Guardian article

Cliffs:

Big regularly scheduled Texas biker meeting

Brawl erupts between members of Cossacks and Bandidos gangs

Police descend

Everybody starts shooting at everybody else

9 members of Cossacks and Bandidos dead (all gunshots)

170 arrested, may face Felony Murder charges as part of "criminal conspiracy"

Police claim to have found over 1000 weapons

No idea at this time how many (if any) were shot by police vs shot by each other

Wasn't this like a week ago? This thread just seems a bit late.

It was Sunday

Poppa,

Was kinda surprised nobody started a thread about this. Crazy story. Sounds like there'll be plenty more to keep this relevant over the coming weeks/months.

South Park had it right about bikers.

If Texas actually pursues 100+ felony murder charges due to this I'd say that adds a whole new dimension to the story. The article is kind of vague but if what they're implying is even remotely possible it sounds like this shooting may spawn >100 death penalty cases alone.

The shootout led to 170 arrests on charges of “engaging in organized criminal activity” linked to capital murder, which in Texas can carry the death penalty.

I'm fairly confident they'll let most of the people who weren't active shooters plea down to lesser charges but who knows.

Felony murder rules on their own are pretty dodgy in my opinion. On paper it sounds like a great idea but in practice you get a lot of iffy cases. I'm not sure that some random Biker who was taking a piss when the shooting started should be facing the needle, even if he is a ****head and knew a brawl/shootout was going to go down.

morons

Wac(k)os

lol bikers. such losers.

If Texas has fairly expansive self defense laws, I'd assume everyone will plead self defense.

"That biker pulled a gun, so I defended myself " X 170

thugs ghana thug

Back in my day, the Banditos were peaceful Frito-loving types.

My general rule of thumb is that any adult who states that they have an enemy or enemies is probably a ****ing idiot.

Perhaps Howard or some other resident lawyer can explain why RICO charges cannot be brought en masse against members of 1% gangs. Sometimes that whole "freedom of association" clause in the 1st amendment is a real bitch.

Ashleigh Banfield was on TV claiming that text messages or voice mails planning any sort of organized violence would definitely open the door to felony murder charges.

She seems to have gotten quite bloodthirsty on law & order issues.

I never got this "tuf guy" mentality. I thought that **** went away once Fonzie was no longer on TV.

How in the hell did police manage to corral and arrest 170 of them? Were they sleeping?

The police confiscated 1,000 weapons? Sounds like the majority were non-violent, even if they were carrying.

Gang members are violent by definition.

The police were there in force before the shooting even started. They knew the meeting was taking place and seemed ready for violence (and arrests).


I think hundreds of others fled and discarded weapons as they went (or the idiots are counting steak knives from the restaurant as "weapons" in order to sensationalize the arrests).

Even the Sugar Hill Gang?

They started out with 18 officers and several state troopers. Not nearly enough if 170 of those arrested had actively participated in shooting. Sounds to me like they rounded up a bunch of stragglers.

pretty crazy, and good obviously.

saw something about "police waco gang" and thought it was going to be the number of officers killed and it turns out that number is 0 but one of the members was a former officer.

I'm not a criminal lawyer, but my guess is that RICO may also be viable here. That said, my immediate reaction is that felony murder is an easier sell to a jury. For those that don't know what it is, the basic idea is that if someone dies during the commission of a felony, the felon can get hit with a murder charge. I wasn't aware that felony murder in Texas can carry the death penalty; I'd guess that's going to be a hard sell to a jury for bike gang members that can plausibly say they were uninvolved with any actual shooting.

To the guy that took the first shot, not so much -- WTF did he think would happen, that he'd intimidate the **** out of the opposing gang and they'd all run away? Taking a shot there is like lighting a fuse on a keg of dynamite.

Crazy case. Glad I didn't start the fracas by having my Korean date say "Nice bike!" to the wrong guy.

howard,

everything in texas can carry the death sentence.

I haven't followed it too closely but my understanding is that they had officers (including some swat) with automatic rifles in position. Once a shot was fired the cops opened up. That scenario makes a large surrender much more reasonable.