Editor’s note: This story mentions threats of violence against the LGBTQIA+ community. Before dawn on a Sunday morning in April, the bars in Austin had just closed. Joshua Ybarra started walking to his Uber. Then he heard an anti-gay slur hurled at him from behind. Three men leapt on him, pinning Ybarra to the ground […]
Category: Crime
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‘Governor Abbott, I Did Not Do This’: Texan in Death Row ‘Junk Science’ Case Pleads For His Life
UPDATE, Oct. 8, 3:55 p.m.: Robert Roberson, the father who is scheduled to be put to death on Oct. 17, has been granted a hearing by the Anderson County District Court on a motion to vacate his execution warrant, his attorneys announced on Tuesday. The motion to vacate alleges that a previous judge on Roberson’s sentencing, […]
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Federal Complaints Over ‘Bullsh*t’ Blue Alert Hit 4,500
Texans have turned to official channels to complain about last Friday’s ear-splitting Blue Alert, which spurred hundreds of angry posts on every social media channel used by the more than 30 million Texans who received the early-morning notification from police. As of Monday morning, approximately 4,500 consumer complaints had been filed over the alert, the […]
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‘I Am Not Batman’: Texans Are Pissed the Cops Woke Everyone Up Before 5AM on a Friday
Hundreds of people have taken to social media to share their collective anger — and to announce that they’ve turned off their phone’s public safety alerts — over a 4:52 a.m. Blue Alert on Friday, which sent a piercing alarm to the roughly 30 million people who live in Texas (and hadn’t already opted out). […]
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An ‘Innocent’ Man’s Last Days: Robert Roberson’s Prayers from Death Row
Last Friday, a cloudless, azure sky framed the Allan B. Polunsky prison unit — where 167 men await executions on Texas’ Death Row — as an unlikely group ventured through its doors in the name of salvation. Polunsky is the state’s supermax prison for the most egregious criminal offenders in Texas and, for decades, the […]
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In Houston Nearly One in Three Victims of Crimes Believe it’s a Hate Crime
Houstonians believe they’ve been victims of hate crimes at much higher rates than what’s being reported to police – and they’re not reporting it because they don’t trust cops will do anything about it, according to a new study. Rice University researchers surveyed 5,000 people in Houston and Harris County last summer about their experiences […]
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Ken Paxton’s Impeachment Attorney Representing 120 Diddy Accusers
At least 120 people have come forward to accuse Sean “Diddy” Combs of sexual misconduct, and a prominent Texas attorney is representing them. Houston lawyer Tony Buzbee on Tuesday revealed that the victims include 60 men and 60 women, with 25 of them being minors at the time of the alleged incidents, the Associated Press […]
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Former Cop Who Killed Botham Jean Eligible for Parole on His 33rd Birthday
Whether by a sick twist of fate or cruelty, while the late Botham Jean’s family was left to celebrate his 33rd birthday on Sunday in his absence, the former Dallas Police officer who killed him, Amber Guyuger, became eligible for parole on the same day — Sept. 29 — according to records from the Texas […]
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Spider Monkeys Rescued at El Paso Border
Two 5-week-old baby spider monkeys made it to the El Paso Zoo after being rescued from smugglers who were hiding the animals squished in the center console of a truck during a Border Patrol search at a port of entry. “This rescue also highlights the dangers of keeping monkeys as pets — while they may […]
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John Grisham, Lawmakers Rally Behind Man Set to Be Executed in ‘Infuriating’ Case
Famed author John Grisham and a bipartisan group of 86 lawmakers think Texas is about to make a big mistake: executing an innocent man. The man in question is Robert Roberson, 57, who has been on death row for allegedly shaking to death his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki, for more than 20 years. But a lot […]