Free Republic

If the DA takes the witness stand in additional disqualification hearings, he will no doubt find himself answering questions about his utterance of a falsehood on the witness stand, something the law defines as aggravated perjury, a felony crime. The defense bar representing clients in the Twin Peaks cases is eagerly awaiting two hearings scheduled in the cases of at least 10 defendants who seek to disqualify the elected Criminal District Attorney, Abel Reyna, on grounds of multiple acts of criminal misconduct. According to Gary D. Smart, an Arlington attorney, 19th Criminal District Judge Ralph T. Strother has scheduled hearings...

An Arlington lawyer said Thursday his client welcomes an opportunity to have McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna testify at an open hearing set for March 1. Gary D. Smart, who represents Raymond Hawes, III, has filed a motion to recuse Reyna, and he says 11 other lawyers who represent bikers have also filed motions seeking Reyna's dismissal from prosecuting still more Twin Peaks trials. Smart said his, and several other similar motions, are set for hearing before 19th District Judge Ralph Strother on March 1 and any testimony offered that day could involve both current and former prosecutors and...

With McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna desperately dumping Twin Peaks biker cases right and left in recent days, the astonished taxpayer must demand honesty of himself if not of Reyna: Does anyone really believe Reyna has suddenly been struck by an epiphany that has stubbornly eluded him in the three years since the May 17, 2015, biker shootout that left nine dead and 20 wounded? -this epiphany has to do with political odds, not any interest in justice. And it must have been some epiphany. Reyna is credited with hijacking a Waco police murder investigation in 2015 and throwing...

An attorney for one of the bikers indicted in the deadly 2015 Twin Peaks shootout said it appears the "Twin Peaks dam" is starting to break with the dismissal of charges against 13 bikers Thursday. Meanwhile, the same attorney, Brian Bouffard, said McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna only dropped the cases in a show of "moral cowardice by an elected official" to avoid adverse testimony at a scheduled Thursday hearing to disqualify his office. Two district judges signed orders submitted to them by the DA's office Thursday morning dismissing charges against 13 bikers arrested in the May 17, 2015,...

Attorneys for two Twin Peaks shootout bikers are seeking sanctions against McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna, claiming a last-minute motion offered Monday to remove Judge Ralph Strother from the case was improperly "filed for nakedly political purposes." Fort Worth attorneys Brian Bouffard, who represents Cossack Jorge Daniel Salinas, and David Conrad Beyer, who represents Cossack Billy McCree, charge in motions filed Tuesday that the state's motion to recuse Strother was "baseless, made in bad faith and caused significant hardships" to those who traveled from out of town for the hearing. "The state’s recusal motion was filed only seconds after...

Six Shooter Junction – Paula has questions; she can’t get the answers. They’re all about who shot who – with what weapon – at Twin Peaks Restaurant on May 17, 2015, and thereby prevented a political meeting by activist bikers because of the colors of the patches on their jackets. The cops protected the public. This way, the public might never had had to learn that the State of Texas collected $13.5 million for motorcycle safety, and then refused to release the funds for the Texas Department of Public Safety to use for the stated purpose they had been collected...

McLennan County will ask the state to reimburse $600,000 in costs associated with the first trial stemming from the deadly shootout in 2015 at the Twin Peaks restaurant in Waco. The county received about $270,000 in October 2016 from the state’s County Essential Services Program, primarily for costs incurred the day of the incident and shortly thereafter, including housing people at the Jack Harwell Detention Center. At the same time, the city of Waco received almost $250,000 from the U.S. Department of Justice. County commissioners agreed Tuesday to reapply for the state program. County Administrator Dustin Chapman said the reimbursement...

A week after Twin Peaks defendant George Bergman rejected a plea offer for misdemeanor deferred probation and demanded his day in court, his attorney and the McLennan County District Attorney's Office agreed to postpone the trial. In a joint motion filed late Thursday afternoon, prosecutor Michael Jarrett and Dallas attorney Clint Broden asked 54th State District Judge Matt Johnson to postpone Bergman's trial at least 180 days. The judge granted the motion. The motion states only that the postponement is not sought for purposes of delay but so that "justice is done." However, Johnson said the attorneys told him they...

Barrister Casie Gotro, who battled the powers that be in Waco to a take nothing judgment in the case against Dallas Bandidos President Jake Carrizal, got her report card. She “doesn’t play well” with some men who think they are very important. Had she fared better with them, her client could have been found not guilty, rather than receiving a mistrial due to a hung jury. The amazing thing is, the powers that be never really presented any evidence that Jake Carrizal participated in a conspiracy to engage in organized crime that led to capital murder and/or aggravated assault on...

Prosecutors, defense counsel and the defendant had just emerged from the judge’s chambers in 54th Criminal District Court when F. Clinton Broden told the judge he wanted to put it on the record his client Scooter Bergman had rejected a plea offer proffered by the DA. All ears were on the dialog. At one point, when Broden brought up discovery problems in the previous Twin Peaks jury trial of Bandido Jake Carrizal, lead prosecutor Michael Jarret began saying, “You Honor, I must object,” when Judge Matt Johnson said in a sarcastic tone, “You are saying there were no problems with...

