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11.3.14 |
Victor Trevino, represented by Chip Lewis, pleads guilty to one case of misapplication of fiduciary property, a third-degree felony – sentencing set for after the election |
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11.4.14 |
Election Day – Devon Anderson elected Harris County DA |
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11.5.14 |
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reverses Alfred Dewayne Brown’s capital murder conviction |
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11.17.14 |
Victor Trevino receives probation from Susan Brown with no jail time as a condition |
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11.25.14 |
Dustin Deutsch, former Harris County District Attorney’s office investigator, indicted for stealing evidence in 2012 (Lonnie Blevins, his partner, was arrested by the FBI in February 2013) |
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12.10.14 |
Cameron Moon’s murder conviction overturned by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals following an incomplete certification process, which permitted him to be tried as an adult |
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12.12.14 |
Devon Anderson announces purchase of body cameras with asset forfeiture funds |
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12.16.14 |
Robert Durst pleads guilty to a reduced charge |
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12.18.14 |
Tadano America Corp. files lawsuit against the Harris County District Attorney’s office over the comic book scandal |
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12.23.14 |
228th Grand Jury no bills Houston Police Department Officer Juventino Castro in the death of Jordan Baker |
I am disappointed that the November election brought us another two years with Devon Anderson as District Attorney. During the election, it was obvious that Devon and her gang were holding their breath and hoping to delay certain difficult issues. Immediately following the election, the door to Devon’s closet full of problems swung open and revealed a laundry list of challenges.
On the day after the election, Devon awoke to an overturned conviction in the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. The highest criminal court in Texas rejected the conviction and death sentence for Alfred Dewayne Brown.
In 2005, Brown was convicted of participating in the April 3, 2003 burglary of an Ace Check Cashing store. During the burglary, Houston Police Department Officer Charles Clark and the store clerk, Alfredia Jones, a single mother of two, were murdered.
Three men, Elijah Dwayne Joubert, Dashan Vadell Glaspie, and Brown, were charged with the Ace murders. Joubert and Brown were convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death, partially on Glaspie’s testimony. In exchange for his testimony, Glaspie received a plea bargain of 30 years in prison on a reduced charge of aggravated robbery.
Immediately after the Ace murders, Ericka Jean Dockery was used by Harris County Assistant District Attorneys to build a case against Brown and likely present false testimony. In a previous article, I reviewed the timeline of this injustice. On November 5, 2014, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals published their opinion in the Brown case.
This Court has reviewed the record with respect to the Brady allegation made by applicant. Based on the habeas court’s findings and conclusions and our own review, we hold that the State withheld evidence that was both favorable and material to applicant’s case in violation of Brady.
I do not know if Alfred Dewayne Brown played a role in the murders of Ms. Jones and Officer Clark; but, that is not the purpose of this story. This case provides an example of law enforcement’s ability to use the criminal justice system to produce a dishonest result. In particular, Brown’s case highlights the misuse of the grand jury system.
A variety of issues contribute to this misuse: repeat/professional grand jurors; the pick-a-pal (or key man) system that allows judges to handpick their grand jurors; law enforcement personnel serving as grand jurors; law enforcement influence on grand jurors; and improper influence such as the police shooting simulator. In Harris County, a prosecutor is allowed to present a case or investigation to any of the active grand juries and the prosecutor alone decides what evidence is presented to these grand jurors. Many people have a vested interest in keeping the current system in place.
During the campaign, Devon Anderson discussed the grand jury system with Houston Chronicle writer Lisa Falkenberg. Anderson said:
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Even though she used the key man system as a judge, she would not use that system now.
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The District Attorney is not in the position to dictate grand jury policy to the criminal court judges.
In the last legislative session, Senator Estes filed SB 834, which would keep the identity of grand jurors confidential. The Harris County District Attorney’s legislative liaison, Justin Wood, was in favor of the bill. So, in 2013, under the leadership of Mike Anderson, the Harris County District Attorney’s office took a position in favor of secret grand juries.
Senator Whitmire and Representative Dutton have filed bills to abolish the pick-a-pal system. In other words, with this legislation, Texas grand juries could only be selected through the jury pool. What will Devon Anderson do now? The no bill of Houston Police Department Officer Juventino Castro certainly magnifies the issue.
Log on to the Texas Legislature Online. Watch SB 135 and HB 282. Will the Houston Police Officers’ Union oppose this legislation? If so, why? Will the Harris County District Attorney’s office take a position?
