A total of 41 people in Montreal were arraigned Friday morning by video conference following massive raids on street gangs and bikers.

By Thursday night, Police had announced 47 arrests but Crown prosecutors told reporters Friday that 41 people were arraigned and six people are still at large.

A total of 54 arrests had been made as of Friday evening.

Eighteen of the accused were set free on bail on a promise to appear later. Among those charged are the father of a police officer, a former Olympic weightlifter as well as a onetime associate of Hells Angels boss Maurice (Mom) Boucher.

Charges include attempted murder, drug trafficking, gangsterism, weapons possession and conspiracy to import cocaine.  The next court appearance will be on Wednesday.

Operation Axe involved 700 police officers from the Montreal police, the RCMP, the SQ, Ottawa Police and a number of other forces. Raids were carried out in Montreal, Laval, Longueuil in Quebec, and in Ottawa and Kingston in Ontario. They started pre-dawn on Thursday.

Wiretaps

The Crown says it has six disks of wiretap evidence amassed during a three-year investigation aimed at targeting drug importers and distributors.

"We have 100,000 conversations that we have in the evidence," prosecutor Francis Cloutier told reporters.

"It's on a period of two and maybe more years so it's a very large (body of) evidence."

Police seized a large amount of drugs, guns and cash.

Crime experts say the raids dealt a significant, but not fatal, blow to the gangs.