Nine Died in the Nation's Deadliest Shootout. Texas prosecutors didn't convict 1 person.

[lostnfound]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/04/03/nine-died-nations-deadliest-biker-shootout-texas-prosecutors-couldnt-convict-single-person/

Who will be held accountable for the deaths of nine people during a biker-club shootout in the middle of a Twin Peaks restaurant parking lot in broad daylight in 2015?
No one, the McLennan County, Tex., district attorney’s office announced Tuesday.
Barry Johnson, the county’s district attorney, said his office would drop all remaining charges against the bikers, bringing the years-long saga to a remarkably anticlimactic end without obtaining a single conviction against any of the notorious brawl’s participants.

The announcement comes nearly four years after roughly 200 members of rival motorcycle clubs descended on the Waco, Tex., strip mall parking lot, allegedly to settle a territorial dispute. Before long, it devolved into a bloody melee. Terrified diners enjoying a midday lunch took cover in the restaurant as dozens of Bandidos and Cossacks bikers exchanged gunfire and brandished knives. Overwhelmed police failed to stop the violence, instead adding to it with more gunfire. In just minutes, nine people died, making it the deadliest biker shootout in U.S. history. At least 20 were critically injured. Dozens of guns and knives were abandoned as swarms of tattooed men scattered.
Nearly everyone at the scene — 177 people — was arrested.


What followed was a prosecutorial fiasco, as one by one, the criminal cases collapsed under a former district attorney’s leadership. During the four years of prosecution against dozens of alleged gang members, only a single case went to trial, resulting in a mistrial. The vast majority of the original 177 cases were dismissed.

[lostnfound]

3. Oops, Thanks! Nt

[USALiberal]

2. Texas loves shootouts! Nt

[Crunchy Frog]

4. It's legal to hunt humans in this country. At least in places like Texas and Florida. n/t

[Shell_Seas]

5. Because they were a bunch of good ol boys.

[lostnfound]

6. Fishy. Seven of one gang died, one of another. Four died by police caliber bullets. A mistrial.

Last edited Thu Apr 4, 2019, 04:12 PM - Edit history (1)

Yet there was video.
Almost like the prosecutors weren’t trying.

https://www.gq.com/story/untold-story-texas-biker-gang-shoot-out

[rusty fender]

7. Disgusting

I guess that justice and the law are just too hard for some prosecutors

[lostnfound]

11. This article was even more interesting. Police were on the scene before it even started.

https://www.gq.com/story/untold-story-texas-biker-gang-shoot-out

The decision to arrest everyone was bizarre

The police were already there as the rest of the clubs arrived that morning. “They're circling like buzzards on a dead deer,” one biker told me. “I look at the people I was riding with, and I said, ‘This don't look right.’ ” Afterward, said the Cossacks' John Wilson, “a Waco spokesman was touting the quick 40-second response time of the police, when that was obviously false. They were here.”

The bikers believe this provides a clue to the Waco P.D.'s ongoing silence: The cops know their response was overzealous, possibly unlawful, and now they're covering it up. Some bikers believe there's an even more sinister explanation: that a firefight of some kind was supposed to happen—that it was all part of a plan by the Waco P.D. to provoke bitter rivals into a public brawl that could be violently crushed and then used as a basis for sweeping RICO indictments.

[moondust]

8. There are a number of states

that I wouldn't even want to drive through if there was any way to avoid it. Liable to get hit by a stray bullet or shot by an asshole with a gun who didn't like the way you changed lanes. Texas is definitely one of them.

[TeamPooka]

9. Texas Justice.

[Kingofalldems]

10. Bikers---Trump supporters.