MNO Blog – Motorcycles, News, Opinions

While Billy Lane is appearing live on Main street in Daytona Beach during Bike Week, he had to appear in court yesterday before Judge Allawas for a case that started back in September of 2006. Billy Lane is still facing charges for DUI Manslaughter and can get up to 15 years if he is convicted for taking the life of 56 year old Gerald Morelock. Though prosecutors did not want Lane’s blood samples to be sent out of state to Colorado, Judge Allawas allowed it and now the Lane defense team stated they are still waiting on the blood and results to be returned. A trial date has yet to be set in this case and the next scheduled hearing has been set for April 11, 2008.

Choppers Inc. the retail store that Lane owns has been closed to the public for over a year and their web site states that the store is relocating. Billy Lane has continued his work and still makes public appearances while he is waiting for a trial date to be set. Lane recently unveiled his latest project the Henderson Bike in Columbus, Ohio and is in Daytona Beach for Bike Week 2008.

Technorati Tags: billy lane, DUI, motorcycle news, Florida, bike week, daytona beach, Melbourne, choppers inc, motorcycles

(Viera, Florida) Billy Lane listened attentively as lawyers discussed whether his blood samples used as evidence in the pending DUI Manslaughter case should be allowed to be sent out of the state of Florida for further examination.

Billy Lane was in court today for a hearing still surrounding the blood work evidence. State attorney Tom Brown stated that he is concerned as to the credentials and credibility of Rocky Mountain Labs located in Colorado. Toxicologist, Dr. Lawrence Masten was not present to explain why he wants to use the lab, but defense attorney Gregory Eisenmenger stated that he could testify by telephone if needed.

Lane’s attorney argued that the state should have no ruling over where the blood work would be sent and claimed full responsibility for the evidence once it was under his control “If we lose it, it is on us” Eisenmenger said. Eisenmenger went on to say that he had researched deeply and was not able to find any other case where the state could dictate what lab should be used for an independent study.

Another issue that the state attorney’s office was unhappy with is that Lane’s defense wants both vials of blood for the testing. Attorney Tom Brown said, again we have no issues with the blood being tested, we just want the lab to show some credibility. Even the web site for the Rocky Mountain Labs should show some credentials and it does not, Brown went on to say. Brown also stated that the lab web site has many outgoing links to DUI defense law offices and schools. Eisenmenger injected that the FDLE ( Florida Department of Law Enforcement) web site has many outgoing links to law agencies so this is true with the lab as well(*).  State Attorney Samantha Barrett suggested that only one vial of the blood be sent out of state for testing at a time, to which Eisenmenger argued that this would only cause delays.

After hearing the arguments from both sides, Judge Allawas overruled the states objection to the evidence being sent out of state and said that she would allow the blood work to travel to Colorado. However, the Judge added that the state would be able to argue as to whether the study performed by the independent lab would be admissible if they feel they are not qualified.

Billy Lane still faces a trial for the criminal charges of DUI Manslaughter from the September 4th, 2006 fatal crash that caused the death of Sebastian Inlet Park ranger Gerald Morelock. Byron Morelock, the brother of Gerald Morelock was at today’s hearing. The charges could bring Billy Lane up to 15 years in prison. Next hearing date is set for pretrial confrence on March 5, 2008 at 9:00 am.

*I found this statement interesting, so I took a look at the outbound links for the two sites in comparison. The FDLE site has 10 outbound links, while the Rocky Mountain labs has 290. Using the web site SEO tools, I got the following results for the two sites mentioned.

Technorati Tags: DUI, billy lane, drunk driving, motorcycle news, melbourne, viera, florida, brevard county, celebrity news

(Viera, Florida) Billy Lane’s attorney appeared before Judge Allawas this morning at 9:00 and asked that time be set aside for his expert witness to testify in the ongoing DUI Manslaughter case against custom motorcycle builder Billy Lane.

Gregory Eisenmenger estimated that he would need one half hour of the courts time in order for Dr. Masten, his expert toxicologist witness to testify as to why he would need to use a lab that is such a great distance from Brevard County, Florida. Dr. Masten uses a lab that is located in Colorado and State Attorney’s office has objected to the blood work being transported this distance. The motions and testimony were originally scheduled to be heard back on November 6th of last year, however attorney Eisenmenger was engaged in the trial of Florida State Representative Robert Allen who had been arrested for soliciting a male undercover officer for sex in a Titusville park restroom. Judge Allawas excused Eisenmenger’s absence and set a new date for today.

