Young Richmond pilot final victim of plane crash that also killed B.C. fugitives

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Investigators in two provinces try to determine how two younger Richmond pilots and two B.C. fugitives with hyperlinks to homicide victims ended up collectively in a small aircraft that crashed within the Ontario wilderness April 29.

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Ontario Provincial Police are main the felony investigation into the crash of a B.C.-owned aircraft that left a Delta airport simply earlier than 6 p.m. on April 23, in response to a web-based flight tracker.

Aboard the four-seater Piper plane was accused killer Gene Lahrkamp of Path, accused conspirator Duncan Bailey of Kamloops, and Richmond pilots Abhi Handa and Hankun Hong.

The OPP launched Hong’s title on Wednesday, a day after figuring out the opposite victims as the 2 accused criminals and Handa, who was flying the ill-fated aircraft.

Hong was additionally a pilot, in response to his Fb web page, the place he posted dozens of photographs of himself at Vancouver Airport or out flying alongside B.C.’s coast.

He advised a pal final October that he had accomplished his industrial pilot coaching the earlier yr.

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“I’m in search of a pilot job whereas doing a little metropolis tour flying for an organization,” he mentioned.

Hong additionally posted a letter from Harv’s Air, in Manitoba, saying he had accomplished his pilot’s floor coaching in 2019.

Harv’s Air teacher Adam Penner mentioned in an e-mail Wednesday that he had by no means met Hong.

“Very unhappy story,” Penner mentioned of the crash. “Hankun was a scholar of our on-line principle programs, so we by no means met him in individual and even talked.”

Whereas residing in Kamloops in 2019, Hong filed a small-claims lawsuit in opposition to the Canadian Flight Centre, alleging that he had paid over $30,000 for coaching to acquire his pilot’s licence however the firm was in need of instructors and airplanes “which delays the size of my coaching.”

“They didn’t full my coaching course of by the goal date on contract,” the go well with mentioned.

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The flight centre filed a counterclaim in opposition to Hong, denying his allegations and saying he nonetheless owed about $2,100 for his program.

Hong’s go well with was dismissed in February 2021.

Neither Hong, 27, nor Handa, 26, have any felony historical past in B.C. Nor does the proprietor of the four-seat Piper plane, who has not responded to messages left for her over two days.

Whereas the net flight tracker confirmed the aircraft leaving the Delta Heritage Airport at 5:55 p.m. on April 23 — six days earlier than it crashed — the caretaker there mentioned Wednesday that there was no aircraft based mostly on the airport matching the outline of the 55-year-old Piper.

“There’s no person right here registered by that title. So if she took off from right here she in all probability got here in for gasoline, loaded up and flew away. So so far as I do know that title doesn’t ring a bell so far as her being a tenant,” mentioned the caretaker, who requested to not be quoted by title.

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He additionally mentioned he didn’t acknowledge the title of both pilot.

Hong seems to have lived in Kamloops for 2 years, the identical metropolis that Bailey is from.

Bailey is alleged to have conspired to kill Mir Aali Hussain in Vancouver in October 2020. Hussain was wounded in a focused capturing, however survived. He was killed months later in Coquitlam.

B.C.’s anti-gang company, the Mixed Forces Particular Enforcement Unit, is taking a look at what, if any, hyperlinks existed between Bailey and Lahrkamp. Bailey is related the Impartial Troopers gang, which is a part of the Wolfpack gang alliance. Lahrkamp, a former Canadian soldier, was alleged to have travelled to Thailand in February to execute former B.C. felony Jimi Sandhu, of the United Nations gang. Each the Impartial Troopers and the Wolfpack are rivals of the UN.

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Lahrkamp, who was charged in Thailand together with Matthew Dupre, had purchased a hilltop home in Path in 2017 to breed canine. However he disappeared from the home a while final fall, in response to an earlier investigation by Postmedia.

Dupre stays in custody in Edmonton awaiting an extradition listening to. Bailey’s two co-accused within the October 2020 capturing in Vancouver additionally stay in custody.

kbolan@postmedia.com

Twitter.com/kbolan

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