While this legislation offers a sure fix, is it the correct answer? Does it get to the root of the problem? Does it let judges like Susan Brown off the hook? I am in favor of the abolition of pick-a-pal grand juries because the problem needs to be fixed immediately; but, I do not want to ignore the meaning behind this belief – there are judges who simply cannot be trusted. The only true solution to the problem of using a grand jury for an unlawful purpose is to identify this wrongdoing, educate the public, and get bad judges out of the courthouse.
Let me speak plainly on this issue. Now, judges are allowed to handpick individuals throughout Harris County to serve on their grand jury. These individuals can be their friends from church or the country club or people who helped get them elected, like political and union folks, including police officers. Lisa Falkenberg recently exposed the fact that most Harris County judges are sealing the names of their grand jurors. Harris County judges can handpick their friends/supporters to serve on their grand juries and defendants may never know the connection because those same judges protect the identities of grand jurors.
Most recently, the 228th Grand Jury refused to indict Houston Police Department Officer Juventino Castro in the shooting of an unarmed black man named Jordan Baker. The judge of the 228th District Court, Marc Carter, signed an order sealing the names of these grand jurors. In a recent Twitter exchange, Judge Carter told Falkenberg that revealing the race and gender information of grand jurors would answer “basic fairness questions.” Falkenberg concurred. As long as pick-a-pal grand juries exist, the revelation of race and gender alone is wholly insufficient in order to determine fairness.
Beyond the 185th grand jury, there are other instances of (at a minimum) the appearance of impropriety on local grand juries. The foreman of the Montgomery County grand jury that indicted Adrian Peterson was the chief deputy clerk and court administrator in Montgomery County. It was recently revealed that, in 2003, Houston Police Officer James Koteras led the grand jury that threatened Alfred Dewayne Brown’s girlfriend Ericka Jean Dockery.
Who cares, right? You are likely an upstanding citizen and the only time that you even think about the justice system is on the rare occasion when you are called for jury duty.
Recently, I had the opportunity to attend an event for the Anthony Graves Foundation. One of the luncheon speakers was Kelly Siegler. In her gruff way, she made a good point: victims are revictimized and communities are damaged when the wrong defendant is prosecuted. That is not justice. And, I think that most of us want justice for our community.
With this bad post-election publicity, Devon Anderson announced that she would use asset forfeiture funds to purchase body cameras for some local law enforcement. She is desperately trying to heal her relationship with the black community after she used Harlem Lewis to champion her “one tough prosecutor” image.
Devon did not fare well with the Hispanic community either with her handling of the Victor Trevino case. First, it was announced that Devon offered Victor Trevino a pre-trial plea bargain to reduce the felony offenses to a class C misdemeanor, a traffic ticket-level offense. Following jury selection and a day of testimony, on Election Day Eve, Trevino pleaded guilty to one case of misapplication of fiduciary property, a third degree felony. The sentencing was reset for two weeks and, surprising no one, Susan Brown gave Victor Trevino probation with no jail time as a condition.
Courthouse watchers raised an eyebrow when Trevino’s case was transferred from Judge Mark Kent Ellis’ court to the dishonorable Susan Brown’s court. Susan Brown, the judge of the 185th runaway grand jury that helped get Mike Anderson into office, held the wife of a defendant in contempt after she yelled “Amen” when a jury found her husband not guilty. Why would Trevino agree to this transfer unless he knew that the fix was in?
Imagine the balancing that was going on with this litigation. Chip Lewis, Trevino’s attorney, desperately wanted Devon Anderson to win. After Lewis permitted Trevino to testify before a grand jury not once, but twice, the constable was indicted. Lewis needed to clean up his mess with Trevino and “represent” his client’s best interests while making sure that his gal was elected. Again, why would Trevino agree to this transfer? Meanwhile, in December, another Lewis client, Robert Durst, received a reduced charge from Devon Anderson after he exposed himself and urinated on candy at CVS.
Let me talk about the Houston Police Officers’ Union for a moment. Every politician in Houston and Harris County tries to curry favor with this union. Deals are made because, let’s face it, unions can be powerful. It was this very union that worked together with Allen Blakemore and Mike Anderson to take down Pat Lykos at all costs because she stood up to them and prosecuted their own. It is this very union that protects officers from indictment.
What is next for the Harris County District Attorney’s office? Will Belinda Hill stay? How will the lawsuit over the comic book caper go down? And, how will the hearing end concerning David Temple? I have said for long time that we live in a banana republic if citizens are denied justice at the Harris County Criminal Justice Center. Chuck Rosenthal may not be the DA any longer but his key supporters are running the show.
