“They don’t know us; we don’t care about them…” – Cholo No Llores
Arlington – Too bad, but it’s not a one man job, this thing of driving the black pony, looking out for the spot on the map in the glare of the slanting sunrays of a blazing sunset on a baking hot prairie turned industrial suburb, a spot between the tributaries of the Trinity.
There it sits, on a dusty industrial boulevard, not far from the Ballpark, Six Flags, Cowboys Stadium – la cantina, an old school road house, nestled right next door to a motel.
SUNSET AT LA CANTINA
Oh, to have a technicolor picture of the scene, the iron ponies parked out front, the prospects watching over the scene, los sargentos de armas, supervising for the sake of security.
It’s a full-blown anniversary fiesta of Los Bandidos del Centro at the Hideaway, a traditional cantina dialed up to industrial strength. It could be on a riverbank or a bluff overlooking a canyon. It is the saloon of legend, the prosaic, quintessential Texas BEER JOINT.
Cholo Do Not Cry is not hard to find. Merely mention his name to the Sergeant at Arms, and he is to be found perched on a stool under a shade tent in the back yard of the bar, watching the auction.
It’s about the camera, a big, bulky Nikon FX news rig with a strobe and a Nikkor AF streetsweeper 20 -120 zoom.
Question: Is it good manners to stroll into the party with intentions of taking pictures?
Cholo means a teenage boy who is a member of what the G calls an urban street gang, a latino with indian blood. His road name amongst the Bandits is a remonstrance – Cholo, do not cry.
“Just don’t take pictures of peoples’ back patches,” he cautions. “In fact, it might not be a bad idea to ask first before taking pictures of anyone.”
These are times of trouble. The G and all the cops have their knives out for the Bandits, and all the riders who wear the 1% diamond, nationwide.
They take pictures of their tattoos, the VIN numbers of their bikes, their faces. It’s called motorcycle profiling and it’s stone illegal to treat people that way while detained in a routine stop.
At least one police department, that thin blue line of Ostentatious, Texas, tells the Bandits they can either do it on the side of the road, or they can come on down to the cop shop and really get it on right.
In further discussion about the concept of outlawry, something prohibited by Section 1, Art. 20 of the Constitution of Texas, Cholo remarks that the world does not know his brothers. They don’t care, he concludes. The antiquated and unconstitutional practice once allowed authorities to simply declare an individual “out law,” that is, beyond the protections of the law, someone to be arrested, perhaps killed, on sight.
WRONG
It is this issue that prompted the joint meeting of the Dallas Metroplex Region of the Confederation of Clubs and the Austin or Central Texas Confederation of Clubs at Twin Peaks Restaurant on May 17, 2015.
The Legislators who were in session at the time got the message, loud and clear. Every last bit of support for an anti-motorcycle profiling bill and a repeal of civil asset forfeiture in the absence of criminal charges or conviction dried up – instantly.
Nine men lost their lives, 20 were wounded, and 177 wearing patches of what the G terms “outlaw motorcycle gangs” went to jail, charged with “engaging in organized crime,” their bond set at $1 million in order to “send a message,” according to Judge Pete Peterson, McLennan County Justice of the Peace, Pct. 1.
He is a retired Sergeant of the DPS, the state highway patrol, who replaced by appointment of the Commissioners Court a retired DEA agent, Billy Martin, who resigned in disgrace after a Texas Ranger made it his personal business to learn just why Martin failed to order an autopsy and did not visit the scene of the suspicious death of a Baptist minister’s wife.
The answer to those questions resulted in the murder conviction of the preacher, who had drugged his wife and handcuffed her to the bed before he smothered her.
The local police chief, Jim Devlin of Hewitt, Texas, reportedly confronted Ranger Matt Cawthon to ask just why he was taking such a personal interest in the matter. Cawthon said, “I owe it to a woman who is in her grave and can’t defend herself.” Thus, Waco justice. The practice has left taxpayers in McLennan County facing the prospect of crushing debt in judgments of indemnity favoring more than 100 plaintiffs who allege their civil rights were ignored, violated, trampled by the District Attorney, the Waco Police, the Texas Department of Public Safety, and others on that fateful day.
