Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

There are new developments in the ongoing fallout from a botched drug raid in Houston that left two suspects dead and five officers injured. Now, doubts are spreading over the confidential informant from whom one of the injured narcotics officers used to buy drugs – doubts that the informant even exists.

Drug Raid Goes Bad in Houston

After receiving a tip that drugs were being sold out of a house in the Pecan Park neighborhood, one of the Houston Police Department's narcotics officers sought the help of an informant to purchase drugs there. When the informant emerged with a pack of heroin, Houston police used the drug buy as the basis for a search warrant on the house that they claimed would net large amounts of heroin and illegal guns.

When the officers executed the no-knock search warrant, though, the result was a firefight that killed the two inhabitants and their dog and injured five officers. No heroin was found.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

Ex-NFL quarterback and University of Texas star Vince Young was arrested on suspicion of driving while intoxicated (DWI) in Missouri City, Texas. According to police, Mr. Young admitted to drinking several beers before getting behind the wheel. He also apparently failed a field sobriety test. That doesn't mean much because there are no details on how he allegedly failed.

Mr. Young spent the night of the arrest in jail, was booked, and then released on $500 bond.

The arrest was not Mr. Young's first: He was arrested in January 2016 in Austin, Texas, as well. He pleaded no contest to that charge.

The incident highlights the prominent place that DWI arrests have in the news media and how damaging they can be for celebrities or public figures. Regardless of VU's presumption of innocence, he will never be acquitted in the media regardless of the outcome

Penalties for a Second DWI

If convicted, this new case would be Mr. Young's second DWI offense because he pleaded no contest to his first DWI charge and because the last conviction happened three years ago – well within Texas' 10-year look back period for DWI charges.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

A recent incident in Montgomery County highlights how hyper-protective Texas laws are for police officers in the line of duty: after fleeing a traffic stop and allegedly dragging a police officer for a few yards, a suspect is being charged not with a misdemeanor assault, but with the serious felony offense of aggravated assault.

Suspect Flees Traffic Stop, Drags Officer

The incident happened on the night of February 13, 2019, in Montgomery County. Police officers pulled over a vehicle that was going southbound on Interstate 45.

According to the initial reports, when the officer approached the vehicle, the driver reached for something under the seat. When the officer told him to stop moving, the driver hit the gas. The officer was dragged by the car for a short distance before letting go.

Media reports are saying that the officer is in "stable condition," even though his injuries appear to only be a scraped knee.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

A Houston man is facing a charge of driving while impaired after already having eight previous convictions of the offense. The driver was arrested after sideswiping a car on the highway, and the breathalyzer test read that his blood alcohol content (BAC) was.22, nearly four times the legal limit.

If you've been charged with a DWI in Houston and have already been convicted of the offense twice in the past, it's important to get the legal representation you need to fight your charge because you are looking at serious jail time and steep fines that will affect your life for years to come. Here's an overview of the penalties you can expect if convicted of a third or subsequent DWI in Harris County, Texas.

Third or Subsequent DWI in Houston

If you've been charged with a third-offense DWI, the penalties that you can face are severe. If you're in a similar situation, you are no longer facing a misdemeanor charge--in Texas, a third or subsequent offense of driving while impaired is a felony charge.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

The fallout in the Houston Police Department from the deadly drug raid in the Pecan Hills neighborhood last month continues. Now, the FBI is investigating the case, and the Harris County District Attorney is reviewing all of the cases involving the police officer, who has yet to be charged for falsifying reports or lying under oath.

How We Got Here: Did Informant Behind Deadly Drug Raid Ever Exist?

We covered the details of the botched drug raid in our blog before, including how the police aggressively doubled down to protect its wounded officers before changing their tune when it came out that the officer behind the case may have fabricated the drug buy that led to the search warrant.

As the investigation continues, evidence is increasingly indicating that the narcotics officer, 34-year veteran Gerald Goines, made up the drug purchase that led to the search warrant and the failed drug bust. Police have been unable to find the informant that made the purchase, and Goines has made inconsistent statements about the informant's identity.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

​The law of driving while intoxicated (DWI) seems like it should be simple and straightforward. It is not. And the U.S. Supreme Court's newfound interest in taking a DWI case shows that the law has been evolving at a rate that requires input from the highest court in the country, once again.