Don Hooper’s chronicle of “The Toxic Criminal Justice Center of Harris County” is missing the infamous date of the most universally poisonous miscarriage of justice emanating from the Andersons’ corruption, December 12, 2013: The Exoneration of “abortion by infanticide” Dr. Douglas Karpen by Susan Brown’s 185th Court “Key Man” (a.k.a. Chip Lewis) Grand Jury orchestrated by DA Devon Anderson under AG Greg Abbott for Gov. Perry. “The first purpose of government is to protect the right to life, and the government has no authority to exclude any human being from that protection. Perhaps nowhere was this stated more strongly than by Saint John Paul II, who in his 1995 encyclical, The Gospel of Life, states that when a government legalizes abortion, it ‘effectively moves towards a form of totalitarianism’ and ‘is transformed into a tyrant State, which arrogates to itself the right to dispose of the life of the weakest and most defenseless members.’ In this case, he said, ‘the State is no longer the ‘common home’ where all can live together on the basis of principles of fundamental equality,’ but rather, ‘the disintegration of the State itself has already begun’ (EV, 20)”
As a result of Karpen’s exoneration of infanticide orchestrated by AG Abbott and DA Anderson to prevent publicity of Gov. Perry and his USP lobbyist sister’s partial ownership of Karpen’s “outpatient” Aaron Women’s Clinic through United Surgical Partners stock holdings, every Thursday called “Kill Thursday” Karpen is legally empowered to continue twisting the heads off of dozens and dozens of four to eight month old live born infants,. Karpen medicates the cervix of his victims causing them to soften on Tuesday to return in a semi-comatose state on Kill Thursday to give live birth.to their babies into the waiting arms of Douglas Karpen.. Long term employees in a viral You Tube said this “procedure” is more efficient than cutting it apart in the woman’s body which from experience takes hours of intensive hard physical labor. Civil Rights Activists Day Gardner and Dr. Johnny Hunter, and local Black pastors appeared on Kill Thursday for a Press Release at Karpen’s Clinic over a year ago asking why Karpen subject to a Lt. Gov. Dewhurst mandated infanticide investigation by OHCDA enlisted HPD Homicide ( as with other murders, but in this case purposely for Planned Parenthood’s Mayor Parker. HPD Homicide never investigated Karpen) spurred by the You Tube, was still allowed to kill children. Mayor Parker sent her Planned Parenthood Gaystapo HPD with billy clubs and steal barricades to suppress Free Speech of pro lifers and pastors that Kill Thursday, not for the first time or the last time. Don Hopper published my picture at the press release on Big Jolly Politics amazed that I called out Cardinal Dinardo by name for his unbroken silence on Douglas Karpen and on the Planned Parenthood Clinic I-45. Cardinal Dinardo is former chair of the NCCB Committee for Pro life Activities. As with the recent exposure of Boehner Rockefeller Republican duplicity in lockstep with the “negro Hitler” the black GW in the Cromniibus coup d’etat, Perry, Abbott, Patrick (who supported Devon’s election in the wake of Karpen’s exoneration) Paxton, and Devon Anderson acted as one body in the exoneration of Karpen. They together share moral culpability for every child murdered by Karpen on Kill Thursdays now as well as the mothers he has butchered and killed.. Bushite Rockefeller Republicans are all RINO’s in regard to the Republic and the grass roots party of the Republic that recruited Lincoln to run for President. Historically RINO Rockefeller/Bush Republicans, “the party of big business,” are the original crony capitalist fascist Nazis who failing to overthrow the American Republic in 1934 have never stopped conspiring and succeeding since. Through the assassinations of JFK, RFK, and MLK and GH Bush’s New World Order, with the black GW and “Negro Hitler” Barak Obama and Planned Parenthood, they have almost completely succeeded. Thank God for true American patriots, actual Republicans like Louie Goumert and the brave 21, real American Patriots, Christians, freedom loving human beings, and Republicans in the true meaning of the word.
Shaneequah, you IS getting’ uh ‘bortion. I can not afford another baby roun’ hyur. I’m already raisin you and yo first baby, DaQuan, and you is jus’ seventeen year old.
Please Mama, don’t make me go to dat Dr. Karpen. Kyetha say he feed festuses to he cats.
I cannot afford no ‘spensive doctor, Shaneequah. Dey cost five hunert dollas fo uh ‘bortion. An he don’t feed no festuses to no cats neither.
