Posted on 11/10/2015 2:44:58 PM PST by Elderberry
Update, 11:12 a.m.: Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Frazier entered the locked district attorney’s office and walked toward the grand jury chambers. He left a few minutes later and said on his way out that his presence had nothing to do with the grand jury.
Original story: A McLennan County grand jury is considering evidence this morning from the May 17 Twin Peaks shootout that left nine bikers dead and 20 wounded.
For the first time ever, the grand jury is meeting in a newly renovated room in the district attorney’s office on the fourth floor of the courthouse annex.
The new grand jury chambers is behind locked doors, unlike the chambers traditionally used for decades on the fourth floor of the McLennan County Courthouse.
District Attorney Abel Reyna and prosecutors Michael Jarrett and Amanda Dillon left the grand jury chambers about 10 a.m. when the panel took a break.
Dillon declined comment about the grand jury proceedings, which by law are conducted in secret.
Grand juries in McLennan County routinely meet twice a month on Wednesdays. But, because Wednesday is Veterans Day, the grand jury was asked to meet Tuesday.
If the grand jury wasn’t going to meet until the next regular meeting on Nov. 18, that would be more than six months after the bikers were arrested and possibly set off a flurry of motions from attorneys seeking relief for their clients.
The Code of Criminal Procedure allows defendants who remain in jail 90 days and who are not indicted the right to ask for personal recognizance bonds or reduced bonds that they can make. Most of the bikers had been freed within the 90 days, so the issue only applied in a few cases.
But attorneys for defendants not indicted within 180 days can file motions asking that all charges be dismissed and that all bond conditions be removed, including curfews, ankle monitors and travel and association restrictions.
That does not preclude prosecutors from indicting defendants at the next grand jury session or subsequent meetings.
Attorneys for bikers have been critical of McLennan County officials over the way most every aspect of the case has been handled so far, including the mass arrests of the bikers on identical arrest warrant affidavits, the initial setting of $1 million bonds for each of them and the fact that a Waco police detective was randomly selected as a grand jury member and appointed foreman by a judge.
The grand jury over which the detective presided has since run its course and was replaced by the current grand jury, which includes a combat veteran as foreman and a Waco attorney as a member.
The new grand jury was seated Oct. 14. Prosecutors subpoenaed the president of the Bandidos motorcycle group’s Austin chapter to appear before the new grand jury but settled for his records from a motorcycle confederation instead.
The wheels of justice grind exceedingly slow and fine.
Is the Waco LEO still the Jury Foreman?
No, that was the previous grand jury.
Cop sniper party.
They got super happy and shooty.
They were JUST WHITE MEN, no media care.
tick....tock....tick....tock....
Thank you for the info.
Thanks! A long read though.
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