Police are defending themselves from suggestions that innocent bystanders might have been swept up in the arrests of about 170 people after a biker shootout at a Texas restaurant left nine dead.
Waco police spokesman Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton said Thursday that there were people at the Twin Peaks restaurant at the time of the Sunday shootout who weren't arrested. In his words, "If you were innocent, or we thought you were innocent, you were one of those that did not get arrested."
Swanton said there were "well over 200-plus" people involved in the Twin Peaks shootout and that "some of those individuals were intentionally released that day."
Some bikers have complained that police acted too hastily in making arrests and scooped up riders who had nothing to do with the violence.
Police are also being less specific about gang affiliations of the nine people killed.
Swanton said Thursday all those killed or injured on Sunday were members of five criminal motorcycle gangs at the restaurant for a biker meeting. A day earlier he told The Associated Press that all those killed were members of the two rival gangs at the center of the violence.
Family members of one of the men killed -- 65-year-old Jesus Delgado Rodriguez -- dispute Swanton's claims. They say Rodriguez was not part of a gang and did not lead a life of violence.
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An Associated Press review of court records and a database maintained by the Texas Department of Public Safety found no criminal history in Texas for Rodriguez.
