BIKER NEWS: Biker massacre which killed nine in shoot-out started because of parking rage in breastaurant lot

BIKER NEWS -- It was a gun battle that shocked the nation and left nine people dead, twenty wounded and 177 under arrest.

Now six months since the biker massacre at the Twin Peaks 'breastaurant' in Waco, Daily Mail Online can reveal the immediate cause of the violence - and how police are accused of having allowed it to happen.

Remarkably, nobody has been charged with murder despite the scale of death and injury, and the fact that 177 people were arrested in the immediate aftermath of the massacre.

The background to the shootings can also now be laid bare - and with it come claims that police knew well that a war was in the offing between the two gangs who clashed, the Cossacks and the Bandidos.

Officers had been trailing rival gang members for up to six weeks before the outbreak of deadly violence.

They had cataloged a string of violent outbursts involving guns and knives between the warring factions.

One Cossack had been attacked on Interstate 35 near Waco by 10 rivals with a hammer and a Bandido had his bike stolen at a fuel stop after being attacked with chains and batons.

At least five other incidents had taken place and in the run up to May 17, police were sure a turf war was brewing between the two rival biker gangs.

Police were also aware that many were planning to attend the Waco gathering with guns and other weapons.

Officers had previously been called to disperse the rival bike groups in March at the same Twin Peaks with the Cossacks warning that the 'breastaurant' was in Waco, their territory, so the Bandidos should not be there.

The starting point for the rivalry appeared to be the previous year. 

On December 12 last year ten Bandidos were said to have burst into Gator's Jam Inn Bar in Fort Worth, shot dead Geoff Brady, 41, of Arlington, Texas, and wounded three others.

Brady was a Ghost Rider, who are allies of the Cossacks. Three men, said by police to be Bandidos, are on $100,000 bail after being held on suspicion of that murder.

Then the Cossacks had their meeting place at Mexia, around 50 miles from Waco, burned to the ground in what is believed to have been an arson attack early in the New Year.

The Bandidos had been attempting to elicit payments from Cossacks which had been refused. 

There was also anger among the Bandidos that their hated rivals were wearing badges proclaiming Texas was their rightful home - a direct incitement, they believed.

With this background, a peace summit was called at Twin Peaks by the 12 different districts of the Texas Confederation of Clubs and Independents, which seeks to regulate the groups.

But it was not to be peaceful, and it immediately went wrong over parking rage.

David Martinez, president of the Dallas chapter of the Bandidos, rode his new Harley-Davidson ahead of his gang into the Twins Peak parking lot.

Clifford Pierce, 53, who despite his age, was a Cossacks 'intern' and had been left outside to direct bikers to leave their machines in designated spaces away from the door.

He tried to direct the Bandidos troop to parking spaces away from the main lot, but screamed when Martinez ran his 2015 bike over his foot. Pierce, although later wounded, survived.

His screams caused fellow Cossacks to confront their rivals and a gun battle ensued.

The Bandidos leader produced his weapon and was followed by others as some groups of men dived for cover inside the restaurant while others went on to confront each other.

It is unclear if both groups knew that they were being watched - but in fact police with sniper rifles were on standby and started firing at people they saw brandishing guns or were perceived to be a threat.

Waco officers were in the lead. They say that they had 24 officers present, of whom three opened fire, discharging 12 rounds. But it is unclear how many rounds were fired in total by the multiple law enforcement agencies who were present.

A police affidavit states that police have possession of a video of Martinez firing a gun and he was later arrested in hospital.

The report states that the Cossacks were supported by other bikers from groups called Bogatyrs and Scimitars.

The Bandidos brought along associates from the Desgraciados, Escondidos, Machatcros, Valerosos and Vaqueros. Despite the names, they are not Latino groups.

The shootout lasted only a few minutes with both sides producing knives and knuckle dusters as police also opened fire and the scene afterwards resembled a battlefield with bodies lying in pools of blood.

One father whose son was blasted to death has told Daily Mail Online he would have lived if police hadn't refused him urgent medical attention to his bleeding wounds.

Speaking for the first time, Rick Kirschner,71, revealed his 47-year-old son Richard jr - nicknamed 'Bear' in the motorcycle fraternity - lay dying from three gunshot wounds in his knee, hip and buttocks outside the restaurant for at least 15 minutes before he was taken to hospital.

He died in the ER, because of blood loss from a severed artery.

Kirschner senior said: 'The police could have prevented his death and I still do not know who shot my son. It all adds up to one big cover up.

'He was not a criminal and had never been in trouble. He was only interested in the bikes and loved his children. He was the type of man who went to deliver toys at Christmas to other children.

