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| -Lurid Crime Tales- | ||
| Singer Billy Joe Shaver never too far from trouble | ||
| 2007-05-13 | ||
| EFL: Willie Nelson once said: "Billy Joe Shaver may be the best songwriter alive today." Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, the Allman Brothers, Kris Kristofferson and of course Waylon and Willie have all covered his songs. It was Shaver who wrote nine of the cuts on "Honky Tonk Heroes," Jennings' breakthrough album. Among his many hits are "Georgia on a Fast Train," "When the Fallen Angels Fly," "Black Rose," "Wild Cow Gravy" and "I'm Just an Old Chunk of Coal (but I'm Going to Be a Diamond Someday)." These days, this redneck rebel, a key figure in the outlaw country music revolt that roiled '70s-era Nashville, is in a familiar place -- in trouble again. That trouble began on a Saturday night, March 31, when the longtime Waco resident drove to nearby Lorena and dropped in at Papa Joe's Texas Saloon, an unpretentious little beer joint in a gray metal prefab on Interstate Highway 35. While he was there he shot a man in the cheek, according to local police. The exact chain of events is uncertain, although the story Papa Joe patrons told police and reporters would seem to have the makings of a country-western chart-buster for the songwriting legend, who in recent years has become a hyper-patriotic, born-again Bible believer. ("If you don't love Jesus, you can go to hell.") At Papa Joe's he was sitting at a table on the back patio with several other patrons, including a 50-year-old man named Billy B. Coker. The two men had never met. Coker told Lorena police that in the course of the conversation, he and Shaver discovered that Shaver's wife, Wanda, had been married to Coker's cousin, who had since died.
Another patron said Shaver posed something of an existential question just before the shot. "Where do you want it?" he asked Coker. Coker got out of the hospital April 3. Shaver has been charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and unlawfully carrying a handgun. Jailed briefly after turning himself in, he's out on bail.
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| Posted by:Steve |
| #2 Well, it was alla Ima could do to keeper from crying... lol Shipr, poor billy joe kain't find any kissin kousin to marry and/or snort koke with.. there's no justice in dis ole krule world ceptin ur own kind pardner... *wipes tear* |
| Posted by: RD 2007-05-13 19:21 |
| #1 the longtime Waco resident drove to nearby Lorena and dropped in at Papa Joe's Texas Saloon, an unpretentious little beer joint in a gray metal prefab on Interstate Highway 35. While he was there he shot a man in the cheek, Well, it was alla Ima could do to keeper from crying... |
| Posted by: Shipman 2007-05-13 18:57 |