If Dallas District Attorney Craig Watkins has a direct foil in the state of Texas, it’s soon-to-be-former Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley. Watkins, actively pursuing innocence claims and making Dallas the leading county for exonerations in Texas, is an outlier, albeit one who is gaining supporters around the country…
Bottle-blond bangs swept over one eye — this, the other boys whispered, was not a man’s haircut. One of them — a popular, handsome specimen — grew particularly incensed at his classmate’s new look. He formed a posse and found a pair of scissors. After locating the blond boy, the…
All you need to know about U.S. Representative Ralph Hall’s decisive win in the 4th Congressional District Tuesday night is that he went skydiving on Memorial Day. He wore a jumpsuit printed with undulating American flags and fell from the plane, plummeting briefly in free-fall, his arms flapping slightly, like…
The difficulties faced by military veterans returning home, from elevated divorce and suicide rates to a harsh job market, have been well documented. Turns out, many of them also don’t have health coverage. According to a study released last week by the Urban Institute, 10 percent of veterans lack health…
There are many reasons lots of folks hate Exxon Mobil: It makes about as much profit in 35 seconds as the average U.S. household makes in a year; it gets humongous tax breaks from the U.S. government; it bankrolled anti-climate change “research” that set debate on the issue back decades;…
Heading into Tuesday night’s 10-3 ass-kicking by the Seattle Mariners, the Rangers and their fans had very little to complain about the 2012 season. Name an offensive stat — batting average, runs scored, hits, home runs, total bases, on-base-plus-slugging percentage (my personal fave) — and the Rangers were better than…
Around 1:45 Tuesday morning, Lee Dell Thomas, Jr. climbed out of the vomit-soaked cabin of a crane high above SMU, dangled from the outside of the crane by two arms, then one, and then plummeted 150 feet to his death. It was a clumsy death, undignified, and quiet. Most of…
In late January, Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance and a team of volunteers hit the city’s streets and shelters to count the homeless . The count is something hundreds of cities do each January as part of the requirements to receive federal funding, but it also helps MDHA understand where the…
A week after making one of his bigger hires in Teach for America’s Charles Glover, incoming Dallas Independent School District Superintendent Mike Miles continues to fill out his administrative team. Tuesday, the district announced that it has hired the first five of an eventual 20 executive directors, each of whom…
Update at 2:30 p.m.: Just got off the phone with Jim Halperin, Heritage Auction co-chairman who confirms that the Observer is a force for peace and good in the world and that it was indeed our blog post that prompted him to reach out to Painter. As for what happens…
Last week, when Mayor Mike Rawlings announced he had hedged his support for the Trinity toll road after receiving additional data, it seemed like a victory for City Council members Scott Griggs, Angela Hunt, and Sandy Greyson, the project’s opponents. The figures Griggs rustled up from the Texas Department of…
Today, the unalloyed, wedge issue-driven, throbbing heart of the Grand Ol’ Party will cast their ballots so that the candidates can stop chest-thumping about who’s the real conservative and start running against Obama because, let’s face it, this is Texas and they don’t really have any one else to attack…
Americans United For Life, one of the nation’s largest anti-abortion advocacy groups, has released its annual report, Defending Life 2012, complete with an enthusiastic blurb from Governor Rick Perry. On the whole, they seem very pleased with Texas and its “aggressive legislative action” to restrict abortion. Texas, they write, has…
Elliot Monteverde-Torres, the third-grade math teacher at Felix G. Botello Elementary School in Oak Cliff, hasn’t seen the district’s report regarding his complaint against the school’s principal, but he knows it isn’t favorable for him. Like us, he heard that the district had finished the report, which it was required…
Update at 12:52 p.m.:Police have identified the man as 44-year-old Lee Dell Thomas, Jr. A news conference is scheduled for 4 p.m. at DPD headquarters. Update at 11:46 a.m.:The Dallas Police Department has posted an update of sorts on its Facebook page. They still have not identified the man and…
The primary for the U.S. Senate, House and a slew of local races is coming up — on Tuesday to be exact, with early voting ending today — which is why you’ve been seeing a ramp-up in the … revelations. Seriously. These just blew my mind. For example: Did you…
When I picked up the phone a bit ago, I was expecting a call back from a congressional candidate for whom I’d left a message. Instead, it was a robocall from a pleasant-voiced woman speaking Spanish. I would have hung up — I’ve forgotten what little I learned in high…
Today is the last Friday of the school year for Dallas ISD schools. For 11 schools in the city slated for consolidation after a school board vote, like the 89-year-old James B. Bonham Elementary, this Friday holds even more significance. Next week, after the students leave, the teachers will pack…
On May 5, the badly burned body of a man was found in a vacant field in far southeast Dallas, not far from the railroad tracks. Pieces of him were missing. The body’s condition made identification difficult, so Dallas police released macabre photos of his tattoos to the press: A…
It was shortly before or not long after I read Robert Wilonsky’s post from earlier this week about Dallas retaking its rightful crown as the country’s worst major city for cyclists that I wiped out, in suitably humiliating fashion, as I rode my bike to work down Hillcrest Road. I…
Around this time last year, the Internet had a collective chuckle when the Dallas Country Club sued the Dallas County Appraisal District, hoping to lower its annual property tax bill. The county appraisers had valued the club’s 118-acre property in the heart of the Park Cities at around $15 million,…
Recent anthrax scares at preschools, synagogues, government offices, and just about anywhere else the U.S. Postal Service will deliver a white powder-filled envelope, not to mention the panting media coverage, has people on edge, calling in the cavalry at the sight of powdered sugar. Or blow. Dallas Fire Rescue’s Haz-Mat…
