Criminal Law

Rozita Swinton a no-show at Colorado court hearing: When will we hear her story?

Posted on July 15, 2008
Alleged hoaxter Rozita Swinton, whose phone calls in March to a San Angelo women's shelter set off the Great Eldorado Polygamist Roundup, skipped out on her court date yesterday on an unrelated hoax phone call in Colorado Springs, CO.Like a lot of the media, I suppose, Grits diverted focus from the Great Eldorado Polygamist Roundup after the FLDS kids were ordered back to their parents, but it always struck me that the most important parts of this story remain untold: Namely, Rozita's role, her motives, and the inside scoop on what really transpired between her, Texas law enforcement and anti-FLDS activists in Utah in the five days before the raid...

Did Los Zetas infiltrate Collin County law enforcement?

Posted on July 15, 2008
Not long ago I asked "What's the matter with Plano?" and the Collin County justice system, but ... Holy crap! This Dallas News story("Mexican drug cartel may have had help from Collin deputy constable," July 15) alleges a deputy constable in Collin County may have been in cahoots with a relative working for Los Zetas:One of Mexico's most powerful drug cartels may have had some inside help in North Texas for several years from a Collin County deputy constable, according to police documents...

Next DPS leader faces trooper shortages, low morale

Posted on July 14, 2008
On the heels of the announced retirement of Texas Department of Public Safety Colonel Tommy Davis last week, the SA Express News published a story yesterday describing problems of understaffing and declining morale at the agency ("Troopers say they are just fatigued," July 13):Some troopers concede they don't look for illegal drugs during a traffic stop or check to see if the motorist is a convicted sex offender violating his probation...

Man Bites Dog: Dallas appeals court tosses drug conviction for lack of evidence

Posted on July 14, 2008
Recently I argued that a prime reason for wrongful convictions is that courts frequently don't require sufficient evidence to prove an offense beyond a reasonable doubt, allowing convictions based on uncorroborated eyewitness testimony, sloppy forensics and coercive interrogation tactics...

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In like a lion, out like a lamb: Proposal to end TYC conservatorship draws media yawns

Posted on July 14, 2008
After the absolute media frenzy surrounding the Texas Youth Commission's every foible over the last year, can anybody explain why there's been no MSM coverage of last week's recommendation to the Governor to end the agency's conservatorship and appoint a new executive commissioner? I expected to see coverage this weekend, but so far, nada...

On the sources of volitional jail overcrowding in Bexar County: Why solve a problem when you can create one?

Posted on July 14, 2008
Bexar County District Attorney Susan Reed must pride herself on an overcrowded jail, because she's insisting on policies that keep it needlessly full.Bexar County jails probationers based on flawed drug tests and insists on jailing petty pot smokers - often for only a few hours - even when the jail is jam packed...

Costs of jail privatization debated in Waco

Posted on July 13, 2008
Reacting to proposed privatization plans for the local jail that only drew one bidder, the Waco Tribune Herald editorial board declares that "turning to a private contractor to run a jail is a cop-out." The paper raises important questions about privatization that arguably apply equally to privatizing treatment services in the state prison system ("Costs of privatization," July 13):Since control of the Legislature changed hands in 2003, Texas has been in a dither attempting to convert things done by government to things done by private enterprise...

Cop who faked search warrant documents should be prosecuted

Posted on July 13, 2008
Here's a rather astonishing and unsettling story of a veteran officer's abusive exploitation of a confidential informant at the Edinburg Police Department from the McAllen Monitor ("Police officer faked drug warrants, exposed informant," July 10):Edinburg police uncovered the staggering list of suspected abuses in an internal investigation launched last year when a confidential police informant claimed he was kidnapped and beaten after Sgt...

Top DPS cop will step down Aug 31

Posted on July 12, 2008
Texas Department of Public Safety Colonel Tommy Davis announced his pending retirement after 43 years with the agency. Here's a roundup of MSM coverage:Dallas NewsAustin StatesmanHouston ChronicleAPUnder Davis DPS grew into a fiefdom that may be dismantled upon his departure...

Guns, Drugs and Cookies

Posted on July 12, 2008
Each of these stories in its own way tickled my funny bone:Wautaga teen no Cookie MonsterLake Worth police arrested an 18-year old who dropped off cookies at the police station after they claimed a field test of the cookies showed positive for marijuana and LSD...

