Posted on 12/08/2015 10:37:19 AM PST by Elderberry
WACO _ Clifford Pearce, the biker who police had placed at the center of the Twin Peaks deadly clash, but for months had not been charged with a crime, is paralyzed.
While sitting in a wheelchair, Pearce rolled up a ramp an into a Waco courtroom Monday. untitled
Clifford Pearce
He pleaded not guilty to a McLennan County indictment alleging he engaged in organized crime as part of a clash between the Cossacks and Bandidos motorcycle clubs.
It was the first time Pearce made a public appearance since the May melee
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.chron.com ...
Likely cartridge cases. Either someone's rifle slings brass all over, or there were 2, maybe 3 shooters up on that berm, just in the part covered by the image.
Somehow I doubt they were bikers.
This whole case stinks to high heaven.
Strange how they can charge people that don’t even belong to the same organizations with criminal conspiracy. Yet they give the slimes a pass, even though the ALL follow the same rule book/colors!
It has been rank on ice from day one.
Check out the first image at the link for the post.
Some might remember that he is one of those I endeavored to engender sympathy for months ago, before he was on the radar screen of many commentators here. It is fine to be concerned about civil liberties of those arrested; this guy was not originally arrested so was then not on that radar screen; it is fine to attest sympathy for those killed and their families as I have also attempted to do; he was not killed, but is now handicapped for life. I attempted to engender sympathy for his fate.
His presence in the parking lot was, by many accounts, the precipitating event of the melee that broke out. Whether his foot was run over or whether as he said from his hospital bed, he merely did not get out of the way fast enough, his fall in front of the bike of David Martinez and his arriving Bandidos and confederates is what precipitated the numerous Cossacks staged on the patio to rush to his defense, and other Bandidos and associates to rush to the defense of their “disrespected” Bandido President.
Some say that LE in Cossack ranks initiated the melee, but it seems to have gone to all Hades the moment Pearce was confronted by Martinez on his bike as he and the Bandidos arrived. Didn’t require any further “instigation.”
May justice be obtained especially for the dead and wounded.
May Pearce’s testimony enlighten us.
May no group expect such sacrifice for the “disrespect” of a biker leader. That is my final take. Pearce’s infirmary and the dead and their families, should not have been asked for such extreme sacrifice to defend the respect of the club or gang or whatever term is proper to use nor for any Club President. There is blame to go around, but the biker gang culture has no small part in this, and it seems to me at this point in the discovery process, the major part.
Agree with your synopsis, but I just blame the cops.
“but I just blame the cops.”
Any cop who did wrong should be subject to the full extent of the law. We all agree on that.
But some on these threads, hold that the biker clubs, gangs, whatever, should be held harmless for attacks between their members on others and the subsequent death and injury.
I sense that the devotion to club caused not a little unnecessary suffering.
I tried to think of an analogy. My husband played handball. If he and his partners engaged another hand ball club, it would not be justified for the club members to be “offended” or to try to take each other down with fisticuffs much less handguns. I am beyond coming up with a comparison. The biker community is in some way unique, so I do not hold them harmless for calling their members to be subject to injury or death.
These are not get together on weekends to go for a cruise folks, these are gangs... drug runners, prostitution, extortion the whole nine yards they are organized crime, and the attempt by those on this site to try to spin them as just innocent victims out on holiday when gunned down by an overly militarized police force is ludicrous.
These guys weren’t just a few old dogs cruising on their bikes looking for chicken wings. These were members of 2 criminal organizations who went after each other.
If cops broke the law, prosecute them, but to play this as they are all just innocent victims of an overzealous police force is nonsense.
I Live in Pittsburgh, the local gang here is the Pagans. Everyone knows it, no one that rides with their colors knows full well what they are and what they do, to try to play them off as just some innocent folks at a restaurant is laughable. If you are riding with a gang, you know damned well you are riding with a gang.
We all know if it had been one of the bikers', Swanton would have been blathering on and on about it for weeks on end.
True, that.
“If cops broke the law, prosecute them, but to play this as they are all just innocent victims of an overzealous police force is nonsense.”
...
I have to agree. The broken bodies, the broken lives, the broken families . . . that is the price “belonging” apparently requires. I can’t accept that for the victims, even if somehow they “accepted” it for themselves before hand. They had no right to put that burden on their families. There are indeed no small number of them who knew they were “riding with a gang.” I don’t know how that plays out with the conspiracy charge which is legitimately hard to prove. Yet there were no few who knew why were they were riding to TP that day.
To complete your ‘analogy’, nor would you expect those handball players who were not involved in your melee example to be arrested and charged for their mere presence in something they had no involvement, would you?
Yet you deem it reasonable and not a violation of constitutional rights that citizens were arrested and charged en mass at Waco Twin Peaks.
There are serious constitutional violations at Waco whether 177 handballers or bikers were arrested.
Judging by the actions of law enforcement and the judicial arm, something stinks in Denmark and it is not the cheese.
Next paragraph in the Incident report: Page 2 Second paragraph: While we were crossing the sidewalk to the rear of Twin Peaks there were still shots being fired and I could hear ricochets from fired rounds in the area around us. As I was scanning people in the parking lot I saw a white male that was wearing a Cossack's patch on his vest running FROM the patio area that I will refer to as the AD corner of the restaurant towards the S JH Kutlgen / IH 35 Frontage road and up the hill to the frontage road. I knew that was the area that Officer Bucher and Jackson were in. The male had a black pistol in his right hand and began raising it up pointing towards the crowd that he had just run from on the AD corner of the business. I began aiming at this person to fire and I saw two other officers going towards his location and then the subject dropped his pistol and continued running towards the frontage road. I made an announcement over the radio that the subject had just dropped a hand gun on top of the hill to the officers there were going towards him and then continued towards Mr. Allen and Mr. Battey with Officer Fischer.
It’s very nice of you to have such consideration for the wounded. However, you fail to consider the autopsies do not bear out the alleged events. The autopsies fail to corroborate the narrative we have been expected to believe.
The video also fails to corroborate the prosecution narrative.
Darn that nasty criminal camera technology.
I have never been a fan of RICO-type laws.
Have you seen video?
For some reason, even though it is required by law (and the case cannot go to trial) the prosecutor is refusing to release the video.
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