Murder and Homicide

Dallas PD Honors Its Fallen on Facebook with Reminders of the City's Dangerous Past

Yesterday, the Dallas Police Department has blanketed its Facebook page with a portrait and brief biography of every officer killed in the line of duty over the past 121 years. The procession of 80 mostly young faces is a somber reminder of how dangerous a job policing is. A handful of the names ar ... More >>

A Man Owed Him $50, So Police Say Echols Dupree Put on His Steel-Toed Boots and Kicked His Head in

A witness watched the whole thing play out. On Saturday night at 8:20 p.m. behind a bodega on Maple Street facing Maria Luna Park, an onlooker watched as a man wearing an orange shirt and black jacket jumped 49-year-old Randy Wyatt. The attacker hit Wyatt in the back of the head, then stood over hi ... More >>

Touching Eulogies (and a Bomb Threat) as Kaufman County Mourned its DA and His Wife

Inside First Baptist of Sunnyvale, Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland lay in a flag-draped coffin alongside the ashes of his wife, Cynthia. That was fitting in a sad way, their friends said, because they knew one wouldn't want to go on without the other. Hundreds of friends, colleagues ... More >>

The Aryan Brotherhood of Texas Just Can't Seem To Stop Killing Each Other

This week, we've given you a little background on the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, and some reasons why two experts familiar with the gang are skeptical that they could be behind the murders of Kaufman County DA Mark McLelland, his wife Cynthia, and ADA Mark Hasse. In short: because while the ABT are ... More >>

Rawlings Unveils Plan to Curb Violence, Says Dallas "Cannot Tolerate" Troubling Trend

Domestic violence killings were on the rise in Dallas last year, which might be one reason why Mayor Mike Rawlings called a presser Monday afternoon. Another could be the fact that exactly a month has passed since a deeply troubled young man slaughtered 26 people in Newtown, Connecticut, most of the ... More >>

Karen Smith, an Executive Assistant at UT Southwestern, Was Shot to Death in a School Parking Garage [Updated]

Update at 10:23 a.m.: Police have identified the suspected shooter as 41-year-old Ferdinand Glen Smith, who has been charged with murder. He's being identified in media reports as Karen Smith's husband. Original post: Last night at about 7:45 p.m., five shots rang out at a UT Southwestern parking g ... More >>

In Rural Tarrant County, a Man is Beaten to Death By Alleged White Supremacists

On the night of July 7, two women huddled in the back bedroom of the mobile home at 6108 Big Wood Court in rural Tarrant County. From another room, they could hear the cries of 34-year-old Earnest Ray Lackey, as three men hog-tied and beat him for hours until, at some point, the screams stopped and ... More >>

Abey Girma, Who Allegedly Murdered Ethiopian Restaurant Owners, Arrested in Colorado

Five days after Yayehyirad Lemma and Yenenesh Desta dead on the front porch of their Marquita Street home, police have captured the suspected killer. Abey Bilette Girma, 37, fled to Colorado after allegedly following Lemma and Desta home early Wednesday morning and shooting them to death. According ... More >>

Nicolas Monarrez, the Cartel Op Accused of Murdering a Pregnant Teen and Her Boyfriend, Arrested Five Years Later

On January 6, 2007, Linoshka Torres, 18, and her boyfriend, 20-year-old Luis Campos, parked his dad's car in the driveway of an Oak Cliff mechanic's house and vanished, keys still in the ignition of the red Ford Explorer, cell phones on the seat. It was supposed to have been a quick trip. Campos had ... More >>

Police Need Help IDing Suspects Who Murdered Man After Fight at Downtown Night Club

Over the weekend, 28-year-old James Ramirez was leaving Thrive at 2:30 a.m. on Sunday when he got into an argument with another Hispanic man in the night club's parking garage. The argument over, Ramirez and a friend left the garage. When they stopped at a red light at the intersection at Lamar and ... More >>

How the Media Turned an Alleged Rapist Into an Alleged Murderer (and Back Again)

Update at 12:15 p.m.: I've posted a copy of the affidavit below. Original Post:Twice in the span of about a week, a young woman walking near the DART bus stop at Walnut and Audelia in Northeast Dallas was approached by a young black man, forced to a secluded area and raped at gunpoint. Police ann ... More >>