TYC reform plan proposes ending conservatorship July 31

Posted on July 11, 2008
TYC Conservator Richard Nedelkoff this week forwarded a reform plan (pdf), an extensive 120 page publication I've only just received, to the Governor which included a recommendation for ending his conservatorship at the end of July 2008 (!) at which time he also anticipates hiring a permanent executive director...

Pending SCOTUS case could moot Sunset proposal to admit DWI breath test results without cross examination

Posted on July 11, 2008
Poking around the Sunset recommendations for the Texas Department of Public Safety, I was a little surprised to see this proposal for "streamlining" hearings for administrative license revocations after DWI:Require affidavits of breath test operators or breath test supervisors to be admissible without the witness' appearance unless the judge finds that justice requires their presence...

Criminal Justice Agencies Under Sunset Review

Posted on July 11, 2008
The Sunset process (a once every 12 year evaluation of individual state agencies) is in full swing this year for a handful of Texas criminal justice related agencies, including:Department of Public Safety (staff report) (sunset recommendations) (public comments)Jail Standards Commission (staff report)Commission on Law Enforcement Officer Standards and Education (staff report)Juvenile Probation Commission (staff report)Youth Commission (staff report)DPS, obviously, is furthest along in the process, having already held a hearing a couple of weeks back to discuss the staff evaluation...

Crime lab workers suffer from "team spirit" mentality

Posted on July 10, 2008
It's one thing to change procedures in an institution, but quite another to change its culture, which is a challenge still facing the troubled Houston crime lab and other government-run forensic labs in Texas.The publication Government Technology has an extensive feature focusing on the Houston lab as an example of virtually everything that can go wrong with forensic analysis, declaring that "Some problems with the HPD Crime Lab - such as underfunding, poor staff training and close ties to police and prosecutors - also may be inherent in crime labs across the country...

Inmate firefighters

Posted on July 10, 2008
In exchange for $1 per hour and time shaved off their sentences, about 2,500 trained inmate firefighters are assisting the state of California to combat its annual summer wildfires. Cool story in the Christian Science Monitor, including this observation from a free-world fireman:The program has had few escapes or incidents of misbehavior, say officials...

Hidden costs of incarceration

Posted on July 10, 2008
The Wall Street Journal has a piece today focusing on the "hidden" costs of incarceration ("Communities pay for high prison rate," July 10) defined asfinancial burdens that communities are often left to manage. For every person who goes to jail, businesses lose either a potential employee or customer...

Dallas to create specialized prostitution court

Posted on July 10, 2008
It may be the oldest profession, but not many young girls will tell you they want to be prostitutes when they grow up.Instead, the path that leads them to that point frequently involves poverty, abuse, addiction, or some combination of the three. Often women committing these crimes - particularly on the low end of the economic scale - arguably are the primary victims in the situation in addition to being criminal offenders...

Feds want to install license plate readers along Texas highways; TXDoT says "no" so far

Posted on July 10, 2008
When the Texas Legislature authorized red light cameras last year in SB 1119, no one ever mentioned the idea of installing license plate readers along the highway to track travelers who aren't breaking any laws. But that's what the Drug Enforcement Agency and federal High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) task forces want the Texas Department of Transportation (TXDoT) to agree to, according to testimony at yesterday's Senate Criminal Justice Committee hearing...

Texas' anti-meth law shifted production to Mexico; prevention and treatment underfunded

Posted on July 10, 2008
At a Senate Criminal Justice Committee hearing yesterday, DPS officials said that restrictions on pseudoephedrine purchases dramatically declined after the Legislature required stores to keep the product behind the counter in 2005.But a reduction in domestic production doesn't mean demand for meth has declined, just that the supply is coming from elsewhere - mostly from Mexico...

Requirement to appoint indigent defendants a lawyer not an "unfunded mandate"

Posted on July 10, 2008
IMO it's a mistake for prosecutors and Texas counties to label additional indigent defense costs stemming from the Supreme Court's Rothgery decision an "unfunded mandate," which is what Shannon Edmonds from the prosecutors association said in a column by Fort Worth Star Telegram editorial writer Linda Campbell...

