Waco shooting (courtesy people.com)

Let’s be clear. The Waco coroner has enough evidence to ID the exact caliber of the rounds that caused the fatal wounds of the nine bikers killed at the Twin Peaks biker rally. The so-called “final reports” released by Judge Walter H. “Pete” Peterson – provided by kwtx.com August 13 and just discovered by this writer – lack this critical information. Make the jump for the TV station’s summary, with toxicology reports omitted and links to the coroner’s individual reports inserted.

Jesus Delgado Rodriguez, 65, died of gunshot wounds from a medium-caliber weapon that fired a copper-jacketed bullet, the final autopsy report says.

One of the bullets entered the left side of his face, the other entered the right side of his back.

There was no soot or stippling associated with the wounds, indicating the bullets were fired from several feet away.

—–

Matthew Mark Smith, 27, the youngest of the nine killed, suffered two gunshot wounds, one to the right side of his back and the other on the right side of his abdomen, the autopsy report said.

In Smith’s case toxicology showed evidence of marijuana in his system at the time of his death but no alcohol.

Again the medical examiner said he saw no soot or stippling associated with the gunshot wounds.

—–

Daniel Raymond Boyett, 44, died of two gunshot wounds to the head, one to the abdomen and had blunt force trauma injuries on his hands and legs, the final autopsy showed.

One gunshot wound entered the top of his head, another the left side of his head and one into the left side of his abdomen.

The medical examiner said he saw no soot or stippling associated with the gunshot wounds.

The blunt force injuries were not fatal but were noticed and reported in the autopsy.

—-

Wayne Lee Campbell, 43, died of a gunshot wound from a small caliber, metal-jacketed bullet that entered on the right side of his chin and traveled into his abdomen.

There was no soot or stippling associated with the gunshot wound, the report said.

—–

Richard Matthew Jordan, III, 31, died of a gunshot wound in his scalp, the report said.

The report says the wound was caused by a medium-caliber, jacketed bullet, fragments of which were recovered during the autopsy.

Again there was no soot or stippling present around the wound.

—–

Jacob Lee Rhyne, 39, died of gunshot wounds to the neck and lower abdomen, autopsy showed.

Fragments from a medium-caliber, metal-jacketed bullet were recovered from the body.

There was no soot or stippling associated with the gunshot wounds, the report said.

—–

Manuel Issac Rodriguez, 40, died of gunshot wounds to the head and the right side of his back, neither of which showed soot or stippling, the report said.

A medium-caliber, copper-jacketed bullet was recovered from the body.

—–

Richard Vincent Kirshner, Jr., 47, died of gunshot wounds to the left buttocks, right thigh and left knee, according to the autopsy report.

Fragments from a small-caliber, metal-jacketed bullet were recovered from his body but no soot or stippling was apparent.

The medical examiner also noted an incision injury to his scalp and to his neck but neither of which would have been fatal.

—–

Charles Wayne Russell, 46, died of a gunshot wound to the chest caused by a medium-caliber, copper-jacketed bullet, the autopsy report said.

The report further said there was no firearm residue recovered in association with the wound.

He also had blunt force injuries to his head.

TTAG writer and combat medic Jon Wayne Taylor examined the reports. He offers the following observations:

  • The coroner discovered several intact rounds, yet failed to name their caliber or link them to a particular firearm
  • In two cases, a bullet entered the victim at an extreme angle and traveled downwards into the victim’s body. This indicates that they were either shot from above or were on their knees when they were shot. In neither case was the shooter within close range (lack of “soot or stippling associated with the gunshot wounds”). In both cases, the bullet would have to been either a high-powered handgun round (e.g., .357 or .44) or a rifle round.

The bottom line: the Waco coroner failed in his duty to provide compete information about the deaths of nine bikers at the Twin Peaks restaurant. Information which would help identify whether or not police killed some or all of the victims. Meanwhile, a gag order on the first biker’s trial remains in place. Some 177 motorcyclists were arrested after the incident, held on $1m bail each. Two remain in prison three months later.

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95 COMMENTS

  1. And people complain that TTAG is against the cops. Then we read about stuff like this. How is a thinking person supposed to react?

      • Transparency would warrant less suspicion. We have zero(O) transparency in the alphabet gangs and the rogue regime that supports them. Either a lot of people are swallowing the kool aid in gulps or they are just too dumb to ask questions.