Dr. Karpen is a good man Shaneequah. He do ‘bortions fo free sumtime. Listen to me Shaneequah, we ain’t got de money fo no mo kids. Desmond is dat baby daddy an he dix lexic. He dumb. DaQuan jes a baby an you can already tell he dix lexic. He dumb too. Does you wont ‘nother dix lexic baby, cuz I jes can’t take care of ‘nother one.
I luvs you Shaneequah. You knows I do, I’m yo Moma. But puhleez don’t have ‘nother dix lexic baby. You already gots one dix lexic baby. Honey you is already fo weeks along. Soon enough there won’t be no ‘bortion doctor will do it.
Oh Moma, I iz scyurt. Whut if I go on and have dis baby den give him up fo ‘doption?
Who gonna ‘dopt uh dix lexic black baby Shaneequah? Fr Christopher Terry? He called Obama a ‘negro Hitler’. You gonna trust a man dat sez dat? He don’t care nuthin’ ‘bout no teenage blek Momas.. He so errgant he thank he iz always right. He thanks uh zygote is uh baby. He so dumb he can’t even spell Louie Gohmert’s name right.”
Who iz Louie Gohmert Moma?
Child, don’t even git me started. You seen dem kids over at de Catholic Charity. Dey some sad kids.. All de meskin an white babies gits ‘dopted but nobody wonts dem black ones. Whenever you walks by there you gonna wonder ‘bout yo baby. It gonna hurt you de rest of yo life. Shaneequah, I want you to git down on yo knees wid me.
OK Moma, but I iz so skyurt. Honey, you gots to trust in de Lawd.Sometime it be best to give dat little life back to Gawd. Pray wid me Shaneequah like de Lawd taught us.
De Lawd is my shepherd; I shall not wont.
He makes me to lie down in dem green pastures: he leads me beside dat still watuh.
He resto my soul: he leads me in the paths of righteousness for he name sake.
Yea, though I walk through de valley of de shadow of death, I will fear no evil: fo thou art wid me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou prepares a table befo me in de presence of my enemies: thou anointes my head wid earl; my cup runns ovuh.
Surely goodness and mercy gonna follow me all de days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LAWD foevuh. Here, take dis Klenex Shaneequah, dry dem pretty eyes.
Thank you Moma.
Moma luv you Shaneequah
“Negro Hitler”? Shaneequah?
Wow.
Looks like you finally found your target audience, Don. Congratulations and Happy New Year.
Murray, you and Kelly have already made my New Year!
So much to write about and to little time. I was wondering what your thoughts are on Antonio Williams or David Temple next or a combined story?
I was thinking two stories. Don’t worry you will get mentioned in both.
I’d go with Antonio. It’s a pretty amazing case. One guy kills at least five different people in four separate incidents. Really good police work by HPD. I was proud to sit second chair with Lance Long on it.
The Temple one should be interesting, too. I can’t comment on it at the moment since I’m Under the Rule. You know how it goes!
Murray, thanks Kelly it is. Btw, you are my audience.
First check a web site devon123.org . You bet the Houston Police Union has some power over the local DA and local judges. Its not just them , its CLEAT, the Harris County Sheriffs Union , TMPA, and all the other police unions and associations. For example HPD alone put about 21K monthly into their political action fund which is paid out to their lobbyist Kieth Oakly and local politicians so that they can have favor.Oakly by the way is the lobbyist for every major police and security union and association in tthe State of Texas. Oakly left the legislature and spread the millions in his campaign account around to the other legislators so he could return the following session and get what he wanted for the unions. he got it all right. Ever heard of the drop program ? Its a retirement program for HPD officers that they can put their paycheck into for retirement and it is matched two to one by government funds. They can place 9{997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} in annually but ten they have other retirement annuities that they can place up to the rest of their check into. HPD officers make on average 80k but with the added gov matching of their retirement and overtime they are averaging 150k. Of course if they are putting it all into retirement annuities they don’t have two pennies to rub together at the end of the year. But wait that’s where the extra jobs come in. HPD has managed to monopolize the extra job and security market an effectively eliminate their competition by arresting them. How do they do it? The pay offs and promise of 5000 HPD officers to vote for Devon Anderson so the she and her staff will diperately interperit the private security act on private security companies smaller less prominant police agecies and out of county police officers that compete with them. The end pay off is they all get to retire as multi millionaires. The new elite.
Oh and BTW the DA investigators get in on the extra job scam action as well.