Feds inspecting Harris County Jail this week

Posted on July 09, 2008
The US Justice Department is inspecting the Harris County Jail this week in response to several high-profile inmate deaths and chronic overcrowding. See related MSM coverage:After inmate deaths, feds begin inspecting Harris County Jail, Houston ChronicleFeds inspect troubled Harris County Jail, APUnderstaffing costs Houston taxpayers $150 million in overtime, Houston Chronicle The article on overtime costs includes a graphic breaking down the largest sources of overtime costs - the Houston Police Deparment and the Harris County Sheriff, which together accounted for more than half of all government overtime expenses by Harris County agencies...

CCTV proponents should abandon claims that surveillance cameras reduce crime

Posted on July 09, 2008
John Honovich, a consultant on video surveillance and biometrics, says in a meta-analysis of recent studies of CCTV effectiveness that the industry needs to change its marketing pitch. Particularly it must stop promising the public CCTV can reduce crime, primarily because virtually all the research on public CCTV use shows that it fails to reduce crime...

Bexar probation chief stands by UA methodology that accused innocent people

Posted on July 09, 2008
There's a certain surreal nature to today's effective WOAI-TV story on use of flawed urinalysis tests at the Bexar County adult probation department.Bexar Probation Director Bill Fitzgerald says his department does not do confirmation analysis when a preliminary drug screen comes up positive because it would be too expensive, but confirmations are free under their contract...

Deputies oppose Waco jail privatization plans

Posted on July 08, 2008
In Waco, Mclennan County deputies are raising a fuss to oppose a privatization proposal that could shift most jailers' jobs to a private company. Reported the Tribune-Herald ("McLennan County Sheriff Officers Association leader calls on Sheriff to oppose jail privatization," July 8):The president of the McLennan County Sheriff Officer?s Association is calling for Sheriff Larry Lynch to put an end this morning to further consideration of privatizing county jail facilities...

Shortage of aftercare beds threatens to continue TDCJ's drug treatment bottlenecks

Posted on July 08, 2008
Although the Texas Legislature (led by Sen. John Whitmire and Rep. Jerry Madden) spearheaded a massive expansion of treatment options and incarceration alternatives last year for prisoners and parolees, a shortage of Transitional Treatment Center (TTC) beds threatens to undermine Texas' expanded programs aimed at mitigating drug addiction...

TV station: False UA positives tolerated in Bexar "because the county wants to save a few bucks."

Posted on July 08, 2008
A San Antonio TV station is preparing an investigative report following up on allegations that the contractor performing urinalysis for the Bexar County adult probation department is using methodologies that produce false positives. From WOAI-TV:Nobody likes being accused of something they didn't do...

Police lied, falsified documents during interrogation that led to teen's untimely death

Posted on July 07, 2008
Lying to suspects during police interrogations is a common practice that courts have long supported, but the tactic carries with it serious risks that are frequently understated or overlooked.Having focused recently on police interrogations practices that lead to false confessions and other negative outcomes, I'd be remiss not to point readers to an article from the LA Times about a 16-year old girl who was murdered because police falsely told a gangbanger/murderer during interrogation that she'd picked him out of a lineup ("Interrogation, then revenge," July 2):When [detectives] Pinner and Rodriguez stepped into the interrogation room with Ledesma [the suspect], they had little real information to work with...

TCJC seeks volunteers

Posted on July 07, 2008
If you live in Austin and want to participate on the front lines to help reform the criminal justice system, you couldn't do much better than to hook up with the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, which is looking for significant volunteer help in a variety of capacities this summer and fall: The Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, a non-profit policy reform and advocacy organization, has volunteer opportunities open to individuals having an interest in the criminal justice system and a passion for social justice...

Texas Lawyer: Dallas Public Defender lacked buffer from political winds

Posted on July 07, 2008
Texas Lawyer published a detailed adumbration of the imbroglio surrounding allegedly politicized firings at the Dallas Public Defender's Office beginning with the chief, Brad Lollar. Those interested should go read the whole thing, but especially interesting to me were suggestions offered toward the end about how other counties might structure PD offices to avoid the same problems with meddling county commissioners:Lollar and Richard Goemann, director of defender legal services for the National Legal Aid and Defender Association, have suggestions for Harris County if it sets up a PD's office...

Bexar probation director fires #2 man amid contention with employees

Posted on July 07, 2008
Bexar County adult probation director Bill Fitzgerald gave his #2 man Paul Kosierowski no reason for his termination when he fired him last week, according to sources who've spoken to the former Deputy Director. He was simply told he was an at-will employee and it was time to pack up his things...

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