Motorcycle gang members sentenced for 2020 shootout in Arvada
Court cases recently ended for nine men involved in a 2020 shootout between rival motorcycle gangs that left one dead, three shot, and several others physically beaten - including a good Samaritan who tried to help one of the injured.
That good Samaritan, Ryan McPhearson, will live with a traumatic brain injury for the rest of his life.
McPhearson was the lead singer for the rock band Nightwolf which was playing at Jake's Roadhouse, 5980 Lamar Street in Arvada, the night of July 11, 2020. It was one of the band's first gigs since resuming performances they'd halted due to the COVID pandemic.
The band had played its first set when patrons began to notice a commotion outside.
Someone said, "Man, there's something going on," said a witness who was at Jake's that night. "It sounded like gunshots."
Many of the bar's patrons walked to a side patio.
McPhearson, however, walked out the front door.
"Help me, somebody help me! I've been shot!" cried a man lying in the street next to a fallen motorcycle, according to the witness.
Realizing the intensity of the ongoing "rampage," as the witness called it, the bar patrons returned to the protection of the building.
But McPhearson walked into Lamar Street to assist the man in the street.
"Our singer Ryan went out to have a cigarette," Nightwolfguitarish Jay Halpern told CBS News Colorado. "He noticed somebody had been shot and had fallen over on his motorcycle and he went over there to help him."
Most bar patrons didn't know McPhearson had tried to help the injured man until they saw another man attacking McPhearson. The attacker stood over the prone McPhearson, repeatedly striking him with a helmet, as described by the witness.
Patrons and friends ran out to McPhearson. His attacker had already left.
"We're trying to take care of Ryan," the witness said, "and we're hearing bikes rolling all through the neighborhood. We thought, 'OK, this is pretty bizarre.'"
The witness believes McPhearson, at 6-foot-4, weighing 300 pounds and wearing black clothing that night, may have been mistaken by his attacker as a member of a rival gang.
Farther way, other downed motorcycles and riders could be seen along a four-block stretch of Lamar Street, the witness stated.
The witness preferred to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution from members of the motorcycle gangs.
McPhearson was hospitalized in critical condition after the incident. He had a traumatic brain injury and several broken bones; in addition to the head strikes, he had been run over by a motorcycle.
An anonymous source stated that McPhearson has partially recovered since the attack and has even resumed his musical career locally - but with difficulty. CBS News Colorado tried contacting McPhearson but was unsuccessful.
William Kelly Henderson, a ranking Hells Angel member, according to police, died during the shooting. Henderson, an Arvada resident, lived about a mile from Jake's Roadhouse.
The night of the incident, Arvada Police Department responded to the scene. It was soon joined by resources from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Eventually, investigators identified 10 suspects, all members of the Mongols and Hells Angels motorcycle gangs. They were all arrested the same day in January 2022 in Colorado, Utah, California and Florida.
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Nine of them were prosecuted on felony charges.
An Arvada PD press release announcing the sentencing of the last defendant called the Mongols and Hells Angels "two of the largest and most violent outlaw motorcycle gangs in the world."
"This was a case of pure evil," stated Arvada PD Chief Ed Brady in the press release, "and our community will not tolerate it. I am incredibly proud of our entire department's efforts and perseverance to seek justice, and the assistance from several professional law enforcement agencies."
Previous reporting from police and media indicated the incident started at Jake's Roadhouse. That was not the case, according to its owner, Doug Jacobsen.
The witness who was there that night said the same: "The (injured) guy just happened to fall off his bike in front of Jake's."