    • With contempt for cops.

      There are dozens of cops who know what the real facts are here. There’s no way that all the information can be suppressed forever. But the Waco cops are all clammed up, preserving the “thin blue line” BS.

      In the end, the information will come out. The fact that so many healthy young men are dead here, from a relatively low number of wounds per victim and that many of those wounds were to the head or neck area indicates that in a melee like this, the shooters were stood-off from the melee, calmly able to aim their fire. If these shots had come from within the furball, there would be shots all over the bodies.

      The number of head/neck/scalp entry wounds is too high to comport with the story that rival gangs were shooting at each other here with handguns. This number of wounds being effected to the head/neck/scalp area means that there were stand-off shooters, most likely armed with rifles or carbines with optical sights. Just as we’ve seen in Iraq and Afghanistan, rifles with optical sights have resulted in a dramatic increase in the number of effective head shots on moving opponents, so we see here.

      Law enforcement is obscuring the facts here.

      • That method worked for covering up the Kennedy assassinations but it won’t work here. Ah truth!

        • The forensic evidence in the JFK assassination comports with the lone shooter from above and behind. The left’s silly cries of “that must have been a magic bullet!” for being able to penetrate JFK and then go into the governor overlook the position of each man relative to each other in the car and the fact that the 160gr 6.5mm bullet has a very high sectional density.

          If we are to believe the conspiracy theory of JFK, then it is easier to pull of in the case of only one dead man instead of multiple dead men.

          Here, we have multiple victims, and an abundance of forensic evidence. Once you start applying modern forensic methods to this many killings in the same timeframe, the official story will start to come undone – quickly. What the agencies in Waco are going to find necessary is wholesale suppression of lots of forensic evidence, and that’s going to be challenged in courts by next of kin, FOIA’s from the press, etc. The clock is ticking and they’ll run out of excuses for not releasing information soon enough.

    • Is it possible that TTAG makes a valid point? Somewhere there should be an analysis of caliber and type of ammunition and matching to firearms shot. Is it possible that that would be for someone other than the coroner to investigate?

    • The problem comes when you have hypocrites who complain about getting associated with criminals who use firearms to commit crimes, then turn around and attack the police in general when a very small number of them do things like this.

      • You say “very small number,” and that’s what many cops typically say. But it’s not just the numbers, it’s that everyone involved is part of the problem, either in committing the act or participating in the cover-up/stonewalling. It’s not like there was one guy who went rogue and started shooting people and the others condemn him for it.

        Look at the Denver SWAT team that raided the wrong house without a warrant. They had no application for a warrant. They beat the crap out of everyone, throwing one teenage son through a window head first, only to realize they had the wrong people. It was an innocent family from a Mariachi band who had never been in trouble with the law. When they realized their mistake, they all conspired to make up charges that the family attacked the cops. They arrested them and falsified their reports. They were all willing to send innocent people to prison–mandatory two years in prison–to cover up their mistake.

        The entire SWAT team and leadership was in on it. It wasn’t just one rogue cop. The fact that all of them thought nothing of sending innocent people to prison for years tells you all you need to know about the agency, that they can do what they want and get away with it. Not one single cop refused to go along with this and tell the truth. The problems are systemic. It’s not just a few bad apples. None of the cops involved ever faced any discipline for this. Not one. Just business as usual.

        http://www.9news.com/story/news/local/2014/09/28/wrongful-prosecution-mistaken-raid-denver/16409795/

        Ever read the DOJ report on the NOPD? Corruption and rampant citizen abuse.

        http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/spl/nopd_report.pdf

        • I just read the article on the Denver family.

          They got 1.8 million for the assault, were any of the cops held to account?

        • That’s why I’m adding cameras with audio and off site real time cloud backup to my security system. Battery back up too i case they cut the power.

        • “. . . the Denver SWAT team . . . ”

          No-knock raids; the Denver SWAT incident; the Waco biker incident; . . . THESE are the things we PotG should be complaining about.

          Bad-mouthing cops in general will do NO GOOD whatsoever; it can only prove to be COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE. Those of us who are sober have to acknowledge that the problem with cops is confined to a minority. We may disagree whether that minority is: 49%; 4.9% or 0.49% That’s fine; it’s still a minority. With as many Federal, State and municipal cops as there are in the US there are plenty of concrete incidents (agency, date, case) that will serve as “poster-child” material for objections.

