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Documents: Police did little to stop Waco biker showdown

FILE - In this Jan. 6, 2016 file photo, Jeffrey Pike, the national president of the Bandidos Motorcycle Club, is escorted from the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse in Houston.  Law enforcement did nothing on the day to stop a meeting in Waco  in 2015 that erupted into the deadliest shootout between biker gangs in U.S. history, even though they had detailed advance intelligence that the encounter between the Cossacks and Bandidos was likely to turn violent. That finding came from a review by The Associated Press of a trove of evidence compiled by prosecutors for use in state trials of 154 bikers, with the first trial slated to begin this week of Oct. 11, 2017.  (Melissa Phillip/Houston Chronicle via AP, File)
FILE - In this Jan. 6, 2016 file photo, Jeffrey Pike, the national president of the Bandidos Motorcycle Club, is escorted from the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse in Houston. Law enforcement did nothing on the day to stop a meeting in Waco in 2015 that erupted into the deadliest shootout between biker gangs in U.S. history, even though they had detailed advance intelligence that the encounter between the Cossacks and Bandidos was likely to turn violent. That finding came from a review by The Associated Press of a trove of evidence compiled by prosecutors for use in state trials of 154 bikers, with the first trial slated to begin this week of Oct. 11, 2017. (Melissa Phillip/Houston Chronicle via AP, File) FILE - In this Jan. 6, 2016 file photo, Jeffrey Pike, the national president of the Bandidos Motorcycle Club, is escorted from the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse in Houston. Law enforcement did nothing on the day to stop a meeting in Waco in 2015 that erupted into the deadliest shootout between biker gangs in U.S. history, even though they had detailed advance intelligence that the encounter between the Cossacks and Bandidos was likely to turn violent. That finding came from a review by The Associated Press of a trove of evidence compiled by prosecutors for use in state trials of 154 bikers, with the first trial slated to begin this week of Oct. 11, 2017. (Melissa Phillip/Houston Chronicle via AP, File)

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) – Evidence from prosecutors shows that state and local law enforcement had overwhelming intelligence of impending violence at a May, 2015 showdown between rival biker gangs in Waco, Texas, and did little to prevent the meeting taking place.

A trove of documents provided to The Associated Press also shows that a state police agent who spoke to the Twin Peaks restaurant owner three days before nine bikers died in the shootout, did not report any request to cancel the event.

While state and local authorities deliberately arrived at the restaurant in force, a federal official closely involved in biker prosecutions says their investigators did not know about the meeting or imminent violence. The official requested anonymity because jury selection began this week in the first trial of a Waco biker.