Lykos 2010: A Year in Review

JANUARY

January 4 – Upset that her goddaughter, Rachel Palmer, didn’t get the free walk to a judgeship that she wanted for Christmas, Pat Lykos asks Palmer’s opposing candidate, ADA Don Smyth, to switch races.  He declines. Moments later, Smyth is approached by Jim Leitner and asked when he is planning on retiring from the Office.

January 12 – A massive earthquake strikes the island-nation of Haiti, ultimately causing the death of approximately 250,000 Haitians.  Arch-conservative Pat Robertson and Republican sleaze bag activist Terry Lowery argue that this is punishment from God.  Lykos takes the high road, announcing there was no earthquake, but that 250,000 deaths was the “normal rate of attrition” for Haitians.

January 15 – Longtime legendary Administrative Assistant Barbara Eaglin retires after decades of harassing baby prosecutors that have come through the Office.  Lykos and the Gang celebrate.  Their initial plans to fire all popular members from previous administrations had been thwarted by Barbara, who they worried might kick their asses.

FEBRUARY

February 3 -- Houston Press writer John Lomax does an article on HCDA’s criteria for filing vehicular homicide cases.  Fearing a panic attack from Leitner, the Office has Catherine Evans explain their policy to Lomax.  Evans handles the interview knowledgably and competently.  This immediately places her on Lykos’ Enemies List.

February 6 – Following a weekend of a larger than normal number of homicides, Lykos describes local area law enforcement as negligent and incompetent and declares she will be launching her own investigation into this.  She and the Gang Who Couldn’t Shoot Straight quickly create their own Harris County Justice League of Super Heroes to roam the streets fighting crime.

February 7 – The Harris County Justice League disbands after Lykos cannot find tights that are flattering to her.

February 15 – Still despondent over the break up of the Harris County Justice League, Lykos launches a new investigation into who (if anyone) had accessed a highly top-secret HPD offense report relating to Deputy Dawg and Lykos favorite Rachel Palmer and her fiancée, Don Hooper.  The resulting investigation is a huge success with numerous office members disciplined for accessing the offense report.  NOTE:  As of this writing, there has still been no investigation by Lykos into whether or not Palmer or Hooper did any wrong-doing, or whether or not Palmer herself pulled a copy of the offense report.  Just saying.

MARCH

March 2 --  The Texas Primaries are held, and faith is renewed that sometimes the good guys do win, as political newcomer Don Smyth handily trounces the heavily supported-by-Lykos favorite Rachel Palmer.  Lykos consoles Palmer by promising to buy her a pony.

March 5 – Judge Kevin Fine stuns Harris County and the rest of the Nation by declaring the Death Penalty unconstitutional.  A confused Lykos angrily insists that although she doesn’t really use it anymore, the Republicans would be furious with her if the death penalty is abolished on her watch.  She vows to talk to Judge Fine the moment she can figure out where his courtroom is.

March 19 – In the wake of the demolition of the Palmer Campaign, die-hard Lykos loyalists put their support in for former (fired) prosecutor Danny Dexter, who is running against Assistant D.A. Marc Brown for the 180^th District Court Bench.  Dexter, who has a penchant for inflating and out-right lying about his record as a prosecutor, is a natural favorite for Lykos, who announces that voting for Dexter is the best thing she’s done since she cured cancer.

APRIL

April 13 --  In yet another triumphant moment, ADA Marc Brown defeats Danny Dexter for the bench of the 180^th District Court, despite Dexter’s endorsements from Gary Polland, Steve Hotze, and low-rent political whore Terry Lowery.  Ironically, the 180^th Bench was once held by none other than Pat Lykos herself.  Lykos is heard grumbling in the hallways:  “So those damn voters are looking at qualifications now, are they?”

April 25 – Given the recent decisions to not prosecute crack pipe cases or to follow the law in DWI cases, Lykos lets the general public know in an editorial that she is going to start prosecuting some selected crimes such as Failure to Stop and Give Information.  Having no understanding of the fact that there is already such a law on the books or how it works, she asks DA Office counsel Scott Durfee to write the paper and let her sign her name to it.  Some speculate that this is how Lykos actually got through law school, too.

