Officers Who Stopped Austin Shooter Must Face Grand Jury
A far-left group is behind the decision to put all officers who use force in front of a grand jury.
The three officers who stopped the Austin shooter must face a grand jury to determine if the state should bring charges against them.
On Sunday, Ndiaga Diagne, a naturalized citizen from Senegal, opened fire in Austin. Three people have died, and two remain in critical condition.
Jorge Pederson, 30, was taken off life support on Monday.
Ryder Harrington, 19, and Savitha Shan, 21, also passed away.
Attorney Doug O’Connell posted on X that the Austin Police Association asked his team to represent the officers:
The Austin Police Association @ATXPOA has asked my team to represent the 3 heroes that took down the terrorist killer who attacked our community. Unfortunately they will face a Grand Jury hearing – as is the process directed to the Travis County DA by the Wren Collective. We will be with them every step of the way.
The Austin Police Association @ATXPOA has asked my team to represent the 3 heroes that took down the terrorist killer who attacked our community. Unfortunately they will face a Grand Jury hearing – as is the process directed to the Travis County DA by the Wren Collective. We will…
— Doug OConnell (@DouglasOConnell) March 3, 2026
Apparently, Travis County DA José Garza follows instructions from the Wren Collective, a criminal justice reform group.
The group has pushed Garza to present all officers who use force to face a grand jury.
Garza has claimed that the Wren Collective provides him with advice on messaging, not on prosecution decisions.
KSAT has an excellent report on the Wren Collective.
You probably already guessed that the Wren Collective is a leftist group.
Let’s talk history and finances.
Jessica Brand, an attorney based in Austin, founded the Wren Collective in 2019…the year Garza took office.
The Wren Collective is not an independent organization. It falls under an umbrella like most leftist groups.
The donation link on the Wren Collective’s website leads to an account for the Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs (SEE), based in California.
The Wren Collective became a project of SEE in 2022.
SEE started in 1987 as the….American-Soviet Film Initiative. The group wanted to promote “the development of opportunities to view Soviet films in the United States and American films in the Soviet Union through tours and exhibition screenings.”
The American-Soviet Film Initiative became SEE in the mid-1990s, following the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991.
KSAT discovered that SEE took in over $21 million in 2019, but has recently grown to over $73 million.
Brand has refused to disclose who has donated or funded the Wren Collective.
Of course, Brand denies any links to George Soros, even though he donated almost $1 million to Garza’s campaign.
Brand might not have personal connections to Soros, but he has ties to SEE.
According to Influencer Watch, SEE has received funding from Alliance for Global Justice, which receives funds from the Open Society Foundations, Tides Foundation, and Arca Foundation.
Soros created and funded the Open Society Foundations.
I mean, you can basically connect all left groups to the Open Society Foundations in some way.
The Suspect
The FBI has been investigating Diagne:
FBI Acting Special Agent in Charge Alex Doran said the FBI is examining the suspect’s criminal history and background, which will also be addressed in that upcoming update. Doran said federal investigators are examining whether there is any ideological or international link to the attack, including reviewing items associated with the suspect such as clothing referencing Iran.
The agency reportedly found “indicators” on Diagne. His car contained items “pointing to a ‘potential nexus to terrorism.'”
The shooting happened after the U.S. and Israel launched an operation against Iran.
Pictures show Diagne wearing a “Property of Allah” sweatshirt.
One official said Diagne had a t-shirt with the Iranian flag on it underneath the sweatshirt.
BREAKING: @FoxNews has obtained a photo of the Austin, TX mass shooter, armed & wearing a sweater that says “Property of Allah”. He has not been identified by authorities, but multiple federal law enforcement sources tell FOX he is a 53-year-old naturalized US citizen who was… pic.twitter.com/YjyT8sIuBr
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) March 1, 2026
https://twitter.com/BillMelugin_/status/2028523048958087593
The New York Post reported that Diagne spread hateful messages on his social media, attacking conservatives and praising an Islamic revolution:
“The Islamic revolution is eternal and here to stay until the end of time,” he raged in a post last April.