The new date for the motions and testimony has been set for January 18th at 4:00 pm. Eisenmenger will also try to suppress the blood evidence during this hearing.

Technorati Tags: billy lane, drunk driving, DUI, celebrity, florida, melbourne, motorcycle news, trial, viera

The hospital medical records of Melbourne, Florida custom motorcycle builder Billy Lane will now be allowed to be used as evidence in the DUI Manslaughter case against him. Choppers Inc. owner Billy Lane is facing criminal charges resulting from the Labor Day weekend crash of 2006 that left Melbourne Beach resident Gerald Morelock dead. The victim, Gerald Morelock was killed when he was hit head on by the Dodge pickup that Lane was driving at the time. Witnesses claim that Lane was speeding and had crossed a double yellow line in an attempt to pass 3 vehicles on State Road A1A when the crash occurred.

Billy Lane and his passenger, Erin Derrick were both taken to Holmes Regional hospital in Melbourne after the crash with injuries, Lane and Derrick were treated and released. Prosecutors in the DUI Manslaughter trial had filed a motion with the court to obtain copies of Lane’s medical records to be examined and possibly used as evidence in the case.

Judge Meryl Allawas ruled in favor of the motion on Tuesday allowing Lane’s medical records to be used in the trial. The defense attorneys for Lane argued that the records should not be allowed and contend that they are private. Defense attorney, Greg Eisenmenger has filed a motion to suppress the blood work taken from Billy Lane after the crash. Eisenmenger’s Motion In Limine says the state failed to comply with Florida Department of Law Enforcement rule 11D-8.012(5). The motion says that he has discovered that blood was not properly handled by not being refrigerated as required by the FDLE code.

FDLE Code 11D-8.012(5) states: “Blood samples need not be refrigerated if submitted for analysis within seven (7) days of collection, or during transportation, examination or analysis. Blood samples must be otherwise refrigerated, except that refrigeration is not required subsequent to the initial analysis”.

The burden of proof will be on the State of Florida to demonstrate they have complied with the FDLE rules.  The defense also filed a motion for independent blood analysis, but Judge Allawas is not happy with the independent lab being located so far away and has not ruled on the motion yet. Independent toxicologist Lawrence Masten of Largo, Florida has been retained by the defense to analyze the blood work, but the lab he uses, Rocky Mountain Instrumental Labs is located in Ft. Collins, Colorado thousands of miles away.

Custom motorcycle builder Billy Lane, shown above with defense attorney Gregory Eisenmenger has been present in court during the last few calendar calls. Eisenmenger has several motions to suppress the blood work yet to be heard by the court including the Motion To Limine (mentioned above) and another “motion to suppress the blood draw and resulting test”.

The motion to suppress the blood draw and resulting test was filed on September 28th, 2007 and states that the attending paramedic the night of the crash had detected the odor of alcoholic beverage in the cab of the vehicle and on the passenger. The same paramedic that provided that information did not detect any alcoholic beverage coming from the Defendant, Billy Lane. However, the paramedic did detect an obvious odor of alcoholic beverage from the passenger when he treated her. The female passenger in the truck on September 4, 2006 was 22 year old Erin Derrick of Rockledge, Florida.

The motion also states that registered nurse, Wayne Stewart, withdrew the blood from the Defendant as directed by Florida Highway Patrol Trooper Davis. Nurse Stewart testified that he did not detect the odor of an alcoholic beverage on Billy Lane at or before the blood draw.

the final paragraph of the motion reads: “Withdrawal of blood without consent is only permitted when an officer has knowledge of an accident involving death or serious bodily injury and some evidence that the suspect is under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Troopers Taylor and Davis, even taking into account the information known to trooper Corbett (but not communicated to Davis or Taylor) did not have any evidence of the Defendant being under the influence of alcohol at the time of the blood draw, so the draw is illegal. Because the draw was illegal, the Defendant is likewise entitled to suppression of the blood test results.”

These motions are expected to be heard before the court on November 6, 2007 at 9:00 am. The actual trial of Billy Lane is not expected to start until early 2008. Lane could face up to 15 years in jail if convicted on the non capital murder charge of DUI Manslaughter.

