He bought it the day before at an auto-parts store, he said, and had no ties to the Bandidos. Obledo wore a Bandidos undershirt that day, but he said it was not visible. Because of his arrest, he lost his job and the home he and his wife were in the process of buying. Obledo was arrested, jailed for about 15 days, charged with engaging in organized criminal activity and had his bond set at $1 million. As he crouched behind a car in the parking lot as gunfire echoed around him, he did not fit any biker stereotype: He drove his car to Waco and was making $123,000 a year as a mortgage-underwriting manager at a financial services company in San Antonio.
It was a New Testament with a camouflage cover, issued to him when he served in the Texas Air Guard. Obledo, 41, still has the property list given to him by the authorities that shows he was not only unarmed that day but was carrying his pocket Bible. Some of the arrested bikers have filed federal civil rights lawsuits against Waco officials, saying they were wrongfully arrested and have had their lives upended simply because they were at the meeting or wearing biker clothing.ĭiego N. Boyett, have raised questions about the mass arrest, saying that many of those arrested had no idea the meeting could turn violent, were not involved in the gang rivalry and ducked or ran as shots rang out. In the months after the shootout, several of those arrested, their lawyers and supporters, including Ms. Boyett, who owned a roadside-service business here, had made plans to be at his nephew’s fourth birthday party later that day. Boyett was a member of the Cossacks, but his widow, Nina Boyett, said he was not looking for trouble. Boyett, one of nine bikers who were killed, sat on a bench recalling her husband, who would have turned 45 this month. Long after they left, the widow of Daniel R. Still, a year later, not all those trying to move on from the debacle are bikers with rap sheets.Ī crowd of about 80 bikers and their supporters rallied at the steps of the county courthouse on Saturday to mark the anniversary. More than 300 handguns, knives, clubs and other weapons were recovered by the police. Police have said that the bikers, who attacked one another and fired on police officers, were part of “a gang-oriented criminal element” that had brought a stockpile of weapons with them. So many bikers were arrested - nearly 200 - that officials used the Waco Convention Center for initial processing.
Gunfire erupted outside a Twin Peaks restaurant at a meeting of a regional coalition of motorcycle clubs after an altercation between two rival groups, the Bandidos and the Cossacks. One year ago Tuesday, law enforcement officials here broke up one of the biggest and deadliest clashes of motorcycle gangs in the country.
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