Investigators trace deadly shooting in Texas to biker gang shootout in OKC
Three people were killed at the Whiskey Barrel Saloon back on April 1
Alyse Jones KOCO April 17, 2023
https://www.koco.com/article/oklahoma-city-deadly-shooting-texas-biker-gang-shootout/43623936
OKLAHOMA CITY —
Investigators traced a deadly weekend shooting in Texas to a biker gang shootout in Oklahoma City.
Three people were killed at the Whiskey Barrel Saloon back on April 1. The violence from that night hasn’t stopped.
One of the nation’s leading experts on biker gangs said the shootout at the Whiskey Barrel Saloon more than two weeks ago sparked another deadly shooting over the weekend. KOCO 5 affiliates at ABC13 in Houston covered a freeway shooting in the middle of the day on Friday that left three people dead.
Motorcycle gang investigator Steve Cook said intel indicates this shooting happened while members of the Bandidos motorcycle gang were traveling for the funeral of one of the victims of OKC’s Whiskey Barrel Saloon shooting.
“Unfortunately, with death comes funerals, and those are very high opportunity targets because rival motorcycle gangs know that it’s typically a mandatory attendance to those functions, so they lay in wait and know there’s a lot of opportunities to ambush people on the interstates,” Cook said.
Cook said retaliation is common in the biker gang world.
“This is certainly not the first time this has happened and, unfortunately, probably won’t be the last,” Cook said.
Cook said this is an ongoing, monthslong feud between the Bandidos and a gang called the Homietos. Now, he’s calling on the public and law enforcement to help settle the dust and keep citizens safe.
“This is something that one would hope is getting the federal authority’s attention. It’s racketeering-style crimes that these gangs are involved in. These are territorial disputes. They are killing one another over territory and over a patch. The public needs to stop ignoring the issue. This isn’t anything new. It’s been going on for a long time. This is organized crime. It’s not street gangs. They are organized crime, and they are involved in a wide variety of criminal activity,” Cook said.
The names of the victims in the Houston shootings have not been released. KOCO 5 reached out to Oklahoma City police to see if they could confirm the homicides are connected, but they said this is not their investigation and they can’t confirm at this time.
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