'One of the hardest things is not knowing who shot him and which gun the bullets came from. There were police bullets from rifles and those from the pistols of those who got involved in the fight.

'But the worst part of it all is that my son would have lived if the police had let him get medical attention.'

Another witness said he went to Kirschner's aid, cradled his head and tried to stem the flow of blood as police ignored his pleas for medics to be allowed to tend the victim.

Richard Luther, 58, said police said they would kill him if he didn't stay lying down and ignored his cries for help for his friend.

'Richard, who we called "Bear", could have been alive if the police hadn't treated us with such anger and fear.'

Luther, a Cossack, father of six and a grandfather to eleven, added: 'I blame the police entirely for the deaths. They could have prevented it because they had prior intel that there could be trouble.

'They only needed to put a few squad cars across the entrance of the Twin Peaks parking lot and people would have gone away.

'They could have prevented the meeting if they knew the Bandidos were going to cause trouble. But instead they were ready with all the rifles and other guns ready to shoot.'

Luther said he saw the start of the trouble which was to end in a blood bath.

He said: 'One of the Bandidos' sergeant at arms rode in and wanted a parking spot right at the front for his bike.

'We had a prospect [junior bike group member] watching the bikes and spaces and this guy drove over his foot.

'I heard him yell and then fall to the ground. Some of the Cossacks and Bandidos got into a fist fight and then there were two or three pistol pops followed quickly by a barrage of rifle fire.

'The police were set up all over the place, but we didn't know that at the time. It was like being in a war zone with all the bullets flying as my friends and I hit the concrete.

'The pistol bullets were louder and the rifle fire had been suppressed and flew over us with a "puff" sound. I could tell which was which and the police have since confirmed their rifles had suppressors attached.

'There was two-and-a-half minutes of solid gun fire around me with people dropping everywhere to the ground. I heard people screaming after being shot.

'Some people ran for their lives while I crawled on my stomach and managed to make it inside the restaurant.

'After a couple of minutes the police came in and shouted at us that if we stood up they would "f****** kill" us.

'When it went quiet outside, they made us stand, put our hands on our heads and marched us out.

'It was then that I saw Bear [Richard Kirschner] on the ground. The blood was pouring out of him and me and two other guys tried to help him.

'One of them got his belt and tied it around his knee which was where most of the blood was coming from.

'Bear said to me "I can't breathe", but I told him to relax and we were going to help him and get him help. 'I kept yelling at the police to get the medics, but they refused and told us to leave him.'

Kirschner, who was around six foot five and 280lbs was put in the back of a pick-up truck and eventually a police officer took him to hospital in it. 

'We had to throw him onto the pick up like a piece of meat. The blood was oozing out of him and I was consumed with terror,' he said.

Luther was later arrested with 176 others and taken to a holding cell and then transferred to a detention center and was in custody for 33 days, sharing a cell at times with seven other people.

The businessman, who has a music degree and received a goodwill message from singer Usher, was released without charge.

His first-person description of what happened is the first detailed account to emerge.

Silence over the case has come from two directions. On the one hand, many of those arrested have either been advised by attorneys not to discuss what happened, or followed 'biker law' by refusing to speak.

And police and other law enforcement bodies are now subject to a gagging order imposed at the end of June by a district judge, because of the impaneling of a grand jury.

The grand jury has yet to bring a single charge but it has plenty to consider. 

The nine dead were eight Cossack members and one Bandido, Manuel Issac Rodriguez, 40, who was shot in the head and back.

Police said 475 weapons were seized and the number included 151 firearms. Other weapons recovered included knives, brass knuckles, batons, tomahawks, a hatchet, stun guns, bats, clubs, a machete, a pipe, an ax, pepper spray and a chain.

However the official silence has caused concern among some relatives that there is a cover-up of police conduct both in the run-up to the shootings and during the massacre itself. 

William Boyett, whose identical twin brother Daniel was one of the dead told Daily Mail Online: 'The whole thing stinks of a cover up with the police trying to buy time so that people forget.'

Sgt Patrick Swanton, of Waco police, declined to answer any detailed questions on the massacre, citing the gagging order but said: 'There has been absolutely no cover up. That is a falsehood.

'It is important that people do know that there is still much to do in the investigative side.

'The judge's gag order means we cannot respond or update until things are brought to the courts.'

Before the judge's gag order, Waco police went on the record to insist officers showed discretion while opening fire.

'We did not fire indiscriminately into the crowd. Our officers were restrained,' Waco Police chief Brent Stroman said in June.

Kirschner snr said: 'I loved my son and I miss him every day. He had never been in trouble with the police and his life has been wasted.

'He could and should have lived. At the very least the police must face a lot of questions and provide a lot of answers.'

This article was first published on 9 November 2015

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