          We NEED the support of the majority of street cops to defend our RKBA. Whether that majority is merely 51%, 95.1% or 99.51% we can’t afford to make enemies of this majority when we are natural allies.

          We must hold cops to account when they violate their agency policies, State/Federal law or the applicable constitutions. In so doing we will make common-cause with the law-abiding citizenry who don’t count themselves as PotG.

          We should NOT pursue discourse that aligns the PotG with #BlackLivesMatter. Instead, we SHOULD make it clear that we are in support of non-violent generally law-abiding minorities and economically disadvantaged. These folks don’t have the time or financial resources to push-back effectively. We have to make it clear to the politicians that WE are standing up for these relatively voice-less victims of lawless behavior by police. WE recognize that if the police can kick-in the door of a poor person they will someday kick-in OUR doors. We aren’t waiting until it’s OUR door they are kicking-in.

          • Those of us who are sober have to acknowledge that the problem with cops is confined to a minority.

            When we have proof that these problems are systemic and cover entire departments, how do we even know it’s a minority? We’ve got LEOs in Tennessee getting in roadside fights over who gets to shake down out of state drivers for God’s sake!

            We’ve got the entire NJSP conspiring against the citizens, we’ve got the entire Ft. Worth PD conspiring against OCT, we’ve got small PDs all over the US being disbanded either for corruption, citizen abuse, or losing their insurance due to excessive payouts or not being able to afford increased rates due to excessive payouts. How do we know who’s corrupt?

            When you’ve got entire PDs going back over old cases, trying to find reasons to confiscate real property (improperly) so they can keep it, I guess you know they are corrupt. I take it you are from PA, so you should know about this trick.

            When you get pulled over for “not staying in your lane” or “weaving” or “improper lane change” and then the LEO says he smells marijuana and wants to search your car, even though you’ve never smoked MJ in your life, I guess you know that one is corrupt. And then his K9 partner who pulls up says his dog alerted, then you know he is corrupt, too.

            • I’m 64 years old and had my first encounter with a cop at age 17. So far, I personally haven’t had a traffic stop where I was mistreated. I have been present when others were stopped and I wasn’t particularly satisfied with the cop’s attitude in a couple of cases. Met cops outside the context of a stop several times, some seemed to have a little attitude and some seemed to be great guys.

              So, from my personal experience, I can’t see that bad cops are a majority.

              If a majority of cops were seriously screwed up then we the voters have really screwed-up in not demanding reform from our politicians. I remain unconvinced.

              I don’t deny that some specific agencies are really screwed-up; corruption and bad-attitudes have corrupted almost everyone. I just haven’t crossed-paths with the cops in such a jurisdiction.

              If you are absolutely convinced that the cops in your municipality and your State are all completely unredeemable then by all means take this to your politicians and try to root out your local problem. However, I would caution you not to tar with the same black brush every cop in every precinct in every municipality in every State. Unless you are really well traveled, there must be some that are pretty good.

              But suppose, for the sake of discussion, I concede that it’s a majority of cops that are bad. 55% or 75% of the precincts. Well, then what do you propose we do about it? Shall we try to get 100% of the cops in the country fired? Including the modest minority that are doing a good job? Shall we tar them all with the same broad brush so that all of them view us PotG as their enemies?

              Personally, I’d prefer to work the problem with bad cops from the top down. Demand that our politicians change policing policies. E.g., change the asset forfeiture laws. Change policing policies. The politicians change the chiefs. The chiefs change the lieutenants; and eventually the bad sergeants and patrol officers get straightened-out or get fired. If we can’t impose change by working downward within the chain-of-command we aren’t going to change the police one street-cop-at-a-time by disparaging the profession as a whole.

      • “when a very small number of them do things like this.”

        How many have come forward to expose this? Is 100% of them are not coming forward, them 100% of them must be the new definition of “very small number.”

        I guess, compared to the number of grains of sand on the beach, it’s a very small number…

  2. They were white gang members. The media and cops could care less. If a SWAT team surrounded a restaurant full of #blacklivesmatter thugs and shot them up indiscriminitely it would be headline 24/7 news for a solid month, and at least a dozen cities would be in flames. Obama would make a speech decrying the “shoot first” tactics of the cops. Loretta Lynch would lynch the Waco police dept and make them wear little cameras like bells.

