New details in Waco biker shootout that left 9 dead

A shootout among rival motorcycle gangs at a popular Central Texas restaurant left nine bikers people dead and 18 injured, and it sent panicked patrons and bystanders fleeing for safety, a police spokesman said Sunday. More than 170 people were arrested.

The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission today ordered the restaurant to remain closed for a week to prevent retaliatory violence, and the Twin Peaks chain revoked the franchise.

The violence erupted shortly after noon at a busy Waco shopping center along Interstate 35 that draws a large lunchtime crowd. Waco police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton said eight people died at the scene of the shooting at Twin Peaks restaurant and another person died at a hospital.

The nine killed were all members of biker gangs, he said, as were the 18 people who were taken to hospitals with injuries that include stab and gunshot wounds. Some victims are being treated for both, he said.

“This is probably one of the most gruesome crime scenes I’ve ever seen in my 34 years of law enforcement,” Swanton said, later adding, “I was amazed that we didn’t have innocent civilians killed or injured.”

Dozens of motorcycles were parked in a nearby lot Sunday. Bodies were found in the parking lot of Twin Peaks and in another adjacent lot for a family restaurant.

“Dozens” of suspected gang members have been detained, Swanton said.

Swanton said at least five rival gangs gathered at Twin Peaks for a meeting that he said focused on turf and recruitment, two areas where the groups have often clashed. Preliminary findings indicate a dispute broke out in a bathroom and then spilled into the restaurant where it escalated to include knives and firearms, he said. There were 150 to 200 gang members inside the restaurant at the time.

Police were aware of the meeting in advance, and at least 12 Waco officers in addition to state troopers were outside the restaurant, part of a national chain that features scantily clad waitresses, when the fight began. Officers shot armed bikers, Swanton said, adding that the actions of law enforcement prevented further deaths. It was not known if any of the nine dead were killed by police officers.

Swanton said that the restaurant’s operators also were aware of the meeting in advance, and he described the management as uncooperative with authorities.

“Apparently the management (of Twin Peaks) wanted them here and so we didn’t have any say-so on whether they could be here or not,” Swanton said.

Multiple attempts to contact Twin Peaks for comment were not immediately successful.

Three armed gang members were later arrested when they attempted to enter the shooting scene to retaliate against rival members, Swanton said. Officers with numerous law enforcement agencies were seen parked along the service road for I-35 near the city and were stationed in several points in downtown Waco around the local convention center. Swanton said authorities are increasing security in the area to prevent further violence among the gangs.

Swanton declined to identify the gangs, but many men wearing vests inscribed with the words “Bandidos” or “Cossacks” were seen in the area.

In addition to local and state police, agents from the FBI and federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were also at the scene about an hour and a half south of Dallas.

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Police knew there could be trouble and had officers on the scene even before five rival bike gangs began shooting and stabbing each other, in a brawl that spilled into the adjacent parking lot of several family-friendly businesses, police said.

By the time the melee at the Waco, Texas, Twin Peaks restaurant was finished, at least nine people were dead, 17 were hospitalized and the arrest tally soared into “the 170s,” Waco police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton said.

What police saw was more brutal than what they’d anticipated — and that might be an understatement. Swanton said in his 35 years of law enforcement experience, “this is the most violent and gruesome scene that I have dealt with.”

The scores of suspects locked up in the McLellan County Jail on Monday morning face charges of engaging in organized crime in connection with the shootout, Swanton said.

Prosecutors and investigators could elect to level other charges, including capital murder, he said, but the organized crime charge is “pretty serious.”

“It doesn’t get much more significant than that,” he said.

Franchise revoked

The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission shut down the Twin Peaks restaurant in Waco for the next week, Swanton said. But it wasn’t a punitive measure, he said; rather, it was shut down because there’s “enough of a reason to believe that more violence would occur there, had they been allowed to remain open for the next seven-day period,” he said.

Later Monday morning, the commission said it was suspending the restaurant’s liquor license for those seven days while its agents investigate what happened. The investigation could yield anything from a fine to the permanent revocation of Twin Peaks’ liquor license, commission spokesman Chris Porter said.

There have been no previous complaints or actions taken against the eatery, he added.

Twin Peaks’ corporate management initially issued a statement offering condolences but later sided with police, who Swanton said had warned the restaurant’s managers of the potential for violence and sought their cooperation in staving it off, to no avail.

“We are in the people business and the safety of the employees and guests in our restaurants is priority one,” the restaurant statement read. “Unfortunately the management team of the franchised restaurant in Waco chose to ignore the warnings and advice from both the police and our company, and did not uphold the high security standards we have in place to ensure everyone is safe at our restaurants.”

It further said the corporate office would be “revoking their franchise agreement immediately. Our sympathies continue to be with the families of those who died and are very thankful no employees, guests, police officers or bystanders were hurt or injured. “

The Waco restaurant’s Facebook account, which had been a landing page for harsh criticism of the franchise, was deleted shortly thereafter.

From fists to knives to guns

It all began in broad daylight — around noon Sunday, at the restaurant known for scantily clad servers and “bike nights.”

The fracas apparently started inside the restaurant’s bathroom with something as simple as a shove or a disrespectful glance, authorities told CNN affiliate KTVT.

That brawl quickly escalated into a fistfight, which led to a knife fight, KTVT said.

The brouhaha spilled into the parking lot, where the gunfire erupted, Swanton said.

Bullets flew toward police, who returned fire. No officers were wounded, and all of the dead and injured are believed to be bikers, Swanton said.

He declined to identify the biker gangs involved. By the time the scene cleared, CNN affiliate KWTX said, authorities had recovered more than 100 weapons.

‘We expected issues’

Swanton said five rival gangs showed up at the restaurant Sunday.

“As they were here, we had officers on scene,” he said. “We expected issues.”

Earlier this month, McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna told KWTX-TV that local police were on heightened alert for possible trouble on Thursday nights, when Twin Peaks hosts bike nights. Reyna said trouble between two local motorcycle gangs heated up when bikers from the Dallas-Fort Worth area got involved.

Swanton slammed Twin Peaks after the bloodshed Sunday, saying the franchise failed to help avoid trouble and ignored the police department’s advice to try to keep biker gangs away from the restaurant.

“Are we frustrated? Sure, because we feel like there may have been more that could have been done by a business to prevent this,” Swanton said.

He said Twin Peaks has a right to deny entry to known biker gangs.

“They absolutely have a right to refuse service to people that may be a harm to their patrons and employees,” he told KTVT. “They didn’t do that, and today is the ultimate aftermath of what their decision was.”

Jay Patel, operating partner at the Waco Twin Peaks, said the franchise is cooperating with police.

“We are horrified by the criminal, violent acts that occurred outside of our Waco restaurant today,” Patel said Sunday night on Facebook. “We share in the community’s trauma.”

Warning to biker gangs

Even after the chaos subsided, Waco police continued arresting people arriving at the scene with weapons.

Swanton warned other biker gang members against coming to Waco to reignite the violence.

“We have been getting reports throughout the day that bikers from out of state are headed this way,” he told KTVT.

“We would encourage them not to, because we have plenty of space in our county jail to put them there.”