re: Biker Shootout at the Twin Peaks in Waco, TX

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Thanks for that new link.

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Matt Clendennen, a member of the Cossacks-aligned Scimitars Motorcycle Club, was released on bond Tuesday. He said he was on the patio sipping ice water and waiting to order lunch when the parking lot fight broke out, then immediately took refuge in an interior hallway.
“I didn’t have weapons of any kind,” said Clendennen, 30, a former firefighter who owns a landscaping business in Hewitt. “The only thing I had was a miniature pocketknife. I’m a business person, a hardworking person, a family man. If I thought there was potential for violence with any organization, I would not be part of it. Why would I? Why put my family in danger?”

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Clendennen said he was on the patio but wasn’t expecting any kind of trouble.
Clendennen said he joined the club a year ago because he wanted an organized group to ride with and found he got along well with the small local group of guys.
“We’re all hardworking men who enjoy riding motorcycles and giving back to the community,” he said.
Clendennen also has been friends with several local Cossacks, including Danny “Diesel” Boyett, a mechanic killed in the melee.
“He was an incredible person, one of the most caring, giving people I’ve met,” he said.
biker stories ra1
Hewitt business owner and Scimitars member Matt Clendennen said he was unaware that he was headed into a violent situation at Twin Peaks restaurant. Staff photo— Rod Aydelotte
Clendennen said he didn’t know about any kind of violent feud going on between the Cossacks and Bandidos, though he knew there was some rivalry. He said he got a message from his motorcycle buddies a few days before that they would be meeting up at Twin Peaks and listening to a presentation on motorcycle legislation.
He said he had been to COC&I meetings before and thought they were public meetings, so Cossacks and Scimitars didn’t need to be invited.
Clendennen said that after the fighting started, he wasted little time taking cover inside.
“The was a verbal altercation, and I heard the first gunshot maybe a minute or two after that started,” he said. “It was a shock moment. You just freeze in place for a split second.”
He said he ducked inside and waited in a hallway leading to the bathroom, then fired off a text to his family to tell them he was OK. Soon, two police officers came in with rifles and made everybody get down on the floor. They escorted out a man from the bathroom who was bleeding from a wound, he said.
The police put Clendennen in zipties and took him with a couple hundred others to the Waco Convention Center for questioning. He said he assumed he was just a witness, and when an officer interviewed him, he got the impression he would be released soon.
‘Total shock’
He said he got worried when he was sent to the McLennan County Jail on State Highway 6, and was astounded when the group he was in was informed of their bond amounts.
“It was total shock,” he said. “My jaw dropped. Like, $1 million, are you serious? What could I have possible done to deserve a $1 million bond?”
Clendennen’s attorney, Clint Broden of Dallas, has filed a civil lawsuit against the city of Waco and McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna, claiming unlawful arrest and detention. Clendennen said the incident has prompted his ex-wife to file a temporary restraining order that has kept him from seeing two of his children and explaining what happened.
Meanwhile, he’s trying to catch up on a busy landscaping season with his business and worried that the arrest will cost him future business, though no customers have yet canceled on him.
And he says he is still trying to answer the questions of his 4-year-old who he has with his current wife.
“I’m still trying to get him over the idea that I went to jail,” he said. “He thinks you go to jail when you hurt somebody.”

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