Subject: Harris County Sheriff's Office

• Marvin Zindler, 1921-2007

  July 30, 2007

• Chuck Rosenthal Resigns

  February 15, 2008

• More Houston Strippers Busted

  June 5, 2008

• Hilary Duff's Dad -- Still Free & On The Prowl

  September 3, 2008

• Hilary Duff's Dad Did Do Some Hard Time

  September 4, 2008

• Sheriffs Department Seeking Air Power

  September 9, 2008

• Bayou Body Count: Shootout On The North Side

  David Samuel Sepeda, 24, had decided to spend Saturday afternoon with his 13-year-old younger brother. They were washing Sepeda's car at the Apache Springs Apartment at 400 North Vista, not far from Bush International Airport, when suddenly they noticed that two African-American men watching them, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office.Suddenly, the two men began walking towards Sepeda and his brother. The men were armed. But so was Sepeda. When Sepeda reached for his gun, according

  June 1, 2009

• Sikh Family Claims Harassment By Sheriff's Deputies

  A Sikh family in Houston, backed by a national organization, is crying foul over how they were treated by deputies of the Harris County Sheriff's Office.Kawaljeet Kaur tells Hair Balls that her family phoned 911 after discovering their home was burglarized November 26; things went downhill quickly from there.Here's how it's described in a press relase from the Sikh Coalition (A "kirpan" is a ceremonial dagger:)Officers ordered Ms. Kawaljeet Kaur to hand over her kirpan -- a religious article man

  December 4, 2008

• Web Extra: Video Interview with Laura Howard from "How to Save a Life"

  Laura Howard, a teenage girl diagnosed as bipolar and obsessive compulsive, attempted suicide during spring of last year, and the Harris County Sheriff's Office responded to the call. The deputies could have taken Howard to the county's NeuroPsychiatric Center, designed for mentally ill suspects as an alternative to jail, but instead they booked her into Harris County. The deputies charged Howard with resisting arrest, and she received probation, but about five months later she failed a drug te

  December 10, 2008

• Sheriff's Deputies Who Worked As Sensitivity Trainers Punished For Being Insensitive

  This week's feature about Laura Howard also deals with crisis-intervention training in law enforcement.According to several sources from the story, the Harris County Sheriff's Office has been slow in accepting crisis intervention as a method of handling suspects and inmates at the jail. Apparently, there has been another setback. The two deputies in charge of training other deputies in crisis intervention were recently transferred, and according to Lieutenant John Legg, a spokesman for the depar

  December 11, 2008

• Last Legacy Of Sheriff Tommy Thomas: A Wrongful Death Lawsuit

  Harris County Sheriff Tommy Thomas is leaving office in a few weeks, thanks to the voters, but his legacy will live on, thanks to a lawsuit filed over a jailhouse death.Daniel Goldberg recently filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the department in state district court on behalf of the parents of Alfred Adams, who they claim was beaten to death by county jailors two years ago."The lawsuit is being filed now," Goldberg told Hair Balls, "because the Harris County Sheriff's Department, under the

  December 16, 2008

• No Need To Check On My Pot-Growing Empire, Officer

  The Houston Fire Department was putting out a small electrical blaze last night at what looked to be an abandoned mechanic's shop.They couldn't be sure the fire hadn't spread inside, so they asked the guy who was on the property if he could open the place up.He didn't really want to."They told him 'Hey, we can't leave until we check it out,'"Harris County Sheriff's Department spokesman Lt. John Legg tells Hair Balls. "He let them in and then he took off."The firefighters thought that was a bit o

  January 6, 2009

• Killer Behind the Badge

  January 12, 1995

• All the Law Enforcement You Can Afford

  March 30, 1995

• Diagnosis

  July 6, 1995

• Security Risk

  March 7, 1996

• Into the Den of Stockmania

  June 13, 1996

• The Victim's Victims

  October 17, 1996

• The Insider

  April 17, 1997

• Letters

  January 7, 1999

• Forklift-Drivin', ATM-Stealin' Band Of Brothers Finally Arrested

  Photos courtesy HCSOIt took three years and officers from at least five different law enforcement agencies, but it looks like they finally nabbed the ATM crooks who used and then left fork-lifts behind as an odd sort of a calling card.The Harris County Sheriff's Office announced today that three brothers - Mark, Melvin and Michael Cupp - have been arrested in connection with a rash of ATM thefts that began in late 2006. The men allegedly stole forklifts and used them to remove and then load ATMs