Technorati Tags: billy lane, motorcycle news, DUI, manslaughter, drunk driving, court, celebrity justice, Melbourne, Florida, choppers inc

(Viera, Florida)Famed custom motorcycle builder Billy Lane was present in court today as his attorney Gregory Eisenmenger argued his motion revolving around the blood work that has remained an issue for the past few months. Eisenmenger has asked that Lane’s blood work be looked at by his expert witness Lawrence Masten. So far the only thing that Masten has appeared to have done was view the blood work and from this viewing he has determined that there may have been a problem with the seal. The blood work was taken from Billy Lane over 45 minutes after the September 4, 2006 crash that left Melbourne Beach resident 56 year old Gerald Morelock dead. Lane was charged with 3 charges after it was determined that he has a blood alcohol content of .192 more than twice the legal limit of .08 allowed by Florida Law. The original charges that were filed against Billy Lane were DUI MANSLAUGHTER, DWLS RVKD OR CNCLD WITH SERIOUS INJURY OR DEATH, DUI SERIOUS BODILY INJURY. The State dismissed two of the charges back on 10/19/2006 leaving only the DUI Manslaughter charges pending. The DUI Manslaughter charges as of today are still pending with two new 1 hour hearings to be announced.

Attorney Gregory Eisenmenger told the court that his expert witness has determined that there may have been some leakage from the vial holding Lane’s blood not being properly sealed. Toxicologist Lawrence Masten says he suspects this because the blood volume appears to be low in the vial. Eisenmenger is asking that his expert be allowed to examine the blood in a lab to see if it may have been contaminated. However, Masten does not have a lab of his own and the lab he uses is in Colorado. The state objected Lane’s blood work being sent to Colorado when it could be easily tested at a closer lab in Brevard County. The court agreed with the states objection and questioned as to why it would be necessary to send the blood to another state. State Attorney Samantha Barrett suggested a closer lab used at Wuesthoff rather than sending the blood work such a great distance. Attorney Eisenmenger immediately interrupted stating ” We don’t like Wuesthoff”. Judge Allawas said that it appeared that it would be necessary to hear more about the blood work and reasons for the lab work, especially noting the objection to the DUI evidence having to be transported so far away. No date was set for this hearing today and will be announced at a later date. There is also a date to be announced in which a motion will be heard on the use of Lane’s medical records as evidence in the case.

Billy Lane is facing up to 15 years in prison if convicted on the criminal DUI Manslaughter charges that are still pending.

Next docket sounding for this case is currently scheduled for November 6, 2007

Technorati Tags: billy lane, court, drunk driving, dui, dui defense, dwi, celebrity DUI, florida, melbourne

(Melbourne, Florida) Billy Lane, the media and the court waited for the scheduled 2:30 hearing toady at the Brevard County court house in Viera, Florida. Just as the judge asked the court bailiff to have someone call the office of Lane’s attorney, Greg Eisenmenger, 10 minutes late Eisenmenger and assistant attorney Robert Berry entered the court room.

The court asked for a pretrial conference today to gain an idea on the exact status of the criminal DUI Manslaughter case that Choppers Inc. owner and custom motorcycle builder Billy Lane still faces since his arrest on September 25th of last year. After accepting apologies from  Defense attorney Gregory Eisenmenger for his being late, Judge Allawas asked both attorneys to report on the status of the case. Eisenmenger told the court that his expert witness was not able to view the blood work taken from Lane after the crash that killed Sebastian park ranger, Gerald Morelock on September 4th 2006. The blood work was sent to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement crime lab and showed a blood alcohol level of .192 for Billy Lane which lead to the charges he now faces. Attorney Eisenmenger said that he expects his expert witness to view the blood work by the 31st of this month and will know then in what form he will file new motions to suppress the evidence. Eisenmenger stated that he intends to file a motion to suppress the blood work evidence either way, but the findings of his expert witness will have an effect on how it will be filed. The court set a target date of September 28th for those motions to be filed.

State attorney Mike Brown stated that he anticipated filing motions as well depending on motions filed by the defense and asked that he be notified as to the name of the expert witness and his qualifications. Billy Lane’s attorney added that after his expert witness completes his findings he would be ready for trial within 4 to 6 weeks and said that he feels the trial should be scheduled to take 8 to 10 days to be heard.

After hearing the status of the case from both sides Judge Allawas stated that she expected the case to be set for trial near the first of next year, very close to the first she added.

Next pretrial conference is set for October 10th at 9:00 a.m. 

