Roundup: The Billy Joe Shaver Shooting Edition

I’ve found the recent shooting involving Billy Joe Shaver particularly interesting and have thus been following it very closely. There’s still a lot of mystery and questions to be sorted out, and maybe we will never know the full truth about what exactly happened, but I thought I’d go through and try to piece together everything that can be found on the web.

The following information can be found in the complaint filed by John Moran, via Linda’s Still is Still Moving (be sure to check Linda’s blog periodically, she’s been staying on top of the story). I summed up the basics of it here:

On Saturday March 31st Billy Joe Shaver was at Papa Joe’s Bar in Lorena, TX (a suburb of Waco).

Lou Ewing was sitting inside the bar when Shaver and Coker left. Ewing heard a gunshot and went to where Shaver and Coker were and heard Shaver say “tell me you are sorry” and “nobody tells me to shutup.” In a statement Ewing wrote that Billy Joe and his wife, Wanda Shaver, “left quickly.”

Gloria Tambling, the owner of Papa Joe’s Bar, said that Billy Joe was involved in the shooting, and was a regular at Papa Joe’s. She also told John Moran that she had personally introduced Shaver and Coker on the night of the shooting.

Michael Strickland said he saw the incident. He says that Coker exited the building first and that Shaver followed close behind with the pistol in his hand as he exited. According to Strickland, Shaver then asked Coker “where do you want it?” before raising the gun and shooting Coker in the left cheek.

John Moran from the Lorena Police Department spoke with Coker after the incident. Coker told Moran that he and Shaver had talked for about an hour to an hour and half during the evening and had determined that Wanda Shaver was the widow of Coker’s deceased cousin. Coker said Shaver then asked him to walk out to the back porch with him, where Shaver asked him “where do you want it?” before shooting him in the left cheek. All of this unprovoked.

From this we can deduce that the shooting took place out back, and that Billy Joe Shaver allegedly asked Coker “where do you want it” before shooting him the left cheek. We still don’t know why Shaver shot Coker, and I don’t think it’s plausible that he would do it unprovoked as Coker suggests to Moran.

The story that the Associated Press ran says that Shaver’s lawyer, Joseph Turner, claims that Coker was drunk and the aggressor in the incident. According to Turner, Coker was wielding a knife as he followed Shaver into the parking lot. Shaver then acted in self defense (via Waco Tribue-Herald). This contradicts the claim Strickland made about Coker exiting the building first. Turner gathered his information from interviewing witnesses at the bar on Sunday.

Two warrants were issued for Shaver’s arrest on Monday afternoon. The two warrants are for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and unlawfully carrying a handgun on the premises of a business with a license to sell alcohol for on-premises consumption. After the warrants were issued Billy Joe Shaver attempted to surrender to Austin police, but they would not arrest him because they didn’t have a record of the warrants.

Shortly after noon on Tuesday Shaver surrendered to authorities in McLennan County. He posted bond around 2:30 and made his way to Austin to perform around 6:00 at Waterloo Records for the release of his greatest hits CD. Austin360 reports that “about 200 wildly supportive fans and half a dozen TV news cameras packed Waterloo Records.” I was there, so I can attest to that claim. Shaver never made any mention of the incident that I heard of aside from saying “it’s just so great to be anywhere.”

It’ll be interesting to see how this thing plays out. Based on all the evidence so far, it’s hard to decide what really happened. The incident would definitely make a good country song, and as one commenter posted on his own blog, “some are more authentic than others” in reference to Billy Joe Shaver as an artist.