“You Zionist and islamophobes can be angry all you want but you can’t do a damn thing about it, no matter what.”
He also hurled vicious insults at conservative women, including MAGA podcaster Laura Loomer and influencer Valentina Gomez.
“Shut the f–k up you Israel first wh–e, move to Israel you f–king bitch,” he said of Loomer in a post from October.
“Free ride is coming to an end, you and your Israel first acolytes fake Jews know it, so melt down all you want you ugly bitch,” he added in a separate post.
The Post also reported that Diagne faced a lawsuit for allegedly running over a pedestrian in the Bronx in 2017.
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Comments
Great, the next time an Austin mass shooter goes on a rampage the cops should let him die of old age!
“A far-left group is behind the decision to put all officers who use force in front of a grand jury”. No, a Democrat group.
One and the same.
Exactly. Our enemy has a name-Democrat. Not ‘far left’ or any of those other prefixes that show up in articles. Use the enemy’s name without the qualifiers.
And in other news, If necessary, the United States Navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz:
“Effective IMMEDIATELY, I have ordered the United States Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to provide, at a very reasonable price, political risk insurance and guarantees for the Financial Security of ALL Maritime Trade… If necessary, the United States Navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, as soon as possible.” – President Donald J. Trump
So what?
Try to stay on topic Sparky.
Sorry Trump and Bibi killed your hero the ayatollah…and several layers of his hench demons. Here’s hoping they get the rest of them.
Lord Haw-Haw chimes in yet again with his Islamonazi propaganda.
The Brits hanged the original Lord Haw-Haw.
Address the issue. Should they face the Grand Jury?
Why is this a problem?
Because it makes sense and will build goodwill towards the US abroad while turning Iran into even more of a villain. It’s the US doing something smart. Therefore moonmouth hates it
Uh, it’s “moonmeth”.
Isn’t there a greasy and dirty Islamofascist/Muslim terrorist, somewhere, before whom you should be on your knees, gleefully sucking him off and servicing him?
oPeRaTiOn ePsTeIn fUrY
This is stupid and a waste of time and money. If I wanted to be a police officer I’d pick a jurisdiction where I could be one without continually being second and third guessed. That is if such a jurisdiction existed.
You could convincingly argue that these men weren’t police officers, but repo men.
They were simply returning Allah’s property.
Repo man was a great movie.
Why would any sane person want to be a cop in Austin? In any touchy situation, the city will decide against the cops in favor of the “Victim”.
It’s a grand jury, not the city.
True, but I’m more interested to know if you’re defending the Austin DA’s policy of making every cop face a grand jury and possible indictment after a shooting, regardless of the facts. Are you?
No one is making them face the grand jury. If they’re confident that there’s no case to be made against them, as is the case here, they can just ignore it. They’re invited to testify to the grand jury as a courtesy. But it makes sense for them to return the courtesy by showing up, explaining what happened, and answer any questions the grand jurors might have, in the expectation that they’ll agree it was a good shoot.
But it’s a fact in every department, as far as I know, that every shooting is investigated, and even every case of drawing a weapon. And every such investigation carries the potential for negative consequences. So they have to face that anyway, just like anyone else who shoots someone for a good reason. There’s always some sort of process, because how else can we verify that the shooting was indeed good?
I don’t know where you get that one from. Simply drawing one’s weapon isn’t going to land you in front of a Grand Jury or result in any investigation. That only occurs if the weapon is discharged. Then the law enforcement officer must justify his use of his weapon to his superiors and possibly to a Grand Jury. But simply drawing your weapon and pointing it at someone ain’t gonna do it.
Been a cop here for 22 years. Every shooting gets presented to the grand jury.