April 26 – Despite an absolutely crippling budget crunch that affects the entire county, Lykos uses office funds to send herself, Bridgwater, Chow, and Leitner to the Bench Bar conference in Galveston.  Very few other prosecutors are allowed to attend.  Lykos is seen polishing off a Jack and Coke before dragging Leitner onto the dance floor to “Party Like It’s 1899.”

MAY

May 4 – Despite the fact that Lykos is up-in-arms over Judge Kevin Fine’s abolition of the Death Penalty, Lykos pleads Capital Murderer Randy Sylvester to Life in prison despite the fact that he kidnapped and burned his two children to death on Father’s Day of 2008 and announced he would fake insanity to beat the rap.  When asked why she even needs the death penalty since she never uses it, Lykos responds: “Well, we need it in case somebody actually does something really bad.”

May 9 – After downing a couple of Jack and Cokes, Lykos goes on Channel 11 for an interview with Mark Greenblatt.  During the interview, she tries to turn the tables on Greenblatt by making him state his name, accusing him of fuzzy math, and then stating he has initiated a “urinating contest”.  Lykos then “pulls a Leitner” and storms out of the interview.

May 13 – As part of a large set of moves, Lykos creates the Capital Trial Divison.  She also adds the position of Co-Deputy Dawg of Misdemeanor.  Other meaningless positions created are the “Prohibition Study Coordinator” and the “Lindbergh Baby Kidnapping Review Team.”  Lykos also moves Don Smyth to the less-than-prestigious welfare fraud, and is later heard telling Rachel Palmer, “See what I did to that mean old man who beat you in the election?”

JUNE

June 11 – In an effort to stem the bleeding of prosecutors fleeing the Office, Lykos attempts to convince prosecutors to stay with the Office by offering them promotions.  When confronted with the possibility that inexperienced people in higher positions might cause problems, she responds, “Dude, I’m the f*cking D.A. and I’ve got no idea what I’m doing.  How bad could it be?”

June 25 – Former Memorial High School quarterback and child star Will Womble announces that he will be leaving the Office.  Womble’s gamble is that the long-sought-after promotion to Misdemeanor Two will be offered to him under Lykos’ new promotion policy.  Instead, Lykos offers to let him “help out Carl in maintenance” as a new job.

JULY

July 1 – Houston Police Chief Charles McClelland issues a controversial memo stating that no HPD officers are allowed to talk to defense attorneys without the express consent of a prosecutor.  Despite prior promises of “transparency,”1^st Assistant Jim Leitner clarifies by insisting that officers can only talk to defense attorneys with a prosecutor present.  When informed that this idea smacks of witness tampering, Leitner lamely admits his clarification on the rule was because he was lonely and just wanted to be included on something.

July 12 -  Long-time Judge of the 180^th District Court, Debbie Stricklin retires slightly early, leaving the post open, briefly.  Long-time lawyers noting the vacancy point out that the court is still run more professionally, knowledgeably, and courteously with no judge on the bench than it ever was when Pat Lykos had held it.

July 30 – After 33 years of distinguished service, ADA Don Smyth retires from the Office.  In an obligatory going-away party, Lykos tells Smyth that she hopes to have as lengthy of a career as he did, as long she won’t have to do any of those “trial-thingies.”

AUGUST

August 4 – The mother of a child sexual assault victim is charged with child endangerment after complaining to KHOU about the District Attorney’s Office’s handling of her daughter’s case.  Lykos and company deny that they would ever file charges on anyone as retaliation for that person speaking ill of them in public.  They then go back to preparing their 5,432 count indictment against local blogger,  Murray Newman.

August 31 – After a few too many Jack & Cokes, Lykos decides it would be a great idea to no longer provide reasonable accommodation to prosecutors with exceptional needs, such as long-time ADA Shirley Cornelius (who is the primary caretaker of a son with special needs).  As icing on the cake, Lykos henchwoman Hannah Chow attempts to get Shirley to illegally alter her timesheet as a budget-saving measure, which Shirley refuses to do.  Instead, Shirley resigns, pointing out to Lykos that it is actually important to follow all this “law stuff” that Lykos has sworn to uphold.