Technorati Tags: billy lane, choppers inc, court, dui, hearing, melbourne florida, motorcycle news

(Melbourne, Florida)  After hours of mediation between the family of Gerald Morelock with Billy Lane and attorneys for DaimlerChrysler, an out of court settlement has been negotiated. The civil action was filed in October of 2006 by June Morelock, the mother of Gerald Morelock against William D. Lane and Daimler Chrysler for the wrongful death of her son. Attorneys for all parties met with a mediator for hours on Monday with Billy Lane and the Morelock family all present. The case is now closed and a settlement has been reached between the parties for a undisclosed amount .

 Billy Lane is still facing criminal charges for DUI Manslaughter, but the civil action against him and Dodge has ended in agreement. Lane’s criminal charges for DUI Manslaughter are still pending with the next scheduled hearing date of August 17 at the Brevard county court house in Viera Florida.

Byron Morelock, the brother of Gerald Morelock, the man killed by Billy Lane in the September 4, 2006 crash has released the following statement:

The Morelock family and Billy Lane / Daimler have come to an agreement. We would like to personally show our gratitude and heartfilled thanks to all of the people thru-out the nation that have showed us their support , love and caring. My family may not have made it through these hard times if it wasn’t for your caring and sympathy. Our tragedy has opened up a ground swell of emotions to say the least. We are just one, of too many families that have been forced into a regrettable situation. I once said that everyone loses in these situations……..although we lost Gerry, who was my best friend and big brother, It seems that I have found so many other ” brothers.” Men and woman that have taken time out of their lives to help us in many ways. They never have met us but opened up their hearts and souls to us .Gerry always said that I looked at the cup half “full”. With all the love shown to us by so many……our cup is slowly but surely filling up !! Please stay in touch with us. Let’s try and turn our tragedy into something good.

With true sincerity, Byron , Seany, June,Dawn & Chelsey Morelock

 More to come as I get the facts with more pictures and interviews coming.

Technorati Tags: billy lane, court, dui, florida, law, legal, melbourne, motorcycle news, wrongful death

Viera, Florida - The DUI Manslaughter charges held against Melbourne custom motorcycle builder Billy Lane remain pending after his case went before Judge Allawas this morning during the 9:00 calendar call.

Robert Berry of  the law firm Eisenmenger Berry & Peters, P.A, was present to represent and speak on behalf of  Defendant, William D. Lane, who was not present. Robert Berry asked the court to continue the case stating that he and assistant State Attorney, Mike Brown were working diligently on trying to clear some questions surrounding the blood work. You may recall, that the blood work Mr. Barry has mentioned was taken from Billy Lane at the hospital over 45 minutes after the crash happened that took the life of 56 year old Gerald Morelock of Melbourne Beach, Florida back on September 4, 2006.

The blood was sent to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement crime lab and it was determined that Billy Lane had a blood alcohol content of .192 at the time the blood was drawn. Lane was later charged with DUI Manslaughter and could face up to 15 years imprisonment by Florida State law. The Judge granted the continuance and set the next date for docket sounding of September 21, 2007 which will exceed a year since the date of the crash. State Attorney Mike Brown had told me that these type of cases typically take around 18 months to complete the process.

Technorati Tags: billy lane, DUI, drunk driving, florida, melbourne, motorcycle news, law, court

(Titusville, Florida) A calendar call was scheduled today at 1:30 pm in the civil trial filed against Billy Lane and Dodge by the Mother of Gerald Morelock for the wrongful death of her son.

The motion filed on behalf of Billy Lane and Dodge states that because evidence was found from a autopsy report showing that Gerald Morelock had alcohol in his blood, that the plaintiff should share responsibility in the crash. Lane was driving a promotional Dodge pickup loaned to him on labor day 2006 when he struck and killed Gerald Morelock. Billy Lane refused to submit to any type of alcohol test, but blood was taken 45 minutes after the September 4th crash and sent to The Florida Department of Law Enforcement crime lab.

Billy Lane’s BAC was returned by the FDLE crime lab reflecting a blood alcohol level of .192, while the autopsy report of Gerald Morelock later showed he had a blood level of .133. The attorneys for the defense of Billy Lane and DaimlerChrysler filed the motion hoping to show that the plaintiff could have had equal responsibility in the crash for this reason.

