Life at the Harris County Criminal Justice Center

Several folks have written in asking if I knew of any reason why the comments section of the blog is no longer accessible within the CJC at Harris County computers.  I've heard varying accounts from people not being able to post comments to people not being able to read them.  Some asked me if I had done anything to the comments by changing something on my blog settings, but I had not. Most surmised that Lykos and the Gang Who Couldn't Shoot Straight had something to do with it. Well, surprise surprise, if you guessed Lykos and Crew as the culprit, you solved the mystery before I did. Apparently Lykos ordered her tech guys to have ITC disable the comments section on all county computers.  I presume that applies to everyone in the courthouse, since I don't see if they could do it only for the District Attorney's Office computers. I wonder whether or not Lykos ran that by Alex Bunin at the P.D.'s Office or any of the 37 judges who might actually  enjoy  readin

Black Ink has a new post on his blog worth reading.  It is as sobering as it is accurate. I have no idea whether or not Kelly will run again, but if she does, Black Ink has a pretty clear picture of what she'll have to go through.  That's Pat Lykos Politics and it is very disheartening to read. If Kelly does run, she'll have my whole-hearted support.  If she doesn't . . . hell, who could blame her?

As most of you all know by now, yesterday it was officially announced that Judge Susan Brown appointed Stephen St. Martin and Jim Mount as Special Prosecutors for the 185th Grand Jury.  In light of the events of the past week, it isn't too surprising of a development. I know Stephen very well because he was my former Chief when I was in the 174th.  If you read this blog, you know that I think extremely highly of him.  He was highly respected when he was at the District Attorney's Office before leaving in May of 2009.  He worked on high profile cases and was a Special Crimes prosecutor.  He has the highest integrity and I think the General Public can rely on both him and Jim Mount to uncover any illegal acts done by the District Attorney's Office without going on a witch hunt to drum up something if there isn't anything actually there. I don't know Jim Mount nearly as well.  He was long gone from the District Attorney's Office when I started there in 1999.  

I finally found a use for my History major in a new article on the Chronicle blog.  You can check it out by clicking here .

Looks like the 185th Grand Jury is not letting go of their investigation any time soon.  Today, multiple subpoenas went out to both current and former-Harris County Assistant District Attorneys, ordering their appearance before the Grand Jury. Yes, I do have the names of who got subpoenaed, but I'm not publishing them.  If you name them in the comments, I'm not publishing them, either. It is worth pointing out that just because they were subpoenaed in no way means that they are targets of the investigation.  But the information they may or may not have could prove to be very interesting. I do hope that those ADAs who are getting subpoenaed know better than to rely on HCDA General Counsel to represent them.  Lykos and her Gang don't exactly have the best track record of standing by their people if it conflicts with their own interests.

More from the BAT van/Grand Jury scandal. Click here for the story .

Just a couple of thoughts on the mechanics of an investigative Grand Jury.  You can get there by clicking here .

On Wednesday, October 19th, the 14th Court of Appeals denied a Motion that Harris County District Attorney Pat Lykos hopes to God that you don't pay attention to.  However, if you simply must  look at it, I suppose you can get to the decision by clicking here . The case is styled " In Re the State of Texas, Ex Rel. Patricia R. Lykos v. Hon. Susan Brown, Presiding Judge, 185th District Court of Texas" and is filed as "Request for Emergency Stay of Grand Jury Proceedings." Sound interesting?  Well, it is.   Very  interesting. By reading the District Attorney's Office "request" and the supporting memorandums of HCDA General Counsel John Barnhill and Grand Jury Division Chief Carl Hobbs, a very clear picture of Lykos' attempt to extract vengeance against Amanda Culbertson emerges. First, a little background.  As I talked about in this post  earlier this month, the District Attorney's Office is very very upset with former-HPD technical s

When Pat Lykos took over as D.A. of Harris County on January 1, 2009, she spent a lot of time garnering praise for herself by taking previously existing D.A. divisions, renaming them, and then claiming to have invented them.  One of the few things that she did actually create on her own was a Division (consisting of one person -- Russell Turbeville) that would be dealing with Cold Cases. Don't get too fired up.  The Division wasn't as exciting as it sounds.  What they were really doing was looking up previously filed cases where an arrest had not been made (although the crime had been solved enough to have charges brought).  This Division basically just sees if they can get some movement from the involved police agencies to actually go arrest the accused folks on already existing warrants.  Although Lykos may take credit it for it, she ain't gonna be solving the Kennedy Assassination any time soon through this Division. But this was an idea that Lykos got from Bill Exley

Recent Harris County District Attorney's Office graduate and future-Public Defender's Office attorney Scott Pope has recently started a new blog worth checking out. You can read it by clicking here .

There's a good article from Lisa Falkenberg in today's print edition of the Chronicle  regarding the ongoing dispute between the Harris County District Attorney's Office and Amanda Culbertson, formerly of the HPD Crime Lab.  I will link to it when it comes online. The long-story-short is that Harris County has apparently had a contract for twenty years with Lone Star College for the testing and maintenance of the instruments used to test breath test results.  Earlier this year, Amanda Culbertson told officials that the Mobile "B.A.T. vans" that have intoxilyzers in them were not reliable , thus jeopardizing numerous DWI cases where they were used.  Her findings were documented in e-mails within HPD, and defense counsel Brent Mayr had filed a Writ in March of this year alleging Brady violations for withholding that information. Fast forward to July, when defense attorneys Dane Johnson and Jordan Lewis find themselves in trial on another B.A.T. van case , where