Category Archives: DA Watch
Grand Jury in Texas: Defending Witnesses and Targets of Grand Jury Investigations
You read about grand juries all the time: just this month, there was national news coverage in the Tamir Rice case, because there was no indictment; the grand jury voted against it. Another example: in the Sandra Bland case, there was an indictment because the grand jury voted for it – after the grand jury…
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Prosecutorial Misconduct in Texas Alert: Ethical Rules Held to Have Broader Duty Than Brady to Turn Over Exculpatory Evidence to the Defense
Back in November 2014, a State Bar of Texas Grievance Committee ruled that a Denton County assistant district attorney named William (”Bill”) Schultz had violated the ethical rules that all Texas attorneys are sworn to uphold. Not only that, but more: he had committed a serious ethics violation and his unethical conduct deserved suspension from…
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Year in Review: Things for Dallas to Consider From a Criminal Defense Perspective
How Dangerous is It to Live or Work in Dallas County? Here we are at the end of another year. Let’s take a minute and consider where things stand as we enter 2016, from a North Texas Criminal Defense perspective: 1. Dallas County Is Really, Really Dangerous As reported by Grits for Breakfast this week,…
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Sexual Assault Arrests for 10 Year Old Crimes: Cold Case Rape Kit Backlog Prosecutions in Dallas and North Texas
This summer, Dallas County District Attorney Susan Hawk announced that she had hired a new prosecutor and an investigator for her Sexual Assault Unit especially to try rape cases based on all the rape kits that are finally being tested here. Dallas and North Texas should expect to see arrests being made in cold case…
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Waco Justice? 100 Days After Twin Peaks Biker Arrests, Things Look Fishy to Criminal Defense
Today, the Dallas Morning News published an editorial calling for the end of the gag order down in Waco which prevents law enforcement and state authorities — much less anyone else — from revealing information about the May 17, 2015 shootout involving lots of bikers and motorcycle club members at the Twin Peaks restaurant in…
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District Attorneys Keep Doing Bad Things: More Texas Prosecutorial Misconduct Stories
The problem of prosecutors doing bad things like hiding evidence and introducing unreliable (or false) testimony isn’t getting better. Recently, the Daily Beast published an expose on prosecutorial misconduct in the United States, labeling the problem a national epidemic. You can read their take on things in the article written by Jay Michaelson and published…
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Police That Lie: More on the Secret Texas District Attorney Lists of Police Officers Not Trustworthy to Take the Witness Stand
Prosecutors have lists of the names of police officers and deputy sheriffs that they don’t trust to take the witness stand — did you know these lists existed? Do you think that every police officer is honest and trustworthy to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth on the stand? Brady…
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Fighting the Prosecutor on Just Punishment: Evidence on Sentencing and Probation After a Conviction in Texas
For many people, maybe because it seems like it in so many TV shows, criminal trials are one big event. It’s exciting and fast-paced, where the attorneys roam the courtrooms, there’s very little paperwork, and there are lots of people going up to the witness stand for short stints. In reality, things are different. Two…
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Update on Law of Asset Forfeitures: Federal and Texas – Are You Any Safer?
As the general public becomes more and more aware, and more and more shocked, over police forfeiture actions – where private property is taken by law enforcement regardless of whether or not the owner has been involved in a crime, much less convicted, there’s been talk about changing forfeiture laws at both the federal and…
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FBI Scandal: Forensic FBI Experts Give False and Flawed DNA Evidence To Get Convictions
This is very bad and it’s going to get worse. Yesterday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Department of Justice finally came forward and admitted that the FBI forensic evidence provided in countless criminal trials over the past two decades has in almost every single case been flawed and unreliable if not downright…
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10 Questions to Ask
Before you Hire a Dallas Criminal Defense Lawyer
Top 5 Mistakes in
Defending a Texas Criminal Case