New National Database Shows Trends in Wrongful Convictions Across the Country

As most people who follow the news know by now, since Craig Watkins became Dallas County district attorney in 2007, 33 local men have been exonerated of crimes they didn't commit. But what does this number mean in the context of the rest of the nation, and what are the common issues that lead to wro ... More >>

"The System Made a Mistake": Judge Finally, Officially, Makes Richard Miles a Free Man

The ever-expanding and always sharply dressed brotherhood of Dallas County exonerees once again lined the courtroom at the Frank Crowley Courts Building for an exoneration hearing this morning, this time in support of Richard Miles, who they already know quite well. After 14 years behind bars for a ... More >>

After a Triple Murder in East Dallas, DPD Accuses a Man of Killing His Wife and In-Laws

By 8 a.m., the news vans had started to arrive, parking on the street behind the cop cars, the Medical Examiner's white sedan, the city of Dallas vehicle marked "Crime Scene." They sank their tripods into the soft mud surrounding the house on Peavy Road, a nice-looking two-story with a two-car garag ... More >>

Two Months After She Was Found Dead at Bus Stop, Dallas PD Needs Help ID'ing Jane Doe

​A little while ago, the Dallas Police Department dispatched to media the drawing you see at right. It's of a woman police believe to be in her 60s, but the department can't be certain -- because, at the moment, it doesn't even know her name.Says Senior Corporal Kevin Janse, a department spokesman ... More >>

Murder at Midnight

Get Trapped

Natalie Maines Still Isn't Ready To Make Nice--Even When She Probably Didn't Intend To Be Mean In The First Place. Oh Well!

This should come as a surprise to absolutely no one: Natalie Maines, of the one-time Dallas-based Dixie Chicks, is in the news again, this time because she's, like, totally getting sued by this guy who is upset at claims that Maines, who's no stranger to controversy, once made that basically sugges ... More >>

From Texas Death Row, a Blog

They Shall Be Comforted

Friends and faith buoy the family of a slain Christian music producer

In Case You Missed It: Two Killed At Garland's Zion Gate Recording Studio

"The Kinds of People Who Can Put a Bullet in the Back of My Head."

Notorious 'Texas Seven' Try to Save One of Their Own By Insulting Him

Dallas Police Confirm Murder-Suicide in Deaths of Rufus and Lynn Flint Shaw

The Aryan Brotherhood of Texas Is a ... Waitaminute ... "Support Group"?

Yaser Abdel Said Is Now Among America's Most Wanted For Daughters' Slayings

A Very Trying Capital Murder Case in Hunt County

A Devil's Deal in Dallas Court

A terrible crime plus skaky evidence tempts prosecutors to play a secret game of "let's make a deal"

The Big Sleep

Take a journey with The Pillowman

Fatal Web

The arrest of Dallas' "Black Widow" lights a fire under a cold murder case

Look Out Below!

McManus shows the fun in an Avalance

House of Death

A dozen men were tortured, killed and buried in a small house in Juarez. Three years later, the U.S. government is still trying to cover up what happened.

The Meaning of a Charged Word

Death Takes a Holiday

Put a signature on The Christmas Day Murders

Death Takes a Holiday

Put a signature on The Christmas Day Murders

Undue Process

Want to send an innocent man to prison for life? Judge Karen Greene is ready to help.

The Big Thaw

Collin County's cold case squad empties its file of unsolved murders

You Can Run, But You Aren't Hyde

It's Hard Out There For a Pimp

Hell of a Show

Documentary takes a look at an infamous rock-and-roll concert

The Garden of Angels

With statues, crosses and Christmas ornaments, parents mourn and celebrate the memory of children taken by violence

Dr. Cop

John Mullen is a modern-day action hero straight out of television, a full-time emergency room physician who fights crime and solves murders on the side

Old thrills

RTC gives Witness for the Prosecution a rousing turn at the stand

Lucky break

The O'Hair case gets a boost from a trio of hapless thieves

Walter Waldhauserwired

A convicted killer gets placed on an electric leash

Last dance

In Dallas' cantinas, where the company of pretty young meseras is doled out by the drink, a killer lurks

Arresting development

Love is a Killer

The brutal murder of Adrianne Jones has left Mansfield teens feeling dazed and betrayed

Lambs to the slaughter

Laws to speed executions will make it harder to save Death Row's innocent