    • White people don’t have the same sympathy toward other whites who they perceive as thugs or criminals that blacks do toward their own perceived thugs.

      • Keyword being “perceive”.

        As in, white people are gullible fools who actually believe police propaganda that every person they murder was a “bad guy”. Amazingly, this 1st grade level vocabulary is often enough to convince most white people to drop to their knees and start sucking.

      • No money to be made from this event by the Chicago grievance industry. No progress to be made in pushing any narrative sacred to the leftist media. So, no sustained media attention.

      • That’s probably true. I am a white guy and i have absolutely no sympathy for white thugs.

        But I also do not have any sympathy for black thugs or Asian thugs or hispanic thugs.

        Thugs be thugs.

        My problem with this shooting is that I haven’t been convinced any of the arrestees or the deceased were actually thugs.

  3. Hmmmm….all those head shots. I guess we can safely say it wasn’t the work of the NYPD.

    Investigation continues…..

  4. So no one is supposed to know or figure what guns at this altercation fired “small caliber, copper jacketed” projectiles? Right…

    Now there are a lot of options available in .25 cal jacketed cartridges so maybe these guys were all carrying and shooting at each with pimp guns.

    • How many .25 cal loads fired from “pimp guns” are known to produce the kind of penetration required to enter the chin and reach the abdomen of an adult male?

      My FIRST thought was “that sounds like .223.” There are other possibilities.

      It depends on the bullet; could be a .25 or even a .22 LR…more detail is needed to say for sure.

      Here’s Shooting the Bull’s next wave of ballistics gel testing!

  5. What distinction is implied by “small” vs. “medium” calibre? Does “small” mean .223 whereas “medium” mean .30+? Is there any indication that the police were using e.g., .300 BLK or AK-style rifles? Could the “medium” calibre rounds be a mixture of rifle and hand-gun or all rifle or all hand-gun?

    Is it usual for a coroner to neglect to specify the calibre of a bullet from a victim of a gunshot?

    I find it very hard to imagine that interested parties will be unable to obtain disclosure of the calibre of each bullet. The delay and obfuscation will only make it worse for the WPD.

    • Evidentiary data such as caliber, primer marks, and rifling, etc. would suggest that some sort of criminal investigation was being conducted. Clearly that is no the case here.

    • “Is it usual for a coroner to neglect to specify the calibre of a bullet from a victim of a gunshot?”

      Having been privy to numerous homicide related autopsies and investigations (and testified a time or two as well), I can say unequivocally…”No. The vagueness seen here is most assuredly NOT usual.”

      The coroner may not specify a specific round/caliber; SOMETIMES it can be difficult to tell even if most/”all” of the bullet is recovered.

      However, there is usually a measured diameter and “consistent with” given…if not in the coroner’s report itself, than in the subsequent ballistics report.

      The coroner can mike (or even eyeball measure with a simple ruler) the bullet diameter and weigh it. The report will also have detailed information on trajectory and tissue damage along that path. What organs were involved, hemorrhaging, etc.

      One thing that slams this as “not usual” is that the coroner’s report itself WILL have the measurements of the entrance wound and any exit wound present. I’ve seen this done as a cross measurement…two diameters, each taken 90 degrees from each other.

      Also, the measurements of the entrance/exit wounds (if any) to the clothing will be given.

      So, the full coroner’s report should contain at least something (the entrance wound measurements) to estimate a fairly narrow bullet diameter range, even if the coroner himself did not measure the diameter and weight of bullet fragments.

      This case continues to stink…stinks to high heaven.

      • This is a heavily sanitized coroner’s report. Hell, its less a coroner’s report than it is a press-release with some medical detail.

  6. I hope that some day there will be justice for these men, but I doubt it. It certainly won’t come from Waco PD. As someone who travels through Waco occasionally I vow to never spend a dime in Waco again for the rest of my life.

  7. Wayne was almost certainly killed by the police. Not necessarily unjustified, but why hide it? It’s not like anyone is going to riot over someone with that little melanin.