Well then, I guess there’s a first time for everything, isn’t there? See https://www.texastribune.org/2026/03/03/texas-austin-shooting-police-grand-jury/ (“DA won’t refer police who killed Austin shooter to grand jury”)
Do you really think those cops should face anything for shutting down an active shooter?
There needs to be a formal process of verifying that it was a good shoot. And I see no reason why that process shouldn’t be external to the department rather than internal.
criminal justice
reformperversion groupFIFY
Seems like a misuse of the Grand Jury. What evidence does the prosecutor have to believe a crime was committed, justifying taking it to a Grand Jury? Officers are authorized to use force. Again, what evidence does the prosecutor have to believe their use of force wasn’t appropriate?
It’s not a misuse, it’s a procedural issue that in this case seems like a waste of time and effort, but may be good as a matter of general policy.
There’s no need for evidence that a crime was committed, or for the prosecutor to believe that the use of force wasn’t appropriate. It’s the grand jury that will consider whether there is such evidence. That’s precisely what a grand jury is for.
Look, in every police force I have ever heard of, it is standard procedure that every time an officer fires a weapon, or even draws a weapon, there is an internal inquiry into whether this was appropriate. Usually the immediate conclusion is yes, it was clearly appropriate, well done and back to work you go. Sometimes it isn’t so clear and it may take a few days to decide, and in the meantime the cop is doing desk work. If it appears that it was inappropriate, then it has to be decided what the consequences should be, whether it’s just some retraining, or internal discipline, or in an extreme case criminal charges.
But this is all internal to the force. If there are a significant number of people in the community who are skeptical of a police force’s ability to police itself, it’s not unreasonable to decide that as a matter of general policy all uses of force will be reviewed by an outside investigative body which will do the same as the usual internal inquiry does. In most cases it will take one look at the circumstances and congratulate the officer on a job well done. Sometimes it will recommend discipline, and sometimes criminal proceedings.
And that is precisely what a grand jury is supposed to be for. So if you want to have such an external review process it’s not unreasonable to give it to the grand jury. I expect in this case it will be a simple matter, the DA will present to the grand jury that this is what happened, we think the cops did well, what do you think? And the grand jury will agree that they did well.
The fact that the DA is a leftist supported by Soros, and that he consults with a leftist law firm for advice, doesn’t seem relevant to this particular case, where there’s just no way to see anything wrong with what the cops did. That comes in only in more complicated cases, where there is something that can be seen in varying lights, and the DA can be expected to take the worst view possible.
It’s Austin….. I’d place a bet on this going to trial but that’s easy money. A key issue is to see how the judge in the coming trial angles the proceedings. I hope you are absolutely correct, but… it’s Austin.
It is Austin, and I’m well aware of what kind of people get elected in Austin, and what kind of DA in particular Travis County tends to get. They haven’t had a decent human being in that office in a long time, if ever. But even a Soros POS isn’t going to want to indict these cops. And if he does want to, a grand jury is unlikely to go along with it.
Remember he doesn’t have to present all of the true evidence, but he can’t present any false evidence or he’ll get in huge trouble, huger than Soros can bail him out of. And if the officers are invited to testify, as is common practice, then they can introduce any evidence that he chooses to leave out. So I don’t see the issue here.
Of course if there is an indictment that will be a disgrace. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Yes, the prosecutor has discretion. Or does he? If he has made a rule (regardless of any influences that may have led him to make the rule) and the rule rules out discretion, is he using discretion? Or is he toeing an ideological line and abusing the system for (Leftist) political purposes (whether his own or someone else’s)?
For Demsocialists, the process is the punishment.
damnnn another win for the leftists
so now ..not only do they get to silence their own so he cant speak out on his lefty wing pro omar pro dnc agenda
(and the msm up until now still says…the fbi cant say what the motive was)
another win for the lefty silencing the anti criminals aka maga)
but the get to parade the cops around further discouraging the brave so that they too may give way for more blk matriarch types to run the police force so that whty can suffer the same way the original african slaves suffered under the whip of their own
african takmasters >>>muslims>>>dutch>>>>etc
What do you mean by “parade around”? The cops don’t even have to show up at the grand jury hearing. They can if they want to, but if they’re confident that they did nothing wrong they can ignore it and probably will never hear about it again.
