Tomorrow morning, at around 10, Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle will hold a press conference during which he will announce that, effective April 30, 2010, he will no longer be Dallas Police Chief. He has known this day was coming for a while. He told Dallas City Manager Mary Suhm…
View Larger MapJust saw this press release from the Dallas Police Department that contains relatively few details about something called Operation Car Wash, which DPD says has resulted in 27 arrests since warrants were first issued back on September 9. The release catalogs the drugs also seized, and DPD spokesman…
At 10 this morning, the state Senate Committee on Criminal Justice will have a little face time with John Bradley, the newly appointed chair of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, created in 2005 to see whether Texas should have executed Cameron Todd Willingham in 2004. (Probably not, said the August…
While the focus of this week’s National Prostitute Diversion Conference was Dallas’s collaborative approach to treating prostitutes as victims and diverting them to programs that include drug treatment, counseling and job training, many of the attendees repeatedly asked what was being done to enforce laws against men who pay for…
As promised earlier, here’s the full 75-page report from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission concerning use of force during the Rainbow Lounge raid in Fort Worth in June. Per the agency’s Open Records Coordinator, driver’s license information and vehicle license plate numbers have been redacted from the documents; hence, the…
Last week, as you no doubt recall, Sheila Hill’s attorney, Victor Vital, requested a new trial or evidentiary hearing based upon possible jury misconduct preceding all those guilty verdicts in the Dallas City Hall federal corruption trial. Now we know how U.S. District Judge Barbara Lynn will proceed — by…
Some time this morning, we should have the full copy of the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission’s so-called “use of force” report concerning the raid on the Rainbow Lounge in late June. Till then, TABC spokesperson Carolyn Beck offers this morning a lengthy summary, in which TABC Agent Chris Aller –…
This morning, The New York Times’ editorial page insists the tale of Ernestina Mondragon, the first of 39 drivers ticketed by Dallas police for not speaking English to speak up, is merely a symptom of a larger issue: “how local police departments should deal with recent immigrants.” (And, no, the…
Dallas has developed a growing reputation as one of the few cities in the country to treat prostitutes as victims, whether through unique programs for under-age targets of human trafficking or specialty courts that help convicted sex workers create new lives. And so, two years after the Dallas Police Department…
Until today, there has been not a single word of media coverage about an incident on the Dallas North Tollway earlier this month involving a state trooper accused of using excessive force to make an arrest. But moments ago Tela Mange, spokesperson for the Texas Department of Public Safety, sent…
Here’s a friendly little heads-up from your pals at Unfair Park: If you’ve received a citation from the Dallas Police Department and haven’t taken care of it, you might want to settle up sooner than later. That’s because the city’s this close to signing a contract with Dallas County that’ll…
When we spoke with juror Nedra Frazier hours after she helped convict Don Hill, his wife and three others in the Dallas City Hall corruption case, she mentioned Hill’s denial about owning a fax machine as “the one thing that stuck out” during his testimony. After she referred to it…
It’s just a single line on the city’s Automated Red Light Enforcement Commission’s agenda for Tuesday’s meeting: “Program Transition from PWT to DPD.” But as it so happens, Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle tells Unfair Park, that transition — getting the city’s Safe Light Program out of Public Works and…
Sean Salisbury was not — no way, no how, no sir — fired from The Fan 105.3 for “sexting.” At least, that’s what Richie wrote on September 11 about his former radio-station teammate. Gawker Media-owned Deadspin, which has been obsessed with the Frisco resident’s Salisbury steak for a long time,…
Mark your calendars: March 8. That, says Jack Fink, is when state Rep. Terri Hodge will finally stand trial, per Judge Barbara Lynn’s decision. Say what? You forgot Hodge was indicted along with Don Hill, D’Angelo Lee and the rest of the found-guilty gang? Then you should go back and…
The courtroom was filled with tears, then cheers: Two men who spent 12 years in prison for a crime they didn’t commit went free today. And while Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins believes this a defining moment for his office and a turning point for Dallas County, 54-year-old Claude…
You’re looking at 220 pounds of methamphetamine, 4.5 kilos of cocaine and $660,000 in cash; you’ll have to look at our slide show to see the assortment of machine guns hauled in. The whole stash was seized in North Texas yesterday from more than 80 members of a violent Mexican…
While Irving makes the occasional headline with its use of the Criminal Alien Program — which involves turning over to federal immigration officials people detained for any reason, even traffic violations — top cops in Arlington have taken a stand against that approach. Instead, they insist that helping to enforce…
Will the feds’ new stance on medicinal marijuana have any impact on local users, even though, sadly, Texas isn’t among the states that permit the practice? Craig Watkins’s office says no way, no how. Local Libertarians, not surprisingly, are crossing their fingers. (As opposed to …) “The federal policy shift…
On Friday, 54-year-old Claude Alvin Simmons Jr. and 39-year-old Christopher Shun Scott will be free men for the first time since being wrongly sent to prison in October 1997 for the robbery and murder of Alfonso Aguilar. Two other men will take their places: Alonzo Hardy, who is already in…
So, you don’t like the Dallas Police Department’s new black-and-whites, hunh? That comes as a shock to the DPD — especially Lt. Dale Barnard, the department’s fleet manager. I spoke with him this morning to find out a little more about the new ride, which rolls out in February. Specifically,…
Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins’s office sends word this morning that two men convicted of murder in October 1997 — 54-year-old Claude Alvin Simmons Jr. and 39-year-old Christopher Shun Scott — have been exonerated. Says Watkins’s spokesperson, Jamille Bradfield, these are “the first two non-DNA exonerations since Mr. Watkins…
