Author: Mick Mickelsen
Georgia’s move to execute Warren Lee Hill, Jr., this month was controversial in two important respects. Hill has an I.Q. of just 70, raising questions about whether his execution could be in violation of the U.S Constitution. And Hill’s execution was scheduled to be the first in Georgia to use a controversial single drug lethal…
Plots about wealthy people planning the deaths of love rivals feature heavily in TV crime shows but are rare in real life. Many homicides involve people who know each other and many are spontaneous rather than meticulously planned. However a case in Lubbock, Texas in which a plastic surgeon is accused of paying an alleged…
An intoxicated manslaughter case has been making headlines in Texas because of its tragic nature. Five family members in one car died when their father crashed the vehicle into a bulldozer as he drove home from a Father’s Day party at Medina Lake in San Antonio. The fifth victim died on June 21. Eight-year-old Abram Demers was…
The jailing of Texas banker R. Allen Stanford, has led to comparisons with Bernie Madoff and Enron in the annals of white collar crime. Stanford was sentenced to 110 years in jail. His forlorn appearance in a Houston court room was a far cry from his jet setting days on his fleet of private airplanes…
The case of Clint Broden’s client Michael Arena, who walked out of prison on June 1, 2012, almost 13 years into a 20-year prison sentence, was a high profile example in Texas of a wrongful conviction. But according to a new registry of wrongful convictions compiled by the University of Michigan Law School in a…
On Wednesday, June 13, 2012, Raul Rodriguez, a retired firefighter was found guilty of murder for the shooting and killing of Kelly Danaher in 2010. The trials sentencing phase is to begin on Thursday, June 14. The facts, as best as I have been able to ascertain, are that Mr. Rodriguez confronted his neighbors who…
Charles Manson committed his crimes in the late 1960s but he remains one of America’s most infamous killers. Now police in Los Angeles, where he committed his crimes, believe recordings of conversations between his associate and a late Texas attorney, could shed light on the infamous killings or implicate Manson in other killings. Los Angeles…
Drunk driving arrests don’t normally receive much media coverage. When the person who has been pulled over and arrested is well known Dallas TV anchor Jane McGarry, it’s a different story. McGarry is an NBC anchor for Dallas. She was arrested after she reportedly failed to signal a lane change.mcgarry A Department of Public Safety…
Many offenders in Texas end up at the Dallas County Jail after they have been dealt with by the criminal justice system in Texas. Jail by its very nature is a place of last resort. It should be tough. But it should not be dangerous. However, a series of deaths at the jail is undermining…
The Chicago Tribune reports that three people were shot to death at a cockfight in Texas Thursday, April 19, 2012. The shooting occurred in a small Texas town called Edcouch, which sits about 25 miles from the Texas-Mexico border. Police investigators say that several gunmen stormed the cockfight wearing masks and opened fired. Three spectators…