Cue the spaghetti western jazz, the intro to “The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly,” the tune that always marks where Fr. Guido Sarducci makes his entrance at the Bat Wings with The Supremes.
A JOYOUS OCCASION
“Oh, frabjous day, callou, callai,” saith the Jabberwocky, for Cholo explains that the fiesta is in part all about how most of the defendants charged with organized criminal activity at Twin Peaks are now “free and clear” of the strictures of their arrest, indictment and release on bond.
Wot dis mean, Cholly, is they have regained the God-given right guaranteed by the First Amendment to associate with whom they may choose, to wear items of personal adornment, no matter the colors, and to attend the social functions held by outlaw motorcycle enthusiasts.
The large crowd of hundreds of bikers is respectful, friendly, subdued, sober and having a real good time at their party. True story.
He points to Ft. Worth Bandido Jester, who is on the auction block announcing a home security system complete with cameras, hard drive and the various accoutrements of surveillance, “so you can keep an eye on your old lady,” etc. The bidding opens at $100.
“Until just the other day, that brother,” says Cholo, pointing at the Jester, “was under indictment. Now he’s free and clear of his charges.”
As quickly as the auction concludes, we asked Jester for permission to take his picture, and he was not sure just how to proceed.
Discipline among the ranks is high, and there’s a reason for that. Dobber, a member of the Ft. Worth Chapter, is facing a murder trial for the incidents at Gator’s Crowd Inn on December 12, 2014.
“Drifter,” former president of the Ft. Worth Bandits, is doing 45 years for a murder allegedly committed on that night.
Folks say the Bandits were attacked as they entered the place by elements of Wino’s Crew, The Ghost Riders, and Cossacks as soon as they walked through the door.
It wasn’t an isolated incident. At a toy run in Wise County, similar attacks took place, leaving Bandidos bloodied at the otherwise peaceful event.
As in Ft. Worth and Waco, the cops made no move to arrest their attackers.
One must look closely for the fly specks in the pepper, when it comes to prosecution of the Bandidos. It was in June following the events of May 17, 2015, that a federal grand jury handed down an indictment naming then Bandidos, U.S.A., president Jeffrey Pike and Vice President John Portillo as racketeers accused of operating an ongoing criminal enterprise.
They lost their initial court case earlier this spring in U.S.District Court in San Antonio.
It is not until one begins to view the events in perspective with an eye to critical thinking that it becomes very apparent that just about every day is get the Bandits day.
Jester never got back to The Legendary with either a go or no go decision from his club, the Ft. Worth Chapter of the Bandidos MC. We parted friends with a fist bump because, he said, he had recently fractured some bones in his right fist.
We left him in the company of Desagraciado Scooter, the man who was given the opportunity – twice – to plead to either felony aggravated assault in return for a sentence of deferred adjudication, and then the offer of deferred adjudication for misdemeanor assault.
Said Scooter on the day of his temptation by the prosecutors and the Court at Waco, “That would be the first lie I told about it.”
He, too, is a free man, his case dismissed with prejudice because of a lack of probable cause for jurors to believe the allegations in the indictment stemming from his arrest at Twin Peaks on May 17, 2015.
Bandido Reno and Proud Bandido’s Old Lady Ogie stepped into the picture, right away. Reno is a member of the North Dallas Chapter, and he and his old lady were enjoying the freedom to freely associate and speak with ease at the Centro Bandits’ fourth anniversary party. His indictment is dismissed with the proviso that there is far less probable cause to believe the allegations therein than there is in other cases.
Let’s find a blank wall of limestone or granite somewhere in this great Lone Star State of Texas, and there let’s sand blast the names of the men who stood up to tyranny with a firm commitment to not plead guilty to that which not only they did not do, but no one did – because it never really happened.
The video that agents operating on behalf of the Department of Homeland Security proves that. Ask the jurors who suffered through five weeks of vague and disjointed testimony for their opinion. They split 11-1 in favor of acquittal of Bandido Jake Carrizal, president of the Dallas Bandidos.
So mote it be.
- The Legendary
FREED: Reno and his old lady, Ogie, of the North Dallas Bandidos