United Nations

The United Nations (UN) is a criminal gang that originated in the Vancouver, British Columbia area. History Formation The UN gang was formed in Abbotsford in 1997 by a group of high-school friends from around the Fraser Valley. The founder of the gang was Clayton Roueche, a white Canadian who grew up surrounded by Vietnamese-Canadians and Lao-Canadians. Roueche came to develop an Asian fetish as he was described as spending much of his time in Abbotsford's Vietnamtown where he loved: "the fortunetellers he'd find there, grainy bootlegged kung-fu movies and Vietnamese girls". A Korean-Canadian said of him: "Clay was never white. Maybe he was born white, but his soul was never White." After graduating from high school in 1993, Rouche worked in a variety of sales jobs and opened a restaurant which soon failed. James Coulter, the best friend of Rouche recalled: "It started slowly. I started using E-ecstasy-just to stay awake and stay balanced because when you take ecstasy and you drink, it sort of counterbalances, you don't get high from ecstasy and you don't get drunk from drinking. But as soon as the ecstasy wears off, you are super, super drunk. Then I just started using crack, just for an extra high. Maybe it was take the stress away, I don't know." Coulter had moved to Abbotsford in 1996, was working in a warehouse and spent most of his free time in nightclubs and raves. Coulter stated: "I started hanging out with kids with nice cars. And you know, they would go to the gym in the day, and that really conflicted with my warehouse hours. And they had a couple of jobs here or there for me, and they would say, 'Hey do you want to learn how to grow marijuana?' Do a week of work, and you'll get a couple of grand". Coulter started to work as a petty drug dealer and in January 1997 he first met Roueche in a rave in Chilliwack. Roueche had connections with various Asian organized crime figures in Vancouver via the family of his Lao-Canadian girlfriend, and sold drugs at prices considerably lower than those allowed by the Hells Angels, which made him popular with Coulter and his associates. Coulter and Rouche started selling drugs together to pay for their drug habits.