SEPTEMBER

September 2 – Local media seems to finally catch on to the fact that the Harris County Criminal Justice Center is poorly constructed with a bad elevator system that could create a tremendous danger to human life in the event of a fire.  Seeing the public interest, Pat Lykos suddenly declares that she is opposed to people being killed in a dangerous building – unless, of course, those people are illegal aliens.

September 16 – Despite limited funding and a now desperately low amount of prosecutors staffing the courts, Lykos publishes her long-awaited campaign propaganda piece paid for by taxpayer expense memorandum on all of her accomplishments during her first year in Office.  Accusations of Lykos committing plagiarism arise when somebody points out that all of her “accomplishments” were stolen from another book – the Texas Penal Code.

September 29 –The Houston Police Department issues a public warning that a possible serial killer may be on the loose, after the murders of three women in the Downtown area.  Lykos assures the public that there is no serial killer on the loose Downtown, and that the deaths are just the “normal rate of attrition” for women in Downtown Houston.

OCTOBER

October 6 – Never one to shy away from capitalizing on a tragedy, Pat Lykos announces in the wake of a teenager’s suicide that she will be launching an investigation and prosecution into those who commit “bullying.” The investigation seems to stall out after someone points out to her that if bullying was a crime, Lykos herself would be the new Charles Manson.

October 18 – Despite budgetary cuts across the county, Lykos begins changing the layout for business cards held by the Assistant District Attorneys.  The former cards which had printed the title “Harris County District Attorney’s Office” across them are now replaced with campaign propaganda piece paid for by taxpayer expense cards that read “Office of Patricia R. Lykos,  District Attorney.” The move is actually the first intellectually honest thing Lykos has done during her tenure, since she never really was looking out for Harris County’s best interest.

October 30 – Former ADA and 2008 District Attorney Kelly Siegler makes national headlines after clearing former-Death Row inmate Anthony Graves of the capital murders he was charged with.  An infuriated Pat Lykos screams at Baldwin Chin and Alicia O’Neil, “You nimwits are going to sit in your office until you’ve found and exonerated somebody off of death row for ME!!!!!!!”

NOVEMBER

November 2 – Republicans rejoice as they sweep the elections in Harris County.  Pat Lykos cautions her party to “not get too excited,” citing that it wasn’t as much of a Republican sweep as it was the “normal attrition rate for Democrats” in a non-Presidential year. 

November 15 – Alexander Bunin is named as Harris County’s First Public Defender.  Lykos, despondent over the idea of not being main media darling for the Houston Chronicle, takes out her aggression on her underlings.  While holding the Office dog, she asks the Tuesday morning meeting: “What has four legs, is neutered, and is always sniffing my ass?”  She then cackles and tells the group,  “Roger and Jim!”

November 20 – Brian Rogers decides to make himself the “Bad Boy” of the Houston Chronicle by writing an article that is less than flattering of Pat Lykos.  In it, Lykos explains the approximately 20% rate of experienced prosecutors leaving under her tenure as the “normal rate of attrition.”  In a related story,  Jim Leitner has to be treated for bumps and bruises after being trampled during the mass exodus that occurred in November.

DECEMBER

December 7 – The showdown over the Death Penalty reaches its zenith in Judge Kevin Fine’s court, as Judge Fine opens a pending case to testimony over the unreliability of capital punishment.  Lykos successfully lobbies the Court of Criminal Appeals to stop Fine’s hearing by begging on her hands and knees and saying:  “Please, for the love of God, don’t let that moron take away the death penalty!  My Republican supporters will kill me!!!”

December 13 --  In lieu of the Office Christmas party, Lykos instead sponsors numerous thirty minute mini-get-togethers which she calls “holiday cheer.” During the party, Lykos is seen talking to two children in front of a gingerbread house.  Unfortunately, the children are never heard from again.

December 29 --  The first Assistant District Attorney of Collin County is indicted for Tampering with a Government Document for doing THE EXACT SAME THING that Hannah Chow had ordered Shirley Cornelius to do.  Lykos is seen consoling a very rattled Chow by assuring her that the guy from Collin County wasn’t actually indicted – that was -- you guessed it -- just the "normal rate of attrition"  for prosecutors in Texas.

December 31 – An angry Pat Lykos adds count number 5433 to local blogger Murray Newman’s proposed indictment after reading this re-cap.

Happy New Year, everybody!