When a union contributes thousands of dollars to your campaign and also promises you a block of voters , 5000 members that are registered voters whofrom hpou, 10000 from tmpa, etc… As a politician you will pass any legislature they propose to you and as a judge or district attorney you will prosecute and favorably adjudicate any case they press to stay in their favor. I personally know many good peace officers that have been ruined and their families devastated because they became targets of the Houston police union just because they dared to compete with their members in the private security market. I know an officer that was recently arrested and convicted in cccl judge standlys court. This case was appealed and overturned surprisingly enough by Marc Brown. Marc Brown was in business at one time with Mike Anderson and is a friend of Devon Anderson. The defendant in the case upon the aqquital filed an FBI complaint against the Harris County D.A. and it investigators for aggrivated kidnapping and aggravated robbery as the D.A. investigators falsely arrested him at gunpoint without warrant and unlawfully seized his vehicle and property. As soon as the complaint was filed the Harris County District Clerks office no longer had records of this case as though it had been expunged from the system without any court order. Harris County has been arresting less than full time officers for conducting traffic control extra jobs for years. Judge Brown in his brief in the aqquital stated that there is no authority under the private security act to regulate any peace officer conducting traffic control. The DA kills two birds with one stone expunging this case first no lawsuit or criminal case can be filed for wrong doing if there is no record and secondly agencies other than HPD will not be aware that they can legally in Harris County work traffic control. There are agencies in Harris County that employ officers part time that could bennifit from this but the union wants to keep it secreted and under wraps to keep the monopoly in tact.
If the HPOU is so powerful, how come the city stopped the drop program over ten years ago for new officers? And no political endorsement promises votes of any kind, none of the officers I’ve ever hired even knowing who their union supported politically. Most police vote for conservative candidates while most unions support liberal candidates, ask around in Austin when the leg is in session. But unions tossing a few thousand bucks at someone won’t change how a candidate acts when developers set up soft money accounts with hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars to sway those candidates in a different direction.
If in fact Ken the drop program was stopped ten years ago for new officers , it is still then in existence for those who belong to it. I had an HPD retiree in my store a few months ago he had no idea who I was and he shot his mouth off about how he has 25 million available in his retirement account that is delved out to him at the rate of 15k weekly. That’s absolutely absurd and so grossly disproportionate to officers with other agencies or working class people in general. The governor of Texas Gregg Abbot was put in office by the police unions of Texas. Go to the HPOU website and they tell on themselves. Check their PAC page and they announce every month how they raise 20 to 30 k for distribution. Also look at what the PAC page Bragg’s about, that HPOU political action committee is responsible for blocking reserve officers from working police extra jobs. Follow the trail in 2002 the executive director of the defunct Texas Commission on Private Security Cliff Grumbles issued an administrative executive order making it a promulgated administrative rule allowing reserve and other less that full time peace officers to wear the uniform of the political subdivision that they were employed by while working private security. This did several things, one of which was to put more uniformed police officers on the street in Harris County on the dimes of private businesses effectively deterring crime to the benefit of Harris County citizens. The next thing it did was to make it affordable for businesses to hire off duty police of their choice and pay a fair rate , fair to the business owner and fair to the police officer. 25 dollars per hour on average in 2002. This also gave officers from smaller less prominent agencies economic opportunity to feed and cloth their family while waiting for something better to come along. But of course the HPOU and their paid for friends at the Harris County DA office ie; Edward Porter and Chuck Rosenthal couldn’t allow HPOU and its members (who pay them handsomely) to have any fair competition so they wrote a bullshit brief and sent it to their friend (Houston native) Attorney General Gregg Abbot who without a second thought rendered his opinion that the rule allowing all of these officers must be recended and that Harris County should start arresting any of these officers that dared to work in its jurisdiction. Immediately overnight the rate for these extra jobs went to 45 dollars an hour and all the other officers from less prominent agencies had to go back to workiing in the private sector for less than 10 dollars per hour. Now mind you I live in a small town in another county but the officer that works at our bank here is a Harris County deputy. He comes in to my county and works without any one giving him any grief at all. We live in an economicly deprivated rural area with few and far between extra employment for police officers and we certainly don’t have the drop program here. In fact the average Houston police officer earns 80 k or more on his primary job and the average officer from my area is eligible for public assistance and food stamps. None of us who serve our small rural communities will retire as millionaires. And by the way new enrollment for the drop program being stopped doesn’t mean it doesnt still exist. There are new programs that allow deposit of up to entire payroll being placed in retirement annuities for HPD. The main reason drop was stopped is because other city employees such as fire , ems , sanitation etc… were not alotted such a beneficial program, again predjudicial treatment that benefits HPOU and it members over other people. And no matter what you say you can’t white wash corruption in the legislature and the fact that the police unions lobby pays millions out in bribes to benifit their members and pass laws to oppress their competition.