They can be required to testify. And they likely will be.
Has he? Maybe so, but the link you provided doesn’t say that, and has nothing whatsoever to do with Garza, or with anyone in the Travis County DA’s office. It’s about the private consultations that a Wren lawyer has had with the Bexar County DA and his deputy, and the advice she has offered them on various cases.
Maybe it’s true that she hasn’t advised them on what decisions to make, but only on how to market those decisions. But that doesn’t tell us anything about what influence she or her firm have had with the Travis County DA’s office.
It’s perfectly possible that both things are true: that the Travis DA takes orders from Wren, while the Bexar DA merely asks for PR advice.
You got some Wren Collective on your chin there.
Huh? What on earth is that supposed to mean? Are you capable of reading and comprehending plain English?
whether its jan 6 or daniel penny
lefty knows how to run the gulag and the only thing standing in their way has been a pesky djt
same way they wouldnt talk about being socialists…now its getting mroe risky to say you’re a maga a patriot a pro capitalist
so the fact that the wren group is doing like all their other soul bros and hos is nothing new
its just becoming easier for their type to be held up as heros…lugi anyone!!?????
A grand jury is not a gulag! A grand jury’s job is to investigate potential crimes. Every single use of force by a policeman is potentially a crime, so it’s not unreasonable for a grand jury to take a look at it and decide whether there’s any there there, which in this case there clearly isn’t.
Correct me if I’m wrong but a grand jury generally does what the DA wants them to do and it is a bad DA that can’t get them to do what they want. This means if the DA wants to charge the officers he generally will get the grand jury to go along and they will be charged. This is not appropriate oversight in my opinion which I agree is needed.
Grand juries don’t obey the DA’s orders or anything. But he can generally manipulate them if he wants to, because he controls what evidence they see. If he doesn’t want them to see something he doesn’t have to show it to them. So often he gets the result he wanted; sometimes he doesn’t, because even seeing only the evidence he shows them they still don’t agree with his conclusion.
But in this case I see no reason whatsoever to think the DA would want to get the cops in trouble. Soros prosecutor or not, this is not a case he would want to prosecute. This story isn’t about this specific case, it’s about a general policy that all police force goes to the grand jury for review. And that may be a good policy; a grand jury is not inherently any less trustworthy than an internal police review.
You don’t know how often a police officer uses force, do you? Literally every time handcuffs go on force was used. Every time a police officer pulls along a suspect in handcuffs, force is used. In fact the police Continuum of Force begins with officer presence. So we can make a good case that an officer merely being somewhere is use of force, by their own training and definitions.
You also don’t understand grand juries. There are two types that our state has: Investigating and Charging. The Charging grand jury has the DA being them a specific situation and asks them whether there’s enough to charge someone with various crimes and, if so, which.
The Investigating grand jury is given subpoena power and is pointed in the direction of a target, usually some type of institution or something more paperwork based, and told to go for it. This sounds a lot more like a Charging grand jury.
But in either case the grand jury isn’t given carte blanche. They are guided and I believe empowered by the authority of the District Attorney. This is a very, very odd thing to happen.
It’s blindingly obvious that not every time an officer arrests someone is it investigated. But every time one draw a gun, and certainly every time one fires a gun, there has to be some sort of process. If the Travis DA — whether it was on Wren’s advice or his own idea — has instituted a general policy that the grand jury looks at every case that could potentially involve charges, then it makes sense to include this one.
I’m just saying let’s save the outrage till after the grand jury has looked at it. If they do anything other than congratulate the officers for a job well done, then it will be time for outrage.
