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Tuesday Roundup: JWP Shakes His Groove Thing, DPD Reforms Policy, Ron Kirk’s Tax Problems & More

March 3, 2009 By Trey Garrison Leave a Comment
  • The aftermath of the tragic death of a DPD officer in January has resulted in a change to how felony warrants are served. Among the best changes, and underplayed in the story, is that police will knock and announce that they are, indeed, police. Good for the police, good for the public. Fewer no-knock warrants = fewer mistakes.
  • EPIC FAIL: When you snatch a purse from a 65-year-old grandma and she chases you down and sits on you until cops arrive, you definitely ought to consider another line of work.
  • EPIC FAIL 2: Cop puts another gun — a fully automatic M-16 — back out on the street. Possibly literally. That’s some fine police work there, Lou.

Filed Under Creepy Guys in the Park, Police, Politics, The DFW, Zombies

Monday Roundup: Making A Prohibition Buck, Taxing Times & More

March 2, 2009 By Trey Garrison 4 Comments

Before I start — video of the Saturday buyback will be up sometime today. Sorry for the delay.

Now let’s get to it.

  • Tim Rogers already dealt handily with the ridiculous column James Ragland wrote Saturday arguing that Six Flags shouldn’t serve beer. Great stuff. Interesting side note: Ragland relied in his column on Carl Fors, founder and president of Texas Sober, an organization of neo-prohibitionists out of Fort Worth. Texas Sober makes a pretty penny off their obsession over other people enjoying the occasional beer. They also own a company that sells police dummies at $235 a pop and other junk. Ragland calls Six Flags to task for wanting to sell beer, because in his words, “this is all about making an extra buck or two.” For Texas Sober, it’s about making a buck or $235, it seems.
  • My buddy Michael Davis has a slide show of the gun buy-back up on his blog. Check it out. And yes, Michael and I are friends. Even when we don’t see eye-to-eye, I respect the hell out of him. Here’s one of the shots from his slide show. Handsome dudes, I think. (PS – Update your RSS subscription to Dallas Progress here.)
  • And finally, here’s Dallas City Council candidate John Jay Myers with his part in the fight against the $550 million taxpayer owned convention center hotel.

Filed Under City Owned Boondoggle, Guns, Police, Politics, The DFW

Friday Roundup: Captain Obvious Edition

February 27, 2009 By Trey Garrison 6 Comments
  • Twenty-one Dallas police officers got disciplined for violating the city’s no-chase police back in September. The policy says police can only pursue suspects who are dangerous felons. The idea is to reduce the risk of accidental injury and death for both police and innocent bystanders. Who wants to get run over or in a crash because an officer is chasing someone who shoplifted sunglasses, right? One of the officers in the September chase crashed out and was seriously injured. Here comes the irony: “There’s also criticism that two officers suspended provided life saving assistance to one of their own.” An officer who, ironically, wouldn’t have been injured if he has just obeyed the no-chase policy.
  • We live in a state where two of every three households has a gun. We live in a world where knowledge = power. We live in a reality where ignorance is dangerous. And yet this woman in Garland lives in a world where a safety program designed to protect children has no place. Too. Much. Stupid.

  • Who could foresee any public hand-wringing over the fact a Spanish company (Spain is in Europe, where Spaniards come from, not South America, where Mexicans come from) won the bid to do the work on LBJ Freeway? Who? Captain Ob… you get the idea. (I suppose those angry about this would rather pay more in taxes so an American company would do the construction? And wouldn’t that be a form of affirmative action?)

Filed Under Guns, Police, The DFW, Zombies

Thursday Roundup: Harshing Drug Warriors’ Mellow, It’s Dead Jim, Twitter Twaddle & More

February 26, 2009 By Trey Garrison Leave a Comment
  • A rare moment of near sanity in the War on Certain Drugs: a Fort Worth guy whose brother hid drugs in his house was sentenced to just probation. Now, this is a guy who wasn’t a dealer, has no criminal record, and passed drug tests for two years. Sure, he knew they were there, but who narcs out family? Naturally, narcotics officers are livid. They should probably smoke a fattie and chill out.
  • Angela Hunt declares the Trinity Tollway dead. Given the levees a-gone break and the city’s a-gone broke, hard to disagree with her diagnosis.
  • Magic Eight Ball sez: Unlikely. (You just know the real winner is going to get hunted after a secret online auction in Hostel II.)
  • Here’s at least one thing Rep. Joe Barton of Texas shouldn’t apologize for: tweeting “Aggie basketball game is about to start on espn2 for those of you that aren’t going to bother watching pelosi smirk for the next hour.” We need more of this, not less.
  • Want two reasons the Democrats are going to lose control of the House in 2010? There‘s the first. And there’s the second. (Smells so much like 1993, don’t it? Thank you, Mr. Obama — you are generous. Oh, and Mr. Holder — Molon Labe. We were ready for it, this time.