John, feel free to call me “Kev” but my name isn’t “Ken”. If you’re worked up over someone claiming to have 25 million in a retirement account from either the city or the county, I suggest you calm down because no such account exists. If one of them won the multi-state lottery for a large amount or came from a wealthy family, it is possible they have some trust fund to that effect but believing everything you hear without verifying it makes scant sense.
Then, with all due respect for your opinion, Governor Abbott was elected by a majority of Texans who voted for him. He did not scrap by with a win over abortion Barbie either, he seriously pummeled her in terms of votes. Even if every cop or fireman in the country could have voted in our election, it would not have changed the outcome regardless of how they voted. Whatever legislation the Governor signed had to go through our legislature first, the officers I’ve hired still getting the same 25 to 30 dollars an hour as they have for years. If your rural area is paying much more than that, you are paying more than anyone in Harris County is paying that I’m aware of, perhaps there is a reason for that or maybe you never checked with other deputies to see what they would charge.
But back on track about their retirement programs, I suggest you ask Mr. Hooper which city employee group still has a DROP program for new employees as he has mentioned it in his articles. You claim that firemen don’t have it yet Don says they do, I know who I’m going to believe when confronted with a real person versus an anonymous troll. And as a second cousin to someone in Public Works, I know that all city employees had the ability to join such a program until the police and city employees other than firemen gave the benefit back to the city in 2004. Mayor Lanier gave that to them to keep employees from leaving, their own retirement checks placed in an account to stay longer. He said it saved the city money because the city no longer had to pay more into the funds for those so covered.
Claiming political contributions are bribes works both ways though. I’ve donated money to responsible, conservative candidates in the past yet they never steered any business my way or changed laws to favor me over anyone else. It’s part of the price to get better government. The last time I checked, the only people or groups donating millions to anyone were not police from this area, I doubt their entire PAC makes a million each year. I don’t follow such things as closely as Mr. Jennings does but maybe you have an agenda where facts don’t matter so I’ll wish you well.
If in fact Ken the drop program was stopped ten years ago for new officers , it is still then in existence for those who belong to it. I had an HPD retiree in my store a few months ago he had no idea who I was and he shot his mouth off about how he has 25 million available in his retirement account that is delved out to him at the rate of 15k weekly. That’s absolutely absurd and so grossly disproportionate to officers with other agencies or working class people in general. The governor of Texas Gregg Abbot was put in office by the police unions of Texas. Go to the HPOU website and they tell on themselves. Check their PAC page and they announce every month how they raise 20 to 30 k for distribution. Also look at what the PAC page Bragg’s about, that HPOU political action
the executive director of the defunct Texas Commission on Private Security Cliff Grumbles issued an administrative executive order making it a promulgated administrative rule allowing reserve and other less that full time peace officers to wear the uniform of the political subdivision that they were employed by while working private security. This did several things, one of which was to put more uniformed police officers on the street in Harris County on the dimes of private businesses effectively deterring crime to the benefit of Harris County citizens. The next thing it did was to make it affordable for businesses to hire off duty police of their choice and pay a fair rate , fair to the business owner and fair to the police officer. 25 dollars per hour on average in 2002. This also gave officers from smaller less prominent agencies economic opportunity to feed and cloth their family while waiting for something better to come along. But of course the HPOU and their paid for friends at the Harris County DA office ie; Edward Porter and Chuck Rosenthal couldn’t allow HPOU and its members (who pay them handsomely) to have any fair competition so they wrote a bullshit brief and sent it to their friend (Houston native) Attorney General Gregg Abbot who without a second thought rendered his opinion that the rule allowing all of these officers must be recended and that Harris County should start arresting any of these officers that dared to work in its jurisdiction. Immediately overnight the rate for these extra jobs went to 45 dollars an hour and all the other officers from less prominent agencies had to go back to workiing in the private sector for less than 10 dollars per hour. Now mind you I live in a small town in another county but the officer that works at our bank here is a Harris County deputy. He comes in to my county and works without any one giving him any grief at all. We live in an economicly deprivated rural area with few and far between extra employment for police officers and we certainly don’t have the drop program here. In fact the average Houston police officer earns 80 k or more on his primary job and the average officer from my area is eligible for public assistance and food stamps. None of us who serve our small rural communities will retire as millionaires. And by the way new enrollment for the drop program being