No. Police point their guns at people on a regular basis. That is not a use of force- it’s a threat of force. The situation is such that if conduct observed does not stop immediately it will result in gunfire. Yes, the action by the suspect is so serious that deadly force could be used. If the observed action stops then no force was used.
tmm, and yet it’s standard practice in every department I’ve ever heard of that every time an officer draws his weapon there is a review.
Milhouse makes things up.
He’s here to demoralize–to make us think that even when we think we’ve done something right, it’s actually the Democrats or the left who were right and we just don’t really have any chance.
He does this with that unctuous tone that marks the expert concern troll.
What cause is there to investigate these officers? How could a grand jury possibly help them?
This is a disgrace. I hope the next Mass shooter goes after the wren Collective and the event is allowed to run its course naturally with no interference.
This is not a disgrace. The Wren Collective seems like a despicable set of people, and the Travis DA seems like a despicable person, but in this specific case there doesn’t seem (yet) to be anything wrong. Any police use of force needs to be reviewed, just on principle, to prevent the police from turning into a tyranny. And it makes sense for that review to be conducted by someone outside the force.
It is a disgrace in every decent cop on the Austin Police Force should find a job elsewhere
The leftists, Dhimmi-crats, “liberals” (falsely characterized), “progressives” (also falsely characterized), “Democratic Socialists” (communists, re-branded), communists, “Anti-fa,” Islamofascists, Muslim supremacists, Hamasholes, etc. — I don’t care what moniker they invoke to characterized themselves, on any given day.
All of these vile pukes are pure evil.
Austin is such a shit show now
For all that it’s the state capital of Texas, Austin is still a heavily liberal city – the apocryphal “wretched hive of scum and villainy”. The officers will be indicted by the Grand Jury, the tool-of-Soros district attorney will prosecute, a hand-picked liberal jury will convict, and a liberal judge will throw the book at them. It will likely take two cycles of appeals for the officers to finally be cleared, long after their careers have been tanked. No, I don’t have any faith in any system – justice or otherwise – that has liberals as part of it.
A hundred thumbs up from a Texan.
It’s a pity, actually. I used to like going to Austin for a day trip, or an evening out. But it went well around the bend, so I limit my trips to the immediate area around Bexar.
Bexar doesn’t sound too great either. Even if the DA there is not basing his decisions on advice from Wren, he’s still far too chummy with them.
Not as many politicians and sycophants running around loose, so less general tension. And the San Antonio City Council has limited powers. Plus, from what I’ve heard, we have a hell of a lot more gun stores and shooting ranges than Travis County. For example, using my usual range as Point Zero, there are at least three stand-alone gun stores within two miles, plus a combined store/indoor range about a mile and a half away.
There’s no basis for that prediction. It may turn out that way, and in that case it would be very bad, but it’s far too early to be expecting that.
If it does turn out that way, will it be merely a coincidence, or will it be because Bill’s opinion is informed by observations and an ability to recognize patterns?
Patterns like this one.
That case was far from open and shut. There was a genuine case to be made against Perry, so the grand jury wasn’t wrong to indict him. As for Garza, I have never suggested that he’s not a vindictive bastard. But being a vindictive bastard is not good reason to suppose that he intends to ask the grand jury to indict these officers, let alone that the grand jury will go along with such a request. The case here does seem open and shut, so I expect that Garza won’t try anything.
There was a genuine case to be made against Perry,
No. There wasn’t.
Latest news is that under pressure from Governor Abbot, Garza has dropped charging the police officers. Garza may just be waiting and will return charges to a Grand Jury with in the next couple of years.
He was never considering charging them. The policy is simply to let the grand jury review the case; not to recommend charges.
I was a cop in Honolulu. Any time a police officer is involved in a shooting, the cop is investigated just like any other citizen. I haven’t paid much attention to the entire process before, but a grand jury surely is part of that. I would be shocked beyond belief if the cops are indicted.
Investigation after a shooting? Yes. Grand jury? No, this was not a thing until BLM happened and leftist DAs started dragging cops through a grand jury.
