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If you thought violent biker gangs were a relic of the Altamont era, the shootout at a Waco, Texas, restaurant on May 17 might have come as a shock. A long-simmering beef between the Bandidos and Cossacks boiled over into gunfire. When police arrived at the scene, gang members shot at them too, leaving nine bikers dead, 18 people injured, and 170 suspects in police custody. Over 100 weapons have been confiscated. The scale of this incident dwarfs a typical urban gang confrontation, says Harold Pollack, co-director of the University of Chicago Crime Lab and an expert on gangs and...

MCLENNAN COUNTY - Law enforcement officials from across the country met at McLennan Community College for four days for a private conference about policing the growth of motorcycle gangs. The conference, put on by the Midwest Outlaw Motorcycle Gang Investigators Association out of St. Louis, MO, was scheduled before the Twin Peaks shooting May 17 after investigators saw rising tensions between motorcycle gangs on the rise in Central Texas. "We do a considerable amount of talking about these confederations and coalitions... and try to make them understand a little bit the motives behind these is other than what they advertise,"...

WACO, Texas (AP) — Texas officers responding to a deadly melee outside a biker gathering in Waco had disabled their automatic rifles so the weapons couldn't fire more than one round per trigger pull, the city's police department said Friday, countering witnesses who said they heard what sounded like gunfire from automatic weapons. Only three of the nearly two dozen officers outside the Twin Peaks restaurant fired their weapons, shooting a total of 12 bullets, after gunfire erupted following a dispute between two rival biker gangs, according to Waco Police Chief Brent Stroman and statements released by his office. The...

Twin Peaks Update #3 I’ve been asked for a timeline of the events leading up to the Twin Peaks Incident. In Mid-March, Waco PD personnel became aware of rising tensions between the Bandidos and Cossacks in the state and the Waco area. The two gangs, as classified by the Texas Department of Public Safety Gang Intel Unit, were increasing their violence against each other. It was reported that the increase was due to the Cossacks wearing a “Texas rocker patch” on their vests. As all of the violent events between these individuals has already been reported in detail and in...

Media Release #1022 CNN Releases Alleged Twin Peaks Video/Photos In reference to the CNN release of video and crime scene photographs that appear to be from the Twin Peaks Incident, neither Waco Police Department nor the McLennan County District Attorney Office released those to any media outlets. CNN has stated that “they” put the Waco Police Department graphic at the top of the video which indicated we released it. Again, we did not. They have now removed that graphic as the video is not attributed to us and CNN is in the process of updating their sites. There is a...