Posted on 06/17/2016 7:21:57 PM PDT by Elderberry
Two Waco police officers who are unavailable to testify Monday have forced the postponement of a hearing at which a biker arrested in the Twin Peaks shootout is seeking to disqualify McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna from prosecuting the cases.
The hearing, originally set for Monday in Waco’s 54th State District Court, was rescheduled Friday for Aug. 8.
Houston attorney Abigail Anastasio, who represents biker Ray Nelson, filed the motion in March, saying Reyna and two of his top assistants, Michael Jarrett and Mark Parker, should be disqualified because they could be potential witnesses in the case.
Anastasio charges that Reyna overstepped his authority by “commandeering” the investigation on the evening of the shootout.
“There is a big difference between advising and commandeering,” Anastasio said after filing the motion.
Nelson, 42, is president of the Hill County Cossacks and one of 154 bikers indicted in the May 17, 2015, shootout at Twin Peaks in Waco that left nine bikers dead and more than 20 wounded.
“They started calling the shots,” Anastasio said. “They were the ones who determined the course of the investigation, what steps to be taken next, without law enforcement having a significant role in that.”
Anastasio amended her motion Thursday to assert that Reyna also should be disqualified because he is a named defendant in civil lawsuits filed by 13 bikers in federal court in Austin and therefore has a pecuniary interest in the outcome of the cases.
Reyna asked Waco attorney Brandon Luce, who until two months ago was an assistant district attorney in Reyna’s office, to represent his office in the motion hearing.
Luce filed a response to Anastasio’s motion on Thursday, challenging her allegations and saying she had not met the “heightened burden” to disqualify an elected district attorney.
Officers subpoenaed
Anastasio subpoenaed Waco Assistant Police Chief Robert Lanning, Waco police Sgt. J.R. Price, Detective Manuel Chavez and Detective Mike Alston to testify at the hearing. Price and Chavez are not available Monday, Anastasio said. She also subpoenaed Reyna, Jarrett and Parker.
The motion alleges that Reyna arrived at the Waco Convention Center after the shootout and changed the scope of the investigation by insisting that everyone linked to the Cossacks, Bandidos or any of their support groups be arrested and charged with first-degree felony engaging in organized criminal activity.
Before Reyna and his assistants arrived, Waco police and other agencies had questioned, identified and processed a busload of bikers and released them from the Waco Convention Center. After Reyna arrived, the remaining bikers went to jail, the motion states.
“This interview with the district attorney’s office changed the scope and course of the investigation,” the motion alleges. “The decisions involved were made not by the law enforcement officers, but by the above prosecutors (and possibly others within that office). The affidavit supporting arrest was not written according to the facts noted by any individual officer, but by the district attorney’s office.”
WTF? More delay of Justice by the Public Servants?
Boy they are swell and all about the delay of law (Justice is typically way different from the rule of Law)
How do the BATFE, other Feds and Tex. PoPos figure into this?
How convenient eh! The corruption in Waco runs extremely deep.
One could say Waco gives Texas a major black eye.
Hey Texas! Are you still one of the good guys or not! Now is the time to prove it. Keep going down this path and you prove to the rest of the country you are not worthy of being a state then no one will care if you secede.
The ball is squarely in your court.
BTW; all anyone wants is true justice for those who did wrong. No cover ups. This country is so cover up weary after 8 years of it; we need truth and justice to balance things out again eh.
TG; don’t even go there...
IBTG
I pretend tg does not exist.lol
He’s becoming a FR meme...
Reyna should be concentrating on trying and convicting those responsible for those killed at Twin Peaks. Nelson may well be one of those who should tried and convicted. But instead, Reyna has played a political game insisting that wearing motorcycle gang garb makes someone guilty, and those who weren’t wearing any motorcycle club gear are guilty also. And, don’t forget those who weren’t wearing any motorcycle duds and traveled to Twin Peaks in an automobile, they are guilty too.
Reyna should never be allowed in a courtroom, except as a defendant.
“One could say Waco gives Texas a major black eye.”
Yes, and it has for a number of years, but it isn’t alone in being a turd in Texas’ Legal “Treatment Pond!” Austin, Houston, Dallas, and SA are all on the “short list.”
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