  March 19, 2009

• The Drunk Bride & The Jail: The Continuing Saga From Someone Who Hates Publicity

  So it's your wedding night. Your new hubby is driving you from the reception to your hotel. You get stopped. He gets charged with DWI, and you get charged with public intoxication. You're wearing your wedding dress in a courtroom and a photog snaps your picture. Suddenly you're the face of the "March Madness" campaign against drunk-drivers by Harris County deputies. How do you get your name out of the media? If you're Jade McClane, file a complaint with the Harris County Precinct 8 Constable's o

  March 31, 2009

• The DWI Bride and Houston's Love for Rush

  Highlights from the Blog at HOUSTONPRESS.COM

  April 9, 2009

• Restitution, Mental Illness, DNA Evidence, Oysters and White People

  January 8, 2009

• The 99-Cent Dog Store

  It's low-rent, but legal

  September 11, 2008

• Montrose Gays, Family Violence and Blood Sucking Pols

  March 20, 2008

• Junior High Kid Goes Big-Time, Zero Tolerance

  She's glad her 15 minutes are up

  July 26, 2007

• Coming Up Empty

  This six-year battle for a strip club reads like a Monty Python joke — complete with dead parrots

  May 3, 2007

• Baby, Please Don't Go

  It's not too late to keep the Hammer

  April 13, 2006

• Finalist Times Two

  Two Houston Press stories do well in national competitions

  August 4, 2005

• And the Winners Are

  Houston Press does well in a two-state contest

  April 21, 2005

• Recognition Time

  Contests honor Houston Press writers

  March 31, 2005

• Black and White

  Good ol’ boys prosper at the Harris County Sheriff’s Office. Many African-Americans don’t.

  November 11, 2004

• No PAL of Mine

  The doors indeed will close on a respected program

  June 10, 2004

• Collision Course

  A lawsuit challenges deputies who shoot fleeing drivers

  April 29, 2004

• Screwed!

  Robert Casey told on Constable Perry Wooten. Wooten fired him. Now Casey and two other people are suing to get their jobs back.

  June 5, 2003

• Change Change

  Visitors to the county jail can now get the most for their money

  March 7, 2002

• Metal Help

  The late William "Tray" Folliard, the Hard Rock, and stories from 'round town

  June 1, 2000

• Black and White Only

  County jail counts strip Hispanics of their ethnicity

  June 10, 1999

• The FBI Makes Things Go "Boom," And We Have The Video

  (Note: The explosions get bigger the longer you stick with the video.) For the better part of this week, FBI bomb experts have been teaching area cops the Xs and Os of improvised explosives, like the ones made by shoe-bomber Richard Reid or the one that killed college student Matthew Rugo in his Texas City apartment three years ago. But on Thursday afternoon, it was show time.Raw chickens and tires were blowing up all over the place at the Harris County Sheriff's Office training facility in Humb

  May 1, 2009

• Aftermath: The Krayolas at Cactus Music

  Photos by Chris Gray The coolest band in Houston this weekend couldn't find a club or venue to play. Not at night, anyway - San Antonio's the Krayolas did manage to play Dan Electro's during Saturday afternoon's live broadcast of KPFT's Joe's Roadhouse, and Cactus Music an hour or two thereafter. If you have any idea who Joe "King" Carrasco is - the Dumas-born rocker who fooled MTV and Stiff Records into thinking his Tex-Mex party music was New Wave in the early '80s - you would have loved the K

  June 22, 2009

• Bayou Body Count: Guy Walks Into A Bar...