  8. “In two cases, a bullet entered the victim at an extreme angle and traveled downwards into the victim’s body. This indicates that they were either shot from above or were on their knees when they were shot. ”

    I can also mean they were prone when shot.

    • Given the description of the bullets paths, the victims could have been supine, but not prone, unless the entrance wound was from a ricochet off the ground immediately in front of a prone individual.

      • OK, I wasn’t clear in my comment, I was meaning horizontal on the ground.

        On their knees when shot is a potentially inflammatory description when they may have been flat on the ground…

  9. Not absolute proof yet, but this stinks to high hell of a cover up. If it proves out to be a cover-up, I hope people hunt those cops down.

    • Yes and no. If the coroner’s report was specific, as in naming calibers and bullets recovered, it would prove extremely useful in convicting the murderers. Especially if there were specific suspects who had those specific weapons on them.

      BUT………………

      If the report was very specific, and the accused suspects DID NOT have those very specific firearms on them, then it would basically exonerate them.

      By leaving it vague, it allows the DA to charge more people and put the blame on more of the suspects much easier. But say one of the bullets recovered was a .30 caliber rifle bullet, and none of the suspects had a .30 caliber rifle, then none of the suspects could be charged with that murder. By saying a “medium caliber” bullet, it’s wide open. For instance, one of those folks that was shot three times with a medium caliber bullet, there could potentially be three people charged with that one murder, if there were three people there with a medium caliber firearm. Vague is better for them. Especially if the specifics start to shift blame onto the officers.

      • Here, the problem for law enforcement is that the rounds used to effect the wounds described by the ME require significant kinetic energy upon impact, and no pistol extant is able to exhibit these types of wounds, even at close range. You need a round that leaves about a 0.25″ entry wound, and has a terrific wound cavity with up to a liter of blood in the wound.

        Read the ME’s reports carefully, then watch some ballistic gel results of handguns vs. the 5.56/.223 or similar small rifle rounds. You see a marked difference in temporary wound cavities between handgun rounds and rifle rounds.

        Now, if none of the gang members who were purportedly shooting each other had rifles, this levels as a question “Well, then who did have rifles that was there that day?”

        And pretty soon, you end up at law enforcement’s doorstep.

        • thats a pretty good observation ,, i see alot of bikers running around ,but its kind of hard to hide a rifle on a scooter ,[excepting nfa class]

  11. ◾”In two cases, a bullet entered the victim at an extreme angle and traveled downwards into the victim’s body. This indicates that they were either shot from above or were on their knees when they were shot”

    This could also indicate they were running in a hunched over fashion, as one might do to move quickly away from a fight while trying to maintain small(er) profile

    • Exactly. If somone is shooting at you and there is no cover: 1) bend at the waist and run or 2) lie prone on the ground.

      Either could result in a top of the head shot.

  12. “Richard Vincent Kirshner, Jr., 47, died of gunshot wounds to the left buttocks, right thigh and left knee, according to the autopsy report…”

    LESSON LEARNED: Carry an IFAK kit guys. This man almost certainly died of preventable blood loss. Others were likely preventable as well, but this is just one example.

    If you carry a gun, or are worried about others who might be carrying guns, than you should be prepared to treat basic gunshot wounds.

    • A great idea if the police are not involved. But if the cops shoot you they won’t let you treat yourself. Assuming they don’t immediately shoot you again for reaching for the kit, the police would rip the kit out of your hands, beat you prone, cuff you, and let you bleed out. It’s better if there is only one side of the story. And Officer Safety, of course.

    • If you are shot in the thigh and it hits the femoral artery, you could be inside a hospital and still not make it to the table in time. You can bleed completely out in under 5 minutes with a wound like that.

    • One of the bullets shattered his femur.

      Obscure EMT factoid: Breaking (never mind shattering) your femur in either leg can cost you up to 1 liter of blood from your circulatory system. Breaking your pelvis can cost you up to 1.5 liters. Another obscure EMT/paramedic fact: When paramedics or EMT-I’s want to get fluids into someone who is unconscious these days, they use an “IO drill.” They drill into a bone (like your tibia or humerous) with an “IO drill” (a little battery-powered drill) and put a fitting to drop fluids directly into your bone marrow. It allows for faster fluid delivery than dropping a line into a vein.

      That 1L lossage from a broken femur applies when the break is closed, ie, still contained within your body.