The motion was denied by the court when Attorney Sam Cacciatore pointed to case law showing that this motion would hold the “Plaintiff” at partial fault. The plaintiff in this case is Dolores Morelock, the mother of Gerald Morelock.

Mr. Cacciatore told me that the motion was suitable for a case were the plaintiff was injured. Because this is a wrongful death suit and Mrs. Morelock was the plaintiff, she could not be held responsible shared or otherwise for the crash. The civil action against Billy Lane and Dodge is scheduled to be heard in late August.

Billy Lane still faces a criminal charge of DUI Manslaughter from the same crash and could face up to 15 years in jail. No trial date has been set for the criminal case yet.

Technorati Tags: DUI, DWI, Billy Lane, Dodge, Melbourne, Titusville Florida, court, trial, civil, criminal, law, motorcycle news

I have to admit, I do not watch much television, I listen, but seldom watch. Tonight was one of the times for me to watch with the first airing of Motorcycle Mania 4 on TLC. Commercials, wow! Cindi commented on how there was so many of them. My answer to her, “would you rather pay to see this, or let them pay”? So with that said, in the review of tonight’s show, I will include our top picks of use of air time to pay the bills.

With just the opening few seconds of the show, I was ready to go back to Daytona Beach and do bike week again. Working during these events takes from a lot of the fun, but hey, its still a great job. One of the best things about watching Motorcycle Mania tonight was that it was filmed during bike week and watching the show was exciting for that reason.

For those of you that watched the show tonight, I am sure you could see how busy custom motorcycle builder Russell Mitchell was during the live build. However, Russell, like many other celebrity builders will almost always take the time out to talk to fans. It was a pleasure to speak with and meet Russell in Daytona. Speaking of fans, one of the highlights of  the show tonight was watching Russell autograph a fans head. This was not a normal autograph though, this was done in the form of a tattoo. Though Russell claimed that he had not been on the controlling end of the tattoo gun before, he did an excellent job of signing the guys head for life.

Unfortunately, I was not present during any of the time that John Mellencamp was around, I would of like to have met him as well. He seems to have settled down in the years past. I remember seeing him live in Orlando back in the seventies where he racked up thousands of dollars in fines for using prohibited language on stage. I expected to hear more of John’s music, but was satisfied to see him do a unplugged version of “Pink Houses” during the presentation of his original Exile Cycles Mellencamp Rigid.

First good commercial goes out to the TLC reality show Real Deal where Richard Davis is trying to teach some bikers how to make money in real estate by fixing up houses. He leads in to a statement about drinking and … a guy holds up a nail gun and continues driving nails. Then a guy sitting in the class with hair standing straight up ask how long it will take for a persons smell to come back after working on a socket that the electrician left live.

Russell and the guys from Exile Cycles get ready to start the build and once they seem to have everything in place and ready to go, Russell announces that they do not have a full bottle of the gun blue stain to start the frame. Now, it appears that he will only have four days to finish the bike, were it was originally planned he would have five. No sweat, right?

Next good commercial was done by BMW motorcycles. The entire commercial was free of words and was composed of motorcycle stunt video footage. Great commercial to get your point across without saying anything.

Back to the show where Iraq war hero, Capt. David Haigh is presented a custom motorcycle built by chopper builder Bill Dodge with the help of Paul Cox and Keino. The custom motorcycle was given to him on the Hard Rock Roadhouse stage were he got to see it for the first time. I was not around during the presentation, but my hat goes off to Bill Dodge and his sponsors for showing their support for Capt. Haigh and our troops in Iraq.

Thanks goes out to Amour All for the next commercial that made us laugh while the Bud Light commercial was, well not so funny. Back to the show and the final day of the build. Russell completes the wiring on Mellencamp’s bike and wants to hear it run before he calls it a day. The crew gets the bike gassed up and ready, and with a final check, Russell touches two wires together and the engine fires right up. Next up, Russell celebrates by doing a burnout that heats the exhaust pipes up cherry red and draws the attention of the Daytona Police. NAPA auto parts follows up with a commercial full of hot rod burn outs without the cops.

The ending scenes of the show are of Russell and John riding around the Daytona loop and up Highway A1A with John Mellencamp’s new song Freedom Road playing. It was a pretty good show with too many commercial interruptions that remind me of why I do not sit in front of the television to often. It was cool to see all of the bike week happenings on TV, but I would rather live it.

Technorati Tags: exile cycles, motorcycles, bike week, television, motorcycle mania