Category: News
Some people make mistakes when they are young. In Texas, a serious mistake as a teen can mean decades behind bars. The criminal justice system has a reputation for being tough on young offenders and has treated those 17 or older as adults. A new bill filed in the Texas House by Rep. Joe Moody,…
It’s rare for a child as young as 12 to be charged with a serious offense but in Texas, a boy is facing a possible sentence of 40 years in prison over the fatal shooting of a boxer. The 12-year-old was charged with capital murder over the shooting death of a 24-year-old professional boxer in…
Texas has been censured by the U.S. Supreme Court over how it determines intellectual disability when deciding if defendants should receive the death penalty. However, a ruling by the nation’s highest court has failed to spark changes in the Lone Star State. Now the pressure is on the Texas Legislature to amend the law relating…
Many forensic science methods used for years to convict people of serious crimes have unraveled under closer scrutiny. Bite mark evidence was used to secure scores of convictions before it was debunked as junk science in 2016. In December, the state’s highest criminal court declared a Texas man innocent of two murders he served more…
White collar crimes carry high sentences. In Travis County, a former director of the University of Texas faces up 99 years in prison after he was indicted on counts of theft, money laundering, and abusing his official capacity. Jason Shoumaker worked for the University of Texas in Austin for 10 years. He managed facilities for…
Civil asset forfeiture occurs when police seize assets from people who are suspected of involvement in criminality. Nowhere is it more controversial than in Texas where people have lost millions of dollars in valuable assets without being charged with a crime. Recently, the Texas Tribune reported on how police in Texas made $50 million by…
Texas has a reputation for being a tough state for law and order with heavy sentences handed down to offenders. However, the Lone Star State’s initiatives to find alternatives to prison are helping drive forward a national reform bill. When the White House recently backed a bipartisan effort to cut the federal prison population and…
Texas is still clearing more people than the rest of the country after miscarriages of justice, but the state’s exoneration rate is falling. For years, issues with a backlog of drug cases in Harris County meant Texas led the nation in exonerations. In 2017, the Lone Star State recorded 23 exonerations, reported the Texas Tribune….
The execution of a man accused of killing a store worker during a robbery at a Fort Worth gas station in 2010 has been delayed by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals after his attorneys argued he is mentally ill. The execution of 42-year-old Kwame Rockwell was set for Oct. 24. Rockwell and two other…
The crime of drug trafficking is becoming increasingly sophisticated, a fact illustrated by the recent sentencing of a French dealer en route to Texas who set up an elaborate online trafficking scheme on the dark web. French international drug dealer Gal Vallerius was recently sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for drug trafficking. He…