CRIMINAL JUSTICE

In this week’s episode, we discuss the weapon used by the school shooter in Uvalde and new details that highlight how fear of the gun contributed to the botched police response.

A two-tiered system gives less populated counties more time to provide court-appointed lawyers, requiring creative responses to a long-standing problem.

Under Senate Bill 23, all felonies involving a gun would incur a mandatory 10-year prison sentence. It’s meant to curb crime, despite the lack of correlation between harsher sentences and crime rates.

Plagued by decades of scandals over sexual and physical abuse of children, the Texas Juvenile Justice Department is at a crossroads.

Brown’s appeals ran out after almost 30 years on death row. Defense attorneys claim Harris County prosecutors hid evidence pointing to another suspect in the 1992 shooting deaths of four people in a Houston drug house.

Lawyers for four former employees who accused the attorney general of firing them for reporting alleged crimes to authorities say Paxton won’t agree to finalizing the deadline by the end of this legislative session.

In 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Gideon v. Wainwright that the Sixth Amendment’s guarantee of a right to a lawyer applies to criminal defendants. Together with the Texas Indigent Defense Commission, The Texas Tribune hosted a series of conversations Friday on public defense in Texas.

The bill, introduced months after the Uvalde school shooting, also allocates more funds to the state’s school safety allotment, which is money given to districts to improve campus security.

A Chinese crime operation bypassed the password clues of Texas.gov by using stolen identity information to fraudulently obtain replacement driver’s licenses.

During a recent street racing incident, Austin residents faced long 911 wait times. City officials say they need to increase staffing for 911 call takers, but state license and background check requirements make it difficult to fill positions.

Lawmakers lowered the penalty to a misdemeanor in 2021, but then almost immediately began discussing raising it back.

Police often can’t tell if a cannabis vape pen is derived from marijuana or legal hemp, like the delta-8 products on display in gas stations across Texas. That doesn’t stop them from making felony arrests in high schools.

At issue is whether Thomas, who gouged out his eyes after confessing the 2004 murders of his estranged wife, their son and her daughter, is competent to be executed in April.

Many relatives of Uvalde victims back bills that state Rep. Tracy King and Sen. Roland Gutierrez are pushing in the Legislature. But limits on gun access don’t fare well at the Capitol.

Since Jacoby Pillow’s death last month, at least three others have died at Harris County Jail. And the year before, the jail hit a record-high of 27 in-custody deaths.

The families say they were shut out of discussions over the deal between the federal government and Boeing. U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor said courts don’t have authority to override it.

The Texas Department of Public Safety is instead asking lawmakers for $381.5 million to upgrade its current facilities with better technology, dormitories and cafeteria for trainees from across the state.

Advocates for domestic violence victims were stunned by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling, which continued a string of court decisions citing the Second Amendment to erase gun restrictions.

State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, D-San Antonio, wants to prevent communication breakdowns like the ones that occurred in the botched response to the Uvalde school shooting.

Schwertner, a Georgetown Republican, was booked into the Travis County jail at 2:12 a.m.

Ruiz was convicted in the 2007 shooting death of Dallas police Senior Cpl. Mark Nix after a high-speed chase.

After 21 days, the last of many Texas prisoners to consistently refuse food ended his hunger strike. In letters to The Texas Tribune, two prisoners spoke out on the dire solitary confinement conditions that led them to starve themselves.

In this week’s episode, Matthew speaks with Jolie about a hunger strike in Texas prisons and a lawsuit seeking to reform the use of solitary confinement on death row.

The airplane manufacturer was accused of fraud for misleading federal regulators about the safety of its jets, but stayed out of court by making a deal with prosecutors. Victims’ families say they were cut out of the process.

Men sentenced to death in Texas are held in isolation until their execution dates, with little human contact, medical care or legal help, according to a lawsuit filed to improve treatment of the condemned.

State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, a San Antonio Democrat, introduced a package of legislation that includes a bill that would end qualified immunity, which shields government officials from liability for constitutional violations.

Although the number of men refusing food has steadily declined, 38 are still starving themselves to protest Texas policies that often keep prisoners in isolation for years or even decades.

Two girls in the care of Child Protective Services were allegedly sexually assaulted in October after sneaking out of a facility run by the state agency. Advocates say it’s a symptom of the Texas foster care systems’ problems.

One year later, there have been no arrests or charges filed related to the case. Cuellar maintains that he was never the target of the investigation and will ultimately be cleared of wrongdoing.

Spurred by reports of inhumane conditions at Texas Juvenile Justice Department facilities, Austin-area teenagers are lobbying the Legislature to reform the system.

The federal government has largely avoided pursuing the death penalty under President Biden.

Prisoners have refused food to protest practices that have kept more than 500 people in isolation for more than a decade.

Some 50 Texas sheriffs and numerous elected officials have attended trainings on the unsupported notion that sheriffs can single-handedly overrule state and federal law. The Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, which offered state peace officers credit for the seminars, is now investigating.

Robert Roberson was sentenced to death for killing his 2-year-old daughter. Experts have since backtracked on the science used in part to win his conviction.

The preliminary report has not been made public by either the district attorney’s office or the state. The Texas Rangers are conducting a criminal investigation into the shooting at Robb Elementary.

Fratta was convicted in the 1994 murder-for-hire of his wife. Lawyers are challenging Texas’ routine of extending the expiration dates of its lethal drugs, a practice begun when many pharmacies began refusing to provide doses for executions.

Areli Escobar was sentenced to death in 2011 for an Austin murder, but even prosecutors now agree his conviction relied heavily on faulty DNA testing by the discredited Travis County crime lab.

Hundreds of prisoners may participate in the protest beginning Tuesday, the first day of the state’s legislative session. Texas often keeps prisoners in solitary confinement for years or decades.

Round Rock ISD is thought to be among the first school districts in Texas where social workers and police officers work directly with one another to provide mental health support to students.

Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw accused the suspended Texas Ranger of failing to perform his duty during the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School.

The Matas never celebrated Day of the Dead before; this year they built an altar at the grave of 10-year-old Tess, surrounded by family. For Thanksgiving and Christmas, they broke their traditions.

Gov. Greg Abbott and other Republicans have expressed support for legalizing fentanyl test strips, which help users identify whether the drugs they are planning on taking contain the deadly synthetic opioid.

After surviving the fallout from a war in his home country and a global trek, Abdul Wasi Safi was arrested at the Texas-Mexico border on a misdemeanor charge, delaying his chance for asylum.

After the Texas Department of Public Safety suspended Texas Ranger Christopher Ryan Kindell, one of hundreds of officers who responded to the May 24 mass shooting, felony cases he investigated are in jeopardy and experts have questioned the justification for his suspension.

A jury found Aaron Dean guilty of manslaughter last week for the fatal shooting of Jefferson, a 28-year-old Black woman, while she was babysitting her nephew in a family home.

Sylvia Uriegas transported children who were wounded inside Robb Elementary School to the hospital. The terror of that day still haunts her.

A jury on Thursday found Aaron Dean guilty of manslaughter for shooting Jefferson while she babysat her nephew in her mother’s home in 2019.

Abbott is making his pitch ahead of the upcoming legislative session.

Investigative reviews by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and independent consultants found the severely short-staffed prison routinely bypassed crucial security checks, leading to a convicted murderer’s escape.

The Court of Criminal Appeals scuttled nearly 450 cases, saying migrants arrested for trespassing in Kinney County can’t ask Austin judges to hear their appeals.