It was, U.S. District Judge Barbara Lynn said, the biggest jury panel she’d ever had in her quilt-bedecked federal courtroom. Seventy men and women from the seven counties that supply potential jurors to the Dallas division of the Northern District of Texas completely filled the courtroom’s gallery, relegating clerks, the…
In the federal corruption trial of Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price, which opens Tuesday for jury selection, lawyers will grind on for months through millions of pages of evidence gathered since federal agents raided Price’s home and office six years ago. But for me sitting in the gallery, it…
As the wife of the late Dallas billionaire and philanthropist Charles Wyly, Caroline Dee Wyly witnessed her husband’s fortune contribute to reshaping the Dallas Arts District. The AT&T Performing Arts Center named a theater in their honor after the couple donated $20 million, and their generosity reached Republican politicians whom…
Rosa Maria Ortega was sentenced to eight years in prison Thursday after being convicted Thursday of two counts of illegal voting. Ortega, 37, will also pay a $5,000 fine for casting ballots illegally during the 2012 general election and 2014 GOP primary runoff in Dallas County. Ortega, according to prosecutors,…
A couple days ago The Fort Worth Star-Telegram published the transcript of a voice recording in which Fort Worth police Officer William A. Martin explained the Dec. 21 arrest of a Fort Worth woman and her two daughters by saying, in part, “This all got blown out of proportion with…
Ahmed Motaz Al Olabi and his wife Basimal Labbad boarded an Emirates Airlines flight from Dubai to Dallas on Friday with a dual purpose: to see their sons, and for Ahmed to have a surgical procedure to get rid of his obstructive sleep apnea. What awaited them was President Donald Trump’s executive…
The forest, in the case of the United States of America v. John Wiley Price, is almost impossible to see for the trees. There is so much evidence, history and context swirling around the trial of Dallas County’s longest serving county commissioner that even starting to understand how we got…
New data from the University of Texas at Austin’s Texas Policy Evaluation Project reveals just how drastically Texas’ anti-abortion law, House Bill 2, has limited access to abortion in the state, despite the United States Supreme Court striking down two of the law’s three major components. Because the law prompted closure of 24…
The Dallas County Medical Examiner has determined that attorney Brian Loncar died form the “toxic effects” of cocaine, officials told the Dallas Observer Thursday. Loncar suffered from cardio vascular disease that contributed to his fatal overdose, officials said. The American Heart Association calls cocaine “the perfect heart attack drug.” “Even so-called…
Navy veteran Kate Cochran-Morgan starts her day in her usual way, with a little lawbreaking and a cup of coffee. Morning, she says, is the best time to smoke marijuana. It’s just a small amount of a medical-grade cannabis of the sort available now or soon in Colorado and 27…
Last summer, when a Collin County grand jury refused to indict McKinney Police Department officer Eric Casebolt, the teenage girl the officer threw to the ground made it clear that the case wasn’t over. Casebolt may have dodged criminal charges, but Dajerria Becton said she was determined to sue. Late…
In 2016, the state of Texas executed seven members of its death row, marking the fewest people put to death in the state since just three were killed in 1996. Across the state, fewer people are being sentenced to death as well. According to a new report from the Texas Coalition…
Whole Woman’s Health and the Center for Reproductive Rights are suing the state of Texas again. This time, the team that beat the state in the Supreme Court this summer is seeking to stop the state from enforcing a new regulation that would require the burial or cremation of any…
All Tim and Claire Gautreaux wanted was to buy a new car when they headed to Toyota of Grapevine earlier this year. Yesterday the couple sued the dealership for allowing one of its employees to invade their privacy. The couple showed up at the sprawling dealership with a financing offer in…
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is suing Stevens Transport, the Dallas-based refrigerated trucking giant, for discriminating against an Air Force veteran with bipolar disorder, the agency announced Wednesday. In its complaint, the EEOC alleges that Stevens Transport turned down Bill Brown for a job because of the medication he takes…
Dallas developer Mehrdad Moayedi has spent the last two years juggling several projects across Denton, Dallas and Collin counties. As the president and CEO of Centurion American Development Group, he has mastered the use of special purpose districts to help fund development in rural areas, birthed a Riverwalk town center…
No one will be going to jail for the alleged March 2015 sexual assault of a trainee volunteer firefighter with a link of chorizo if a deal tentatively agreed to Friday by the victim and the Ellis County District Attorney’s Office is completed. On March 31, 2015, the trainee firefighter told Ellis…
Dallas County Commissioners removed Randy Smith from his post as election judge of precinct 4070 in Oak Cliff Tuesday. Smith, who is also the Democratic chair for precinct 4070, referred to black people as “niggers” on Facebook last summer. On July 12, Smith posted the following statements: 1. “why do people…
U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor has made himself perfectly clear: An order he issued in August to stop the Obama administration from enforcing guidelines that would push school districts to allow transgender students to choose which restroom and locker rooms they use applies everywhere in the U.S. Texas Attorney General…
Ken Paxton’s string of good publicity ended Wednesday. Last Thursday in Dallas, Paxton celebrated the arrest of Backpage.com CEO Carl Ferrer on a pimping charge from California. On Friday, the Texas attorney general saw a judge throw out the Securities and Exchange Commission securities fraud lawsuit that was hanging over…
The hole Baylor University is in due to the sexual assault scandal that has enveloped its football program is getting deeper. So far this week, the university’s Title IX coordinator has resigned due to inaction from the university, two more women have joined a federal lawsuit against Baylor and a…
Sam Wyly, the Dallas erstwhile billionaire, has settled his six-year squabble with the Securities and Exchange Commission for the discounted sum of $198.1 million. In exchange for this, the SEC has agreed to make sure that the cash is used as part of a multi-part agreement that would also help…
