Former Richardson Mayor Laura Jordan and her husband Mark Jordan will get a new trial, a federal judge announced Thursday, because of improper communication between a federal court officer and a juror during the couple’s original trial, which concluded in March. The juror, No. 11, sent a note to U.S…
A Tarrant County grand jury has indicted an Arlington Police Department officer in the shooting death of a 24-year-old man who tried to drive away from a traffic stop in September 2018. Arlington police Officer Julie Herlihy pulled O’Shea Terry over because he had expired temporary tags on his SUV…
Dallas’ final early-voting numbers are in, and while they don’t show a wave of new voters like the one that hit Texas’ polls in 2018, they do reflect an electorate that seems at least a little more engaged than it was during city elections in 2015 and 2017. According to…
On Wednesday, a Dallas County jury answered the only questioned that remained about a gruesome 2015 murder on White Rock Creek jogging trail. Thomas Johnson, a former football star at Texas A&M and Dallas’ Skyline High School, will spend the rest of his life in prison for murdering Dave Stevens…
The good news for Dallas City Council member Philip Kingston is that he and his attorney are going to have more time to prepare their defense to an anonymous ethics complaint filed against the downtown and East Dallas representative filed earlier this year. That’s thanks to an extension handed down…
The Texas Legislature’s latest attempt to reform the state’s marijuana laws appears to have gone out not with a bang or a whimper but with a tweet. Monday night, the Texas House of Representatives passed a landmark bill that, if it becomes law, would reduce Texas’ penalty for possessing an…
Immediately after shooting Botham Jean, former Dallas Police Department officer Amber Guyger told a city 911 dispatcher that she’d made a horrible mistake. “I’m an off-duty officer. I thought I was in my apartment and I shot a guy thinking he was, thinking it was my apartment,” Guyger said. “I…
It’s not decriminalization, but it’s a start. Late Monday afternoon, the Texas House of Representatives signed off on a bill that would reduce Texas’ penalty for possessing less than one ounce of marijuana to a Class C misdemeanor, the same criminal penalty reserved for traffic tickets and driving with an…
The news was enough to make one check the calendar and make sure it wasn’t April 1. Monday morning, former Republican Texas state Sen. Konni Burton, fresh off her November 2018 loss to Democrat Beverly Powell, announced that she’s starting a news outlet “dedicated to shedding light on the stories…
One of DFW’s longest running true-crime soap operas took another turn Friday as Tarrant County authorities arrested Tonya Couch, the mother of “affluenza” drunk driver Ethan Couch, for yet another alleged bail violation. Couch is accused of failing a urinalysis, violating the portion of her bail agreement that requires that…
For the Dallas Cowboys, the NFL draft went a lot like the rest of their offseason. Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and the rest of the front office made eight picks on Friday and Saturday, buying a few lottery tickets, getting cute in spots and working around the edges of a…
Bedford Republican Jonathan Stickland has long been the court jester of Texas’ House of Representatives. Since his election in 2012, he’s positioned himself as a darling of the Tea Party and antagonistic right, never shying away from a political stunt or a chance to hear his voice projected from the House…
Texas Secretary of State David Whitley’s push to purge nearly 100,000 registered voters from the state’s rolls is over. Friday afternoon, a coalition of voting rights groups announced they’d reached a $450,000 settlement with the state. The groups sued Whitley earlier this year over his order that counties across the…
Texas’ law banning government agencies from doing business with people or other businesses that support the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel is on hold Thursday night after a federal judge issued an injunction against it, ruling that it is likely unconstitutional. The boycott, divestment and sanctions movement calls for…
Turns out Texas state Sen. Angela Paxton’s hands may not have been quite as clean as she claimed they were during a February ethics flare-up over a bill she filed that would’ve changed the securities law her husband is currently accused of breaking. Paxton’s Senate Bill 860 would allow the…
Dallas’ Citizens Police Review Board got meaningfully stronger Wednesday. The new board won’t be as strong as activists wanted it to be and is probably a little stronger than Dallas’ police associations would’ve preferred. Its creation is a compromise, just as Dallas Police Chief U. Renee Hall said it would…
The Dallas City Council voted Wednesday to require all employers in the city to provide paid sick time to their employees, starting in August. Whether any Dallas worker ever benefits from the new policy remains up in the air. Austin passed a similar ordinance in 2018 but still hasn’t been…
Missy Shorey, the combative head of the Dallas County Republican Party, died Tuesday night at age 47, her husband said Wednesday morning. “Friends and family,” Marc Himelhoch said in a Facebook post. “It is with heavy heart that I must inform you that my beloved Missy Shorey passed unexpectedly last…
More than two weeks after running into a couple of state troopers outside Texas House Speaker Dennis Bonnen’s house in Angleton, gun rights activist Chris McNutt spoke out against Bonnen at a news conference Tuesday. He refused to take the blame for the Texas Legislature’s apparent failure to expand gun…
For the second time in two weeks, one of Texas’ biggest political names has decided there’s no error like an unforced Twitter error to get people talking. Last week, Sen. Ted Cruz chose to mock Disney for its $5 million offer to help rebuild fire-damaged Notre Dame Cathedral Paris. Tuesday,…
Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot defended his recent decision to stop prosecuting certain quality-of-life crimes over the objections of members of the Dallas City Council’s Public Safety and Criminal Justice Committee on Monday. The reforms, Creuzot said, are meant to make Dallas a safer, more equitable city, not to…
Dear Indianapolis, Welcome to NRA convention week. About a year ago, we, and by we, we mean Dallas’ feisty alt-weekly, were sitting in the same spot you are now, wondering what to expect from Wayne LaPierre and his merry band of misfits. Given that we’ve already seen the other side,…