Do not give these leftist clowns any intellectual honesty slack, their goal is to have as many necks as they can get under their F-ing boot.
It’s not. That’s the job of internal affairs. You empanel a grand jury to seek an indictment.
More precisely, the state’s attorney brings evidence of a crime to the grand jury, and attempts to show that a certain person or persons were responsible for the crime in evidence. What evidence might the DA bring to the grand jury that the officers committed a crime? “Hands up! Don’t shoot!”?
A grand jury isn’t usually part of that, but I see no inherent problem in making it a part. So long as they do the right thing here and find that it was a good shoot.
The goal of the policy is a “psy-op” against LEO, even if they know the chance of charges is low. No matter what anyone argues to the contrary, the chance of an indictment is not “zero,” especially in a liberal city, and LEO knows this. Knowing that they will face a grand jury will undoubtedly affect the decision making of at least some LEO in stressful situations, which is the goal. It advances us one step closer to anarchy, which is what the persistent democrats want more than anything else. Once anarchy arrives, if they have enough power they will declare martial law and kill everyone that disagrees with them. That’s why they secretly admire and are envious of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
How is that different from knowing that they’ll face an internal review?
An Internal Affairs review can result in no adverse action, recommendation for retraining, reassignment, suspension, termination of employment or yes, referral to the DA for criminal prosecution. Beginning with a Grand Jury as the first step eliminates most of not all of these lesser consequences and goes straight to prosecution. Even if – and it’s a big if in a liberal jurisdiction – if the Grand Jury declines to recommend prosecution, even having that on your record can be a career killer.
Garza quickly backtracked after Abbott landed on him like white on rice. Under TX legislation.passed in 2023, the governor can initiate a procedure to remove a DA. My guess is that Abbott is already looking at this option.
The Powerline blog ( https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2026/03/no-good-deed.php ) is reporting the DA has decided to “No longer seek charges”, as MarkJ stated above. “Seek charges” feels apt, considering earlier discussion.
“Seeking charges” can be a formality. It can go “This is what happened; do any of you think he should be charged? No? Good.”
“Milhouse in reply to geecheeboy. | March 4, 2026 at 2:30 am
How is that different from knowing that they’ll face an internal review?”
Milhouse, it’s only different because it’s one step closer to an indictment. If an internal review finds fault, the grand jury comes next. I admit it may often be a distinction of no practical significance, but it’s a real distinction, nonetheless. That’s why I said “psy-op.” Communists overlook no method that can help them reach their goals. Conservatives are too busy living productive lives to worry about such crap.
Time for the Blue Flu in Austin.
This is what the worst of the lefty-left (registered as Ds, I’ll bet) inflict on the USA: DAs like Garza. SHAME on the voters of that county … the Ds for not fielding a lawyer rather than a lefty sycophant and all the voters for not electing anyone but Garza. SHAME!!
This is definitely an abuse of the grand jury process. A prosecutor doesn’t need a grand jury when the shooting investigation (that is done in all cases of police-involved shooting) demonstrates clearly that the shooting is justified. That is the case here, where the shooting was done for the purpose of stopping an active shooter. But this Democrat prosecutor refuses to exercise such discretion, but elects to drag the process out—because is Democrat-run areas, the process is the punishment. Failure to exercise discretion can only be due to two things: incompetence or political corruption. Dems aren’t incompetent, they are malicious and corrupt.
In Texas, the senate primary votes totaled 4,396,221.
Votes cast for democrat candidates (8 candidates) totaled 2,252,511.
Votes cast for Republican candidates (4 candidates) totaled 2,143,710.
Source: The Texas Tribune (94% in)
The Democrat Party explained:
The Analyst: “If I understand you correctly, you want freedom, with no responsibility. Yeah, there’s only one kind of person on Earth that gets that.
The Patient: Umm, the president.
The Analyst: A baby. You’re fighting for your right — to be a baby.
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