A senior judge granted a motion Wednesday to remove 54th State District Judge Matt Johnson from presiding over the case of a biker indicted in the May 2015 Twin Peaks shootout in Waco. Senior Judge Jeff Walker, a former state district judge from Tarrant County, approved a request from William Chance Aikin to recuse Johnson, saying there is a possibility that McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna, Johnson’s former law partner, could be called as a witness in Aikin’s case. Broden, Callahan and other Twin Peaks attorneys have alleged Reyna hijacked the investigation, usurping the authority of seasoned police officials...

A new motion filed in McLennan County claims that McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna withheld evidence during the Twin Peaks' trial for Christopher Jacob Carrizal. During a criminal trial, both the prosecution and the defense are required to release all evidence, and interviews – this process is called discovery. The motion asks that during the next trial with Burton George Bergman, that the court determine if the prosecution withheld evidence and, if so, how much it withheld. The claim said that Burton George Bergman, a biker accused in the Twin Peaks shootout, had recordings with the Texas Attorney General's...

A Waco attorney said in a sworn affidavit that one of her clients in 2014 told an FBI agent investigating McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna that "he personally delivered cocaine for Reyna's use." The affidavit from former McLennan County prosecutor Brittany Scaramucci was filed Thursday to support motions from Twin Peaks shootout bikers Jorge Daniel Salinas and Billy Jason McCree, who are asking judges to compel Reyna's office to provide evidence in the Twin Peaks cases. Scaramucci's affidavit also alleges that Reyna arranged to have an attorney appointed special prosecutor in cases in which he recused his office "for...

McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna should be disqualified from prosecuting the Twin Peaks cases because he usurped police authority by charging the bikers en masse, he has a financial interest in the outcome and he hopes the notoriety will springboard him into state office, an attorney for one of the bikers argued Tuesday. In a brief hearing Tuesday, Dallas attorney Clint Broden sought to recuse 54th State District Judge Matt Johnson from presiding over a hearing in which he will seek to disqualify Reyna and his office from handling the case of former biker Burton George Bergman. Johnson declined...

For months, District Attorney Abel Reyna and his staff made clear they were champing at the bit to try strapping, 35-year-old Dallas Bandidos chieftain and locomotive engineer Jake Carrizal before any of the other bikers rounded up after the deadly 2015 shootout at Waco’s Twin Peaks restaurant and watering hole. Consequently, many of us in the peanut gallery leaned closer to better understand, perchance appreciate, Reyna’s strategy of legally pursuing 154 bikers on identical organized crime charges, as opposed to the more discriminating capital murder charges Waco police originally contemplated. So much for that idea. The Nov. 10 mistrial only...

At eight minutes after four yesterday afternoon, McLennan County, Texas District Attorney Abelino Reyna filed a motion to quash a hearing Monday at which he and three other members of his office – Michael Jarrett, Amanda Dillon and Heather Nering – have been subpoenaed to appear. The hearing was scheduled because Dallas Attorney Clint Broden intends to call Reyna as a witness in the trial of his client, former Scimitar Motorcycle Club member Matthew Clendennen. Broden thinks Reyna’s testimony may be impeachable. The Scimitars are a support club for the Cossacks Motorcycle Club. On May 17, 2015 Cossacks crashed a...

Waco – Rolando Reyes asked the judge to disqualify the elected Criminal District Attorney in the case against him, a charge of engaging in organized criminal activity filed on Sunday, May 17, 2015, following his arrest at Twin Peaks Restaurant. The motion drafted by his attorney former Galveston District Judge Susan Criss is adamant about Reyna’s allegedly biased and criminal role in his administration prior to the Twin Peaks affair, as revealed in an affidavit filed by Greg Davis, a former lead prosecutor from Reyna’s office. Reyes is one of a trio of defendants including Matt Clendennen and Paul Landers...

In the criminal justice system, the district attorney has more far-reaching powers than any other figure, given that some 95 percent of felony convictions arise from guilty pleas, resulting in prosecutorial discretion rather than that of judges or juries. Thus it’s critical that whoever occupies the post of district attorney be beyond reproach on all ethical and moral levels. And that’s why the sworn affidavit by one of McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna’s former prosecutors should be exceedingly worrisome to every law-abiding citizen. Greg Davis, a veteran prosecutor who put 18 people on death row before going to work...

A pre-trial motions hearing for Dallas Bandido Christopher Jake Carrizal is set for March 16, 2018. The motion was filed on Monday. Channel 6 Legal Expert Liz Mitchell said, in theory, the role of Carrizal's trial in the series of Twin Peaks biker trials was supposed to set the precedent for how the other 153 bikers would be handled. Mitchell said generally the state would want to begin with the case they deemed to be a lock. In other words, prosecutors would lead with the case most promising of securing a life sentence. Then, the other bikers would see what...

WACO – In a sworn affidavit, former lead prosecutor Greg Davis of the McLennan County District Attorney’s Office details item for item the allegations he made as early as 2014 in a federal probe of official misconduct by elected Criminal DA Abel Reyna. Davis met with FBI Special Agent Dan Burst to outline his concerns of factual allegations regarding favoritism shown political supporters in dropping serious cases; the extensive use of special prosecutors to soft soap cases that demanded their day in court; a pre-trial intervention program that is a transparent wash in serious offenses committed by repeat offenders, many...