  It sounds like something out of the movies: from out of nowhere an unknown man in dark clothes storms into a bar, guns blazing. But according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office, that was the scene at an after-hours club early Thursday morning. Deputy Thomas Gilliland tells Body Count that at about 5:20 a.m. a Hispanic man dressed in a black button-down shirt, blue jeans and a white t-shirt draped over his face like a mask walked into the Eclipse club at 960 W. FM 1960 shooting. Witnes

  July 6, 2009

• Houston's Own Professor Gates Incident, Except With Homeless People

  ​It is not against the law to feed the homeless. Nor does this require a permit. Deputy T. McGilbray of the Harris County Sheriff's Office was apparently unaware of this during his patrol on July 19, when he interrupted a local church group's weekly Sunday afternoon homeless outreach in James Bute Park, demanded a "permit to serve food in the park," and then handcuffed and detained one homeless man and one church volunteer who questioned what he was doing. Tom Berna was in the park, which

  August 3, 2009

• Trying to feed the homeless? Not so fast! Meanwhile, METRO blows $80K congratulating itself.

  August 13, 2009

• Bayou Body County: Bloody Weekend In Houston Town

  ​It was around 2:30 a.m. Sunday when Mayra Renteria called the Harris County Sheriff's Office. Her estranged husband, Tomas Carreon, had just walked into her parents home on the 19400 block of Tree Orchard Drive, where Renteria was staying, and began shooting. He killed her mother, Marina Schaerer, 42, father, Robert Schaerer, 49, and their son, Salvador Renteria Jr., 14, authorities say. Carreon, 29, then fled. Mayra Renteria told deputies what Carreon looked like and they broadcast the des

  August 17, 2009

• Bayou Body Count: Don't Mess With The Step-Father

  ​They say there's nothing so powerful as a father's love. Well, Leroy Lewis, Jr. is making a pretty good case for step-fathers, too. He may even go to prison for trying to prove it. Lewis, 32, is charged with murder for allegedly shooting his step-daughter's boyfriend in defense of her, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office. Kedric Money, 19, the boyfriend, was chatting on his cell phone Monday afternoon at 21623 Trilby Way, investigators say, when he got into a fight with his gir

  August 19, 2009

• Council Hears About More BARC Stuff, This Time Some Nasty Divorce Allegations

  ​It seems a day can't go by without some drama regarding the Bureau of Animal Regulation and Care. Today's edition involves a 2006 allegation of abuse against BARC Interim Bureau Chief Gerry Fusco made by his then-wife. The Harris County Sheriff's Office report was posted on an online animal-advocacy forum and e-mailed to council members this morning. The report states that a sheriff's deputy was dispatched to the home of Gerry and Jennifer Fusco in August 2006, whereupon Jennifer stated

  August 24, 2009

• Bayou Body Count: Dead Bodies In Cars, A New Trend

  ​At 3 a.m. this morning, a Harris County Sheriff's deputy was prowling the streets around Bammel North Houston and State Highway 249 looking to nail some drug dealers. Driving along, suddenly he thought he saw a deal going down. The deputy followed a suspicious car for a while, but when he tried to pull over the maroon Chevy Impala, the driver took off down Highway 249. Eventually, the driver stopped, jumped out of the car and ran away on foot, authorities say. But wait, that's not all. Afte

  August 26, 2009

• Bayou Body Count: They're Finding Dead Bodies All Over The Place

  ​For the past four days, local cops and sheriff's deputies have been finding dead bodies all over the place. From ditches and cars to living rooms and the middle of streets, they seem to be popping up everywhere.All the police have are just a few leads, no suspects, and a growing pile of cold bodies at the morgue.On Monday at about 5:30 a.m., Harris County deputies found a Hispanic man who had been stabbed to death lying in a ditch just near 13100 Reeveston Road. He looked to be about 25 to 30

  September 9, 2009

• Bayou Body Count: A Police Shooting Over An Open Beer

  ​There is something to be said about the importance of solid doors, strong locks and a secure home. Think not? Well, the carnage over the past several days may change your mind.It was Friday evening, about 7 p.m., when 18-year-old Jubelle Serano was taking care of her 6-year-old sister at their home at 2539 South Camden Parkway. Suddenly, Serano heard some strange noises. Someone was trying to break into the house.Serano quickly called her boyfriend, who sped over to Serano's place. When he go

  November 9, 2009