      Shatter a femur with an open flesh wound, and you can bleed out in minutes even without arterial involvement.

  13. “… the wound was caused by a medium-caliber, jacketed bullet, fragments of which were recovered during the autopsy.”

    And that there, ladies and gentlemen, is double-speak for .223 Remington / 5.56 x 45mm NATO ammunition.

    Does anyone know of any other round that reliably fragments at the close ranges involved in this event? Could .308 Winchester / 7.62 x 51mm NATO full metal jacket fragment reliably at close range?

    Speaking of .308 Winchester at close range, wouldn’t even hollowpoint 150 grain bullets blow through most human targets and not leave fragments behind?

    • Read the reports in detail. Don’t skim them. Read them down into the gruesome details. Therein, you will see descriptions of entry wounds as being “1/4 inch in diameter, with a 1/16th inch circumferential marginal abrasion.”

      Then read the details of the wound channels beyond these entry wounds.

      Those aren’t wounds from a handgun.

      • Yup … those sound exactly like the kind of wounds we expect from a police officer’s common “patrol rifle” chambered in 5.56 x 45 mm.

    • AFAIK, “medium caliber” in this context almost certainly means handgun ammo, while small caliber is .223/5.56.Which of course does not tell us who was firing those handgun rounds. We do know that only the police had rifles, but since standard equipment includes handguns, the evidence is still unreported. Also, at least to of those killed do not have any report at all as to the caliber of weapon causing their fatal wounds, another strange exclusion; even if no bullets were recovered, the wound track would definitely have been measured and described, as noted by others above.Smith, shot in the side and back, was most certainly fleeing, or was struck in the side and rotated and shot again. Boyett may have been shot in the melee and by the police.

      • OK, so I read Boyett’s autopsy report, and there is a lot of information not included in the news summary (big surprise). Boyett took two to the head, both from above and traveling downward, both left quarter inch holes, both caused massive brain trauma. Other than a grazing wound to his side of unknown caliber, Boyett was most certainly shot by a small caliber rifle while he was on or heading to the ground. Other evidence reflects that he was probably involved in the brawl.

        • Another interesting point. Boyett came in with his hands bagged, but though they took full prints to ID the body, there i no reported GSR testing. Why not?

    • True, but a doctor is not a ballistic expert and is probably not qualified to identify bullet fragments or make such conclusions. That’s the issue I’m wondering about- maybe it’s common for the autopsy report (in that area) to list wounds in this fashion rather than specify caliber, etc.

      • Hannibal,

        We are not talking about a report from an emergency room doctor who treated an injured patient. We are talking about an autopsy report from a medical examiner. He/she darn well better know about causes of homicide such as gunshot wounds and the resulting terminal ballistics. And if he/she doesn’t, he/she should be calling in an expert who does in such a case.

  14. +1 Danny…then again I don’t really know what to glean. Stupid folks/stupid things happens…

  15. +1 Danny…then again I don’t really know what to glean. Stupid folks/stupid things happens…

  16. At the bottom center of the photo, a man is standing with a dark blue coat with large letters “ATF” and small letters immediately below it “police”. Does that irritate other people as much as it irritates me?

    Whatever happened to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms being a revenue collection arm of the Internal Revenue Service? Talk about mission creep.

  17. I must be missing something here… at least one of these families will get their own autopsy, no? There’s no way they can keep a lid on all this.

    Or, are they just buying time until people care any more?

  18. If the coroner’s report was specific, as in naming calibers and bullets recovered, it would prove extremely useful in convicting the murderers. Especially if there were specific suspects who had those specific weapons on them.

    BUT………………

    If the report was very specific, and the accused suspects DID NOT have those very specific firearms on them, then it would basically exonerate them.

    By leaving it vague, it allows the DA to charge more people and put the blame on more of the suspects much more easily. But say one of the bullets recovered was a .223 caliber rifle bullet, and none of the suspects had a .223 caliber rifle, then none of the suspects could be charged with that murder. By saying a “medium caliber” bullet, it’s wide open. For instance, one of those folks that was shot three times with a medium caliber bullet, there could potentially be three people charged with that one murder, if there were three people there with a medium caliber firearm. Vague is better for them. More opportunities to convict people. Especially if the specifics start to shift some of the blame to the officers.

