Charles “Big Charlie” Flores and Richard Childs were searching for money when they slid under the garage door of a one-story brick home on Bergen Street. The Black family had built it in the early 1960s when the one-block neighborhood of Farmers Branch was nothing but pasture. They had raised…
Jason Call had made it. He’s been tattooing for almost six years and appeared in five tattoo magazines, all sold at Barnes & Noble, and was on the cover of one. His clients travel from all over the U.S. to showcase his art on their bodies. He says he books…
Chronic pain patients and their doctors have been sharing their worries with the Observer since the Trump administration announced it was escalating the war on opioids. Some have appeared in articles, more in front of a judge. Some have taken to the streets to secure their needed medication for unbearable pain, paying…
A Denton County sheriff’s patrol sergeant posted a Craigslist advertisement looking for a “needy twink” who wanted to have sex, according to investigators who arrested the officer on charges of solicitation of a minor. “I’m near UNT,” 46-year-old Weston Jordan wrote in an ad posted Tuesday. “I will host and…
Leonardo Villarreal wielded an ax handle, Denton police say. James Auxier used his boot. It was a cold and rainy night in late February outside Jack’s Tavern off Elm Street in Denton when their confrontation with another tavern customer, Kenneth Wayne George, erupted in the parking lot. George died four…
The human remains found in Collin County has been identified as belonging to Christina Morris, unidentified sources told KDLR Thursday afternoon. Plano police is expected to make an official announcement at 4:30 p.m. press conference. An excavation team found Morris’ remains on Wednesday morning when they were clearing brush for…
The Democratic primary race for Dallas County district attorney is turning out to be a battle between liberal forces over who will challenge Republican incumbent Faith Johnson, whom Gov. Greg Abbott appointed after former DA Susan Hawk stepped down for mental health reasons two years ago. In one corner once…
Fernando Cabrera needed someone with a car to take him to pick up some money that a friend known as “Pancho” in Mexico had asked the 21-year-old South Texan to collect. Cabrera, in turn, asked another friend, who asked a younger buddy whose mother wouldn’t let him use the car…
On Thursday, as one North Texas family sets out to bury their 12-year-old daughter who was killed in a gas explosion, Atmos Energy announced it was stopping gas service to another 2,800 homes at noon. Known as a “truly extraordinary event,” Atmos claimed that the homes will be without gas…
The gunshots erupted shortly after 2 a.m. Feb. 19. Dallas postal employee Tony Mosby, 58, had just left the Dallas Main Post Office in a United States Postal Service 11-ton box truck when a car loaded with four friends tried to pass him on the highway. The four had just…
After Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Dwayne Caraway’s recent press conference telling the National Rifle Association to go home, a new petition is urging city officials to revoke the funds it put toward the NRA’s annual conference in May. Dallas resident Jonathan Herzog started the petition when he realized that city…
A week has passed since the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a much-anticipated court ruling in O’Donnel v. Harris County, in which justices reaffirmed a lower court’s ruling that the cash bail system works for the rich but not the poor. “The wealthy arrestee is less likely to…
Dr. Daniel Maynard was the first red flag in Dallas. Called by some a “kindhearted doctor,” he handed out cash to hungry people and pills to chronic pain sufferers. The Associated Press wrote in a June 2003 story that the 57-year-old doctor was “an institution in a part of town where…
Dressed in what looked like SWAT gear and armed with a hammer, the killer came upon fitness instructor Terri “Missy” Bevers in the early morning hours of April 18, 2016. The 45-year-old Red Oak mother of three was setting up a Camp Gladiator exercise class at the Creekside Church of…
Nadiya Williams-Boldware has dreamed about becoming a lawyer since she was child. “My fantasy is to someday be the greatest lawyer in the world,” her 13-year-old self wrote in an English class paper dated November 2, 1989, her birthday. “To be a fighter for justice, and to overcome any case,…
For more images from the Denton protest, see our slideshow. A white veteran, a black veteran and a Mexican veteran stood behind the old Confederate soldier statue on the courthouse lawn in downtown Denton, debating its meaning on Super Bowl Sunday. It’s a familiar debate. The white veteran says the…
When she saw her 24-year-old son sleeping in his brother’s bed, Rebecca Alexander grabbed a heavier blanket and tucked it in around him. It was early in the morning in late April 2016, and she’d just gotten up to get ready for work. She was worried when Jubal told her…
President Donald Trump spent about a minute highlighting the casualties and the heroes of the opioid epidemic in his first State of the Union address in late January. “My administration is committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment for those in need, for those who have been…
Nearly four months have passed since the Las Vegas mass shooting spurred outrage over bump-fire stocks, which gunman Stephen Paddock attached to 12 of his semiautomatic rifles before he killed 58 people and injured hundreds more. A bump-fire stock replaces a rifle’s butt stock, or “shoulder stock,” and lets the…
After the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-minute appeal for a stay, Texas executed William Rayford on Tuesday night for murdering his ex-girlfriend in 1999. At the time, he was on parole for killing his wife in 1986. Rayford, 64, was the second Texas inmate to die by lethal injection…
About a year ago, Jess Herbst became the first transgender mayor in Texas when she wrote an open letter announcing her transition to New Hope town residents and posted it on the town website. “As your Mayor I must tell you about something that has been with me since my…
A year has passed since the Dallas Observer first reported that a 32-year-old mother of five faced felony child endangerment charges for testing positive for marijuana use while breastfeeding. She said she’d been using cannabis to control her epileptic seizures because she could no longer afford her prescription drugs. Five…