Filed Under City Owned Boondoggle, Culture, Guns, Liberty, Life, Police, Politics, The DFW, Zombies

Tuesday Roundup: Lousy TV Reports, Your Consent Is Inconvenient, DISD Takeover a Red Herring? & More

February 24, 2009 By Trey Garrison 1 Comment
  • I was all ready with a “so now Dallas is more dangerous than _____” joke, but after watching this news report three times, I don’t know 1) if the guy shot was stationed in a combat zone, 2) what the hell happened, and 3) why I watched a television news report three times.
  • Yeah, how dare parents inconvenience the state by asking their permission to store samples of their children’s DNA? What, you think you have some sort of privacy or civil rights?

Filed Under City Owned Boondoggle, Creepy Guys in the Park, DISD, Media, Police, Politics, The DFW

Friday Roundup: DART Still Losing Money, Unsafer Dallas & More

February 20, 2009 By Trey Garrison 1 Comment
  • Dallas SWAT are cooling their heels at President Bush’s new house. Which means poker games, neighbors of people with warrants, small-time pot smokers, and barking dogs won’t be getting shot up.
  • There’s money to be made in banning cell phones while driving. So you know the Texas Lege is all over it like a hostage on a ham sandwich.

Filed Under Guns, Liberty, Life, Police, Politics, Porkulus, The DFW, Zombies

Tuesday Roundup: More Crooked Cops, The Death of Choice, Aliens & More

February 17, 2009 By Trey Garrison 1 Comment
  • False arrest, police lying until a videotape shows reality doesn’t jibe with their accounts, a pattern of illegal searches, civil rights violations — and all the DPD officers involved remain on duty. I’ve heard this song before. And the first commenter calls the officers in question the “good guys.” This is where we are?
  • “A restaurant, a bar, is private property, and you the customer have the choice of whether you go in or you don’t,” said Patrick Dixon, chairman of the Texas Libertarian Party. If you’re a nonsmoker, “there are other places that will cater to you.” Why is this so hard to understand? No one else see where this is leading?
  • Robert Guest gives us the 411 about the (let’s be hopefulsome) coming impeachment of a judge — Sharon Keller – who deserves it. And maybe a little jail time, to boot.

Filed Under Liberty, Life, Police, Politics, The DFW

Blue Light Special: A Blue on Blue Complaint?

February 16, 2009 By Trey Garrison 2 Comments

DPD Officer Keith Johnson sends me the following. It’s troublesome on a number of levels. Here’s his message and an attached correspondence.

Please find attached a memo from Lindsey which I assume is a follow up to a letter generated by former officer Greg Tapp regarding a traffic stop he conducted in NE Dallas.
Lindsey generated this memo justifying the stop-we now know the stop wasn’t random, and Tapp abruptly resigned.
Please examine what I have underlined here, Lindsey acknowledges that Tapp has/had emergency lights installed in his private vehicle for “off duty jobs.”
Does the District as a governmental entity condone this? Please take the time to review Texas Transportation Code 547.305.
Do any of Lindsey’s current subordinates have emergency lights in their personal vehicles?
My daughter will be driving soon, and she will not under any circumstances stop for an unmarked vehicle with internal police lights.
It has been a month since Rookwood and Tapp have left the District. Is Lindsey going to investigate any allegations that arose prior to their leaving the District, or is this another issue thats going to go away?
Here’s the memo. Click on it to zoom in and read it:

Private citizen advice: If you ever see blue (or red) lights on an unmarked car anytime, don’t stop. And don’t run. Proceed at a normal speed, call 911 for the police dispatch, and ask to verify if the car is a real cop making a real stop. If you don’t have a phone, proceed normally (a little below the speed limit even) and make it clear you’re not evading, but get to a well-lighted area with plenty of witnesses. It could be anyone in that car behind you. Make sure. When you do stop in an area with witnesses, roll down your window, put your hands on the wheel in plain sight, and go from there.

And hope you don’t run into this officer or one like her.

Filed Under Police, The DFW
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