    There will no doubt be people charged with murder that did not kill anyone.

  19. The behavior of the Waco police, DA, and courts is shameful. When this begin to play out I had some small hopes that justice would prevail. There have to be people on the law side of this travesty who have to be humiliated by the antics of those in charge, yet to my knowledge we’ve not heard one word from anybody in Waco criticizing this obvious injustice. How can you be a cop or a prosecutor and know that what’s happened is anything but incompetence and corruption?

    Despite the obvious fact that what is happening is disastrously wrong on many levels, there are people who are in jail and are probably facing lengthy jail terms for doing nothing more harmful than being a biker and going to lunch at the Twin Peaks restaurant. In Texas, the deck is stacked against any citizen charged with a crime.

    • We may not have heard much because there is a gag order, and everyone except the police obey the law!

  20. I’m wondering if Waco would be similar to here?
    The ME makes his findings and passes the bullets and fragments to the crime lab where the tech people are.
    The techs in the lab then determine caliber, and compare to firearms.
    Things still stink, and something this high profile should put everything else on the back burner.
    It’s not like the FBI incinerated a bunch of women and children or something…

    • Fair enough, Tom, but the coroner’s report should cover ALL the evidence from the body (ies).

      As such, entrance wound measurements and measurements of wound channels should be present. Admittedly, an entrance diameter != bullet diameter precisely, it can given estimates and narrow ranges. A .30 caliber bullet is not likely to make a .223 caliber entrance, for example, or vice versa.

      If the reports don’t have entrance measurements…something stinks. If such measurements were not done (so as to not include them in the report), something stinks…they can never be gone back and gotten accurately again.

      If those measurements were made and reported, but not released, something stinks.

      In other words…something stinks about this case. Continues to stink, I should say.

      • I read Boyett’s, and it does have precise measurements. I haven’t had time to look at any others. He was clearly shot by a small caliber rifle, probably while on or near the ground.

  21. Lesse… Mass shooting involving some sort of law enforcement in Waco. They better get out in front with the info on this, no one is going to believe the story they release later.

    No. One.

  23. Since when is the coroner responsible for the forensic ballistics analysis? The coroner determines the cause of death. A crime lab someplace is responsible for the ballistics, and even with a case that size, the odds are that the ballistics results will take much longer than even the final coroner’s report.

    Aside from a modestly strange number of shots to the head, there is not much to suggest what happened just from the coroner’s reports. It does seem implied that some of the bullets fragmented and were not readily identifiable, and that all the retrieved bullets were sent to the state crime lab for analysis.

    … which could be why the coroner says nothing about the caliber.

  24. McLennan County (Waco) does not have a medical examiner, and, therefore, all homicide victims in the county are sent to Dallas County for autopsy. These autopsies were performed by the Dallas County Medical Examiner’s Office which handles hundreds of gunshot cases each year.

    The language used in these reports to describe the projectiles and wounds is entirely consistent with the language the ME’s Office uses in its gunshot cases. The doctors never specify the caliber or make of a projectile in their reports. As Tom in Oregon noted above, these projectiles will be sent to firearms examiners for further examination and comparison to recovered firearms. Since the firearms were sent to the feds, I assume the recovered projectiles will also be sent to the feds.

    I would also caution readers against making too many assumptions about the trajectories of these shots. The trajectories listed in the reports assume the victims were standing upright and facing the shooting at the time of the shots. That is rarely the case, especially in a case like this one with multiple shots being fired. A change in the victim’s position (ducking, turning, etc) can greatly affect the trajectory of a projectile.

    Like many of the other readers, I also have many unanswered questions and concerns about the mass arrests and some of the subsequent proceedings in McLennan County. However, I see absolutely nothing unusual or nefarious about the the autopsy reports which were prepared by the Dallas County ME’s Office which has no affiliation with the Waco PD or McLennan County.

    • “I would also caution readers against making too many assumptions about the trajectories of these shots. The trajectories listed in the reports assume the victims were standing upright and facing the shooting at the time of the shots. “

      Wound channels through bodies make no such assumptions.

      Curious…how many homicide cases have you testified in, as expert of otherwise?

      I have a few on my resume. Some as “expert.”

      How many shooting death autopsies have you witnessed?

      I’ve got a few I could list on my resume.

      This report, as reported, sucks.

