After initially seeking a manslaughter warrant for the off-duty Dallas Police Department officer who shot and killed Botham Shem Jean after she entered Jean’s apartment, believing it was her own, DPD backed off, Dallas Police Chief U. Renee Hall said early Saturday afternoon. “We were in the process of obtaining…
There was one sure way to know you were near Botham Shem Jean, the man shot and killed by a Dallas police officer Thursday night after she entered his apartment believing it was her own, his friends say. Whether he’d spotted someone he knew or taken the stage to lead…
A Dallas Police Department officer shot and killed a 26-year-old man late Thursday after she entered his apartment in the Cedars believing it was her own, DPD said early Friday morning. According to DPD Media Relations Sergeant Warren Mitchell, the officer, who has yet to be identified, had just returned…
Ahead of November’s election, Texas Republicans have apparently found the hill on which they are willing to die. Late Thursday, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who’s campaigning by flying around in a private jet and speaking in front of local TV cameras at airports, made his newest push for re-election,…
Stop us if you’ve heard this one before, but Dallas is one step away from settling one of the biggest civic issues left on its plate. Thursday, the Dallas Park and Recreation Board voted 13-2 in favor of the latest, greatest city plan to turn over control of Fair Park…
For all the Observer’s many disagreements with former Texas Governor Rick Perry, sometimes he is, even we have to admit, so naive that he’s charming. Thursday morning, the man who got a C in freshman U.S. History at Texas A&M, hopped on the old Twitter machine to calm the fears…
Texas’ fetal burial law is out, pending appeal, but, oh boy, will there be appeals. U.S. District Judge David Ezra ruled Wednesday afternoon that the Texas Legislature’s requirement that all tissue resulting from an abortion, miscarriage, still birth or ectopic pregnancy be buried or cremated, rather than disposed of as…
It’s hard to figure out if any of this is going to matter. An hour before a hearing that could go a long way toward determining the final fate of the Affordable Care Act, and Justin Nelson, the guy trying to take down the guy trying to take down Obamacare…
A federal lawsuit that could end up harming millions of Texans kicks off in earnest this morning in Fort Worth. A coalition of states, led by Texas and its attorney general, Ken Paxton, will argue in front of a federal judge that the Affordable Care Act, despite being ruled constitutional…
Did Zina Bash, a star of Brett Kavanaugh’s U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings, flash a white power symbol while sitting behind Kavanaugh at his Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday? Some people on Twitter think so, but then some people on Twitter think anything. Bash, who until recently worked for Texas…
Getting the obvious out of the way first, the NFL should get rid of the preseason or, at the very least, slim it down to one or two games from the four or five each of the league’s 32 teams play now. If the league wants to claim it takes…
The short week that starts today is a big one for Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Wednesday in Fort Worth, Paxton will take his first big swing at ending the Affordable Care Act, arguing in front of a federal judge that President Barack Obama’s signature achievement is unconstitutional. Paxton is…
Here’s a big tip ahead of college football’s opening weekend: Don’t sleep on University of North Texas. For the first time since the team’s Hayden Fry-led heyday in the late ’70s, the Mean Green are in position to return to national relevance, thanks to Texas’ best college quarterback, 17 returning…
First Baptist Dallas Pastor Robert Jeffress deserves some credit. Motivations, politics and decency aside, he picked the right horse way back in the summer of 2015 when he decided to back then-candidate Donald Trump’s nascent presidential campaign. For his trouble — Jeffress frequently worked “Make America Great Again” into invocations and…
A Dallas County jury sentenced Roy Oliver to 15 years in prison late Wednesday night. The ex-Balch Springs police officer faced as few as five years, and as many as 99, after being convicted of murdering Mesquite teenager Jordan Edwards in April 2017. The jury also handed Oliver a $10,000…
The GOP has a problem attracting women voters, at least among those women who think uninvited pussy grabbing is a bad thing. And they have a problem with younger voters, a depressingly small group but one that nonetheless tends to be passionate about things like civil liberties, the environment and…
Ken Paxton’s political ambitions, at this point, are probably best served by the attorney general staying out of the spotlight, and away from controversy, at least until his November general election contest with Justin Nelson is over. That’s reality for a public official with low name ID and a bunch…
When cops shoot and kill civilians in the United States, they rarely get indicted for anything. It’s rarer still when they get charged with murder and even rarer than that when they are actually convicted of a crime — usually manslaughter, if anything. That’s what makes Tuesday afternoon’s events just…
Roy Oliver killed Jordan Edwards. The ex-Balch Springs police officer fired his rifle into a Chevrolet Impala driving away from a party in the eastern Dallas County town in April 2017 five times. Oliver hit Edwards, 15, in the head, killing the Mesquite High School freshman. None of those facts…
Bureaucracy, not malice, forced activists to wait hours Friday as they attempted to bail 16 people out of Dallas County Jail, sheriff’s office officials said Monday. Organizers with Faith in Texas and the Community Bail Fund of North Texas showed up to Lew Sterrett around 10 a.m. Friday with cashier’s…
While the smart money, if such a thing exists among those willing to gamble on the whims of voters, is still on incumbent Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke got his most encouraging polling news yet in his bid to unseat Cruz. According to a new survey from…
When Texas Gov. Greg Abbott preemptively declared Hurricane Harvey a disaster last Aug. 23, chemical plants and oil refineries in the Corpus Christi area shut down before rain from the storm even started falling, according to a new report from the Environmental Integrity Project. That minimized unnecessary air pollution caused…
