Houstonist told you yesterday about the alleged "mob beating" that took place in East Austin on Tuesday, June 19th. Today, however, the Austin Police Department (APD) backed off of the troubling story, claiming that their initial press releases contained incorrect information, and that, according to Austin Mayor Will Wynn, "the city played a role in that."
Additionally, as new details emerge about the murder, a new troubling element of the story seems to be replacing the troubling "mob" element that APD is now playing down. Now Austin city officials are saying that because of the crowd, emergency workers were unable to respond quickly to the scene.
Sadly, the most important part of the story remains true: David Rivas Morales, 40, died on Tuesday from injuries he received in the parking lot of the Booker T. Washington Terrace complex in East Austin.
The story made national headlines as a result of inital police reports estimating that anywhere from 2,000 to 3,000 people were at the scene when Morales was killed by members of the crowd. Initially, police reported that Morales was a passenger in a car that had struck a child in the midst of East Austin's Juneteenth celebration. In the initial report, APD claimed that the people who witnessed the scene became angry after the child was hit and attacked Morales while he tried to calm the crowd.
APD is now tweaking several aspects of the story. Now, they say that the crowd was not as large as initially reported. Also, APD says that the attack occured away from the Juneteenth celebration that was winding down nearby, rather than in the midst of it. Finally, APD is saying that ambulances were slow to respond because initial 911 calls erroneously suggested that the murder had been part of a gang fight, and therefore additional security precautions had to be taken.
As of right now, it seems a bit unclear to us how APD could be claiming that there was not a significant crowd at the scene, while city officials are simultaneously reporting that emergency response was slow as a result of the crowd. Hmmm. It seems we'll have to wait a bit longer before anyone figures out what actually happened.
Houstonist will keep you updated, but here are some links you may want to check out for more information:
Original Houstonist post on the story
Houston Chronicle's updated article
Austin American-Statesman newspaper article (fyi: you have to do a**hole login stuff)
Austin NBC affiliate KXAN's report
New York Times article with update
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