      It’s true that the coroner is not responsible for ballistic analysis. But, that’s a freaking red herring.

      The post mortem examination report IS responsible for accurate recording of insults to the body. “Caliber” of entrance wounds and degree of tissue damage and wound tracks is part of that report. Or should be.

      The release of information after the post could have done a whole heap to reduce the talk and rumors about this case. Instead, we get his insipid, luke-warm reporting that does NOTHING to tell the full story.

      That alone should cause anyone that has been involved with shooting homicide investigations great pause. They KNOW at this point something of what happened. They are not telling the story. There’s a reason for that.

  25. I am just south of Wichita Falls, Texas. Just walked into a store and found todays edition of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. The front page has an article styled Attorneys puzzled by biker case in Waco. Dont know if its on their website.

  27. The Coroner recovered one bullet in tact! It was the round with custom engraving on it. One of the stories that I read last month had a downloadable copy of the Coroner’s Report. I have the .pdf but no way to upload it here and I cannot remember the name of the article.

    But yes, from my younger combat vet friends, I know that the Coroner could have been much more specific as to the rounds and the weapons that fired them.

    BUT, the ATF has stated out the ballistics report for their very own, Remember that they pledged to do this as fast as possible. Of course that was nearly four months ago.

    Y’all read that short story on Amazon: “The Waco Texas Biker Massacre.” Then you will see why the Justice of the Peace, the largest Police Union in Texas, the ATF and all of those snipers were really on hand. Those arrest warrants were filled out the day before. It is why they knew, down to the last person, how many people were there.

  28. The simple fact that the po-po won’t release the ballistics information is extremely suspicious. IF they were more forthcoming perhaps this would generate more trust than they are getting. UNLESS the ballistics reports indicate they shot a bunch of men for nothing. Then they will get LESS TRUST in a state where most citizens have access to weapons.

    I wonder why they won’t release the info?

  29. “You not only have to avoid wrong doing, you have to avoid the apperence of wrong doing.”

    Waco pd did not take this advice to heart.

  30. So from the excerpts above 7/10 took a bullet to the throat or head. That is some skilled shooting amid a biker brawl. I hope to be so good if I ever have to use deadly force. Those bikers must have done a lot of force on force training.

    • I’m not up to speed on this whole Waco biker shooting, but reading the article above, I too was pretty impressed with the amount of head shots there were. That is some pretty fine marksmanship from the bikers involved in an absolute melee.

      • Yes, way,way too many headshots for a ber-room brawl. Even supposing multiple bikers pulled guns , you might expect 1 head shot victim. It is difficult , well near impossible for anyone in a close quarter shootout to hit such a small target moving while you are moving yourself. Try running and shooting a bouncing basketball. Most of these head-shot kills were done from a rested and controlled position with a rifle, no pistol.
        The varying bullet hole sizes(med or small) don’t say much. The entrance wound from a 223 or 22 or 25 would not be noticeable. Even those might not be distinguishable from 30 cal depending on angle. 9mm or 40 or 45 might be noticeable. However the differences in wound cavities and penetrations is noticeable for all different calibers and pistols and rifles. So the real meat of the autotopsies is missing.

  33. Hmm, the coroner did not provide specifics about the bullets, i.e., caliber, weight, etc? Of course, there has to be a cover up. A coroner, an expert at determining cause of death, should be an expert at ballistics and bullet identification too. It should be covered in their 2nd year of medical school…or is that their 3rd year. Now, the police are going to have to waste time by sending these bullet fragments to a forensics expert who specializes in ballistics, firearms, bullet identification, and the sort. A coroner would be a better to testify in course about ballistics than any expert. They are risking the whole case. Jeez, people.

  34. “they were either shot from above or were on their knees when they were shot.”

    Seriously? You can’t think of any other ways that could happen? Like if they were on their feet and bent over?

  36. Note: There were also 18 people wounded, still the number of headshots is excessive. These numbers of headshots may also be from people hiding yet not keeping their heads down. Which is typical of non- combat veterans.

  37. As of the shots fired from the grassy embankment that’s higher elevation, but most of these people was on the ground trying to seak cover when they was shot. As 1 was took a shot to his belly as another shot grazed his head knocking his head into the concrete as he was crawling to help 1 shot in the neck,.

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