, of Pont-Rouge near Quebec City. He faces charges including possession of firearms, prohibited devices and explosives, and possession of controlled items.
Chabot and Forbes were active members of Canadian Armed Forces serving at Base Valcartier in Quebec City. Their rights to be on base were restricted as the criminal probe unfolded.
The allegations against the men have not been tested in court and the four accused remain innocent until proven guilty at an eventual trial.
The father of one suspect has told Global News that the charges are overblown and that his son and his friends were young outdoorsmen who liked to train together and shoot guns.
The alleged anti-government “Hide_n_Stalk” militia had as many as 17 members at one event, including 16 men and one woman, according to a sworn affidavit by Det. Sgt. Louis-Phillippe Martel from the Montreal Police (Martel is loaned to the RCMP’s national security investigations unit.)
The RCMP says the January 2024 raids led to the seizure of 16 explosive devices, 83 firearms and accessories, approximately 11,000 rounds of ammunition of various calibres, nearly 130 magazines, four pairs of night vision goggles and other military equipment.
The RCMP said it seized these weapons and other military equipment during rainds in January 2024 that led to the arrests of four men in Quebec City in July.
RCMP photo
The redacted versions of the search warrants made public Thursday do not allege that any of the suspects had planned or furthered any terrorist activity, only that police were investigating them amid allegations of possible weapons infractions.
The RCMP code-named its national security investigation “Projet Supion,” which means small squids.
That despite the fact that CSIS had highlighted the group’s existence as a possible national security threat and alerted the Ontario Provincial Police, the Sûreté du Québec and Quebec City municipal police force about it.
RCMP : Podcast of concern
However, included in the search warrant’s sworn affidavit were excerpts allegedly from a June 14, 2023, Modern Canadian Shooter podcast that caused RCMP investigators to be concerned.
A host interviewed the alleged leader of the “Hide_n_Stalk” group, who was not identified in a show entitled, “Hide_n_Stalk: The CAF, Building a Community and Trucks.”
A transcript presented in the search warrant by the RCMP quoted an unidentified man who the police believed to be Master Cpl. Chabot.
During the program, the alleged leader of Hide_n_Stalk railed against the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau’s gun control measures but also against Opposition Conservative leader Pierre Polievre, according to the affidavit.
“A disarmed population is easy to control,” the suspected Hide_n_Stalk leader said. “I don’t think there is a political situation. Poilievre is still bought by the same people. They are all lying.”
“That’s why building a community is important cuz you cannot trust those bastards,” he continued. “I’ve seen how government works and I don’t want to have more of it. ”
“That’s why you need to be reliant on yourself, have a community that backs you. So whatever the f— they try to pull, try coming after dudes that are prepared, are tight, run their shit well, you can’t,” the alleged Hide_n_Stalk leader said. “It’s gonna be another WACO. Then you got Instagram and social media and all that stuff that’s gonna blow in their face.”
The suspected Hide_n_Stalk leader then allegedly suggested he didn’t want to criticize the government too much because, “I’m still serving (in the Canadian Forces) and I’m proud of serving let’s say,” according to the affidavit.
The Waco remark was a reference to a 51-day siege and disaster in Waco, Texas, in 1993.
It saw U.S. law enforcement officers from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) clash with members of a religious extremist sect, causing a fire that resulted in the deaths of 76 individuals, including children. The tragedy came as ATF officers wanted to search the sect’s compound amid allegations they were stockpiling weapons.
Global News checked the Modern Canadian Shooter podcast platform. That episode appears no longer to be available to listeners on the Apple podcasts website.
FINTRAC studied $483,741 worth of transactions
The RCMP obtained a financial analysis of the four suspects’ finances and spending from FINTRAC, Canada’s financial intelligence agency, including credit card activity.
The FINTRAC analysis found that between Jan. 8, 2020, and June 23, 2023, the four Quebec City area men completed $483,741 worth of transactions. The RCMP alleged that corresponded to a disproportionate level and volume of transactions “in relation to their apparent financial situations.”
FINTRAC zeroed in on Forbes, saying he received almost $160,000 worth e-transfers during the period and moved money in and out of accounts quickly and paid off credit card purchases.
Lagacé’s transactions involved more money than his declared job as a painter would normally generate, FINTRAC and the RCMP alleged.
The RCMP used two confidential paid informants during its own investigation. But neither of these paid informants has agreed to testify against the suspects in their criminal trials, the search warrants state.
Where the group trained
Police detectives spent months surveilling the four suspects as they allegedly went and trained in a quarry owned by a company belonging to Lagacé’s father, and to the home of a former Canadian Armed Forces employee in Rolphton, Ont, and a province-owned recreational property near Quebec City.
The RCMP counted participants and studied their activities using a high-altitude surveillance aircraft, and geolocation devices during which airborne video surveillance was recorded, the affidavit states.
The RCMP says it obtained an analysis of the video and concluded that the participants in the Hide_n_Stalk sessions and training weekends were undergoing the same training for shooting and tactical operations which is offered to Canadian Armed Forces.
The police investigators state they gathered extensive social media account evidence which allegedly shows members of the group wearing military combat style uniforms and camouflage on their outings.
Members of the group also sported their own special badges un these uniforms as well, featuring “H & S” and an individualized number as an identifier, the affidavits state.