The major developments over the past decade have been the proliferation of implied consent laws that offer law enforcement a way to score a criminal conviction while barely gathering any evidence. These criminalized implied consent laws were actually the reason why the Supreme Court of the United States last dipped its toe into DWI law, in the case of Birchfield v. North Dakota.

Understanding how implied consent laws work, and why it was so controversial when some states criminalized them, is necessary before a discussion of the Birchfield case.

The Role of Implied Consent Laws in the World of DWI

Implied consent laws occupy an important role in the DWI world. When they wrote DWI laws in the 1930s, lawmakers decided that a DWI suspect's blood alcohol content (BAC) would be the Holy Grail of drunk driving evidence – suspects with BAC at or above 0.08% would be deemed "intoxicated" without the need for further evidence.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

One of the more interesting stories in news relating to driving while intoxicated (DWI) in Texas deals with a man who bit off a piece of a police officer's ear during a traffic stop. There is, however, more to the story than first meets the eye.

DWI Suspect Bites Officer's Ear During Traffic Stop

The incident happened late on Friday, February 8, 2019, in Denton, which just over 4 hours north of Houston. According to the initial reports, police pulled over a vehicle that they said was driving erratically and failing to maintain a lane on Interstate 35.

The traffic stop turned into a DWI investigation when the officer claimed to see a small empty vodka bottle inside the car. The driver refused to get out of the car, so police called for backup. When officers tried getting the driver out of the car, he fought back by punching one of them in the face. In the ensuing scuffle, the driver managed to pin an officer to the ground. There, he bit an inch off of the top of the officer's ear.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

The Supreme Court of the United States is going to take another foray into the world of driving while intoxicated (DWI). While the case that they have accepted does not come from Texas, it could have a huge impact on how implied consent laws intersect with your Fourth Amendment rights. The issue is whether a a legislature can, by way of an informed-consent statute, "deem" a class of persons to have consented to a search. In this case Mitchell was unconscious when his blood was drawn. Mitchell's lawyers challenged this search as illegally obtained because he was unconscious at the time and did not consent to the search.

What Happened in State v. Mitchell

The case that the Supreme Court will hear, State v. Mitchell, comes from Wisconsin. In it, police received a tip that someone who appeared drunk had just driven off in a gray van. Later, police stumbled onto the defendant as he was walking along the beach. He was having trouble standing and his speech was slurred. He admitted to drinking and then driving to the beach, but that he had parked his car "because he felt he was too drunk to drive." The gray van was found nearby.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

The U.S. Supreme Court's decision to accept a case involving driving while intoxicated (DWI) is a strong indication that it is unhappy with the state of DWI law surrounding blood draws, breath tests, and a suspect's consent to a search. Of particular importance in the current case, State v. Mitchell, is the strong difference between DWI searches that involve a suspect's blood and those that involve a suspect's breath.

New DWI Case Involving Blood Draw

The crucially important fact of State v. Mitchell was that police performed a blood draw on a DWI suspect without his consent. The reason for the lack of consent was simple: the suspect was so lethargic from the alcohol in his system that he could not be woken up. Asleep, he could neither provide a breath sample nor consent to a blood draw for evidence of his blood alcohol content (BAC). So police decided that, while he had not consented to the blood draw, he had also not refused his consent. This a presumptuous decision by police to invade a person's body without their consent.

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 Posted on February 02, 2019 in Uncategorized

The recent firefight between a narcotics squad from the Houston Police Department and suspected drug dealers has led to a war of words as the police union attempts to dodge blame for the incident. The aggressive and dangerous vitriol from the police union, however, only betrays a gung-ho attitude that puts the lie in their claims that they are "only protecting the community."

Drug Bust Goes Wrong: Two Suspects Killed and Five Officers Wounded

The situation began on January 27, 2019, when police followed up on a tip by sending an informant into a house in the Pecan Park neighborhood to buy drugs. When the informant came out with a packet of brown powder and said that it was "boy" – a street name for heroin – police applied for and got a no-knock search warrant for the house to look for evidence of a drug distribution crime.

It is unclear if the police ever confirmed that the substance purchased was heroin or not.

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