It’s now been ten years since a shootout between rival motorcycle clubs at a Twin Peaks restaurant in Waco left Nine people dead. Over a hundred individuals were arrested for their involvement, to this day, no one was ever convicted.
In the months after the May 2015 Twin Peaks shootout, 155 people were indicted. Lawyers from across the state began taking on those clients.
Many of the people arrested filed civil suits against the city of Waco and District Attorney Abel Reyna — mostly for wrongful arrest. Those suits were put on hold until a trial occured or the cases were dropped.
At the same time, lawyers for some of the defendants filed motions to disqualify DA Reyna as prosecutor, citing a conflict of interest.
“Half-truths and rumors about me and this office have made their way to the public through biker gang defense lawyer filings and reporting by the media,” Reyna said in a 2018 press conference.
He denied that he and his office had any conflicts in prosecuting the Twin Peaks cases. Reyna did, however, recuse himself from four of the cases.
Special prosecutor Brian Roberts was brought in for those cases. It was the first time a prosecutor outside McLennan County reviewed any of the cases.
After reviewing the evidence, he described the cases as “a colossal mess.”
He told KWBU he wasn’t convinced those people should ever have been arrested.
“Whenever you have any kind of warrant, it has to be supported by a sworn affidavit that establishes probable cause,” he explained. “And I think for most of the people there, they couldn’t even meet that standard.”
Of the 155 people indicted over Twin Peaks, only one ever made it to trial. Christopher “Jake” Carrizal had been the vice president of the Dallas chapter of the Bandidos. His 2017 trial included weeks of police, expert and witness testimony - including Carrizal himself. He admitted to shooting at someone that day, but claimed self-defense.
During the trial, it was revealed that at least four of the nine killed were shot by police. A 2016 grand jury cleared the officers of any wrong-doing.
The Carrizal trial was plagued with delays, often caused by the introduction of new evidence. At the end of the trial, the jury wasn’t able to reach a unanimous decision, forcing a mistrial.
In 2018, special prosecutor Brian Roberts decided to drop the charges against his four defendants.
“If I had found that there was sufficient evidence to prosecute those folks, that’s what I would have done. But that’s not what I felt,” he said.
District Attorney Reyna also dropped the remaining Engaging in Organized Crime charges. He then reindicted 25 people on charges of murder, rioting and tampering with evidence. Jake Carrizal was included in those re-indictments for the charge of rioting.
That same year, Reyna lost reelection to the District Attorney’s office during the primaries. A judge ordered that no further action would be taken in any Twin Peaks cases until Barry Johnson took over as DA in 2019.
Johnson used the lack of criminal accountability in the Twin Peaks cases and public perception of Reyna’s mistakes as part of his campaign strategy.
“I don’t think I would’ve ever been elected in Waco had Abel Reyna not mishandled the investigation and prosecution,” Johnson said.
Eventually, he dropped all remaining Twin Peaks charges. Despite almost 2 terabytes of evidence, including multiple videos, Johnson said there was not enough evidence to pursue the cases.
“We were not able to make one murder out of it where we were able to prove one person shot another person,” Johnson said.
He said there was, however, plenty of evidence for aggravated assault. Those charges carry a 2-year statute of limitations, which had already run out by the time Johnson took office.
“The aggravated assault cases were like shooting fish in a barrel,” he said. “You had a bunch of those.”
He said if he was DA at the time, he would have started with those cases.
“So you get that low hanging fruit and you kind of get the ball rolling down the road,” Johnson said. “Then you try your big kingfish once you have some momentum.”
But instead, Johnson says, then-DA Reyna chose to pursue the Engaging in Organized Crime charges, which fall under conspiracy.
To successfully prosecute those charges, Reyna had to prove both that the defendant planned with other members to commit the crime of assault or murder and they were members of a criminal organization.
“It was a risk,” Johnson said. “And it didn’t work out for him.”
In the decade since the shootout, over 100 civil suits have been filed. Most allege civil rights violations due to the cookie-cutter arrest warrants and indictments. They name the city, the county, police officers and DA Reyna as defendants.
Many are still active.
Abel Reyna and the City of Waco declined KWBU’s request for comment because of the ongoing litigation.
One of the remaining civil suits was filed by Morgan English. She and her husband were arrested at Twin Peaks and spent two weeks in jail.
“There were a lot of lives destroyed that day,” she said.
English claims the city lied in the affidavit leading to her arrest. She said she filed the suit in part to make the city admit it's wrong-doing.
“There were people who had children taken away, homes taken away, jobs lost,” English said. “I don’t think Waco truly understands the magnitude of how many lives it destroyed that day.”
Since the 2015 shootout, she and her husband have had two children. They relocated to Georgetown after her husband lost his job from the shooting. Although their lives are much different now, she said the scars are still there.
“I’m still scared to hear cars backfire. I live in constant fear of going to public places because you never think that’s going to happen to you,” English said through tears. “We both live in fear of ‘what if’ when we go to public places. Waco took that from us.”
Shortly after the shootout, the Twin Peaks restaurant closed. Since then, a few restaurants have tried, unsuccessfully, to occupy the space.
Its latest owners said they hope to open a Mexican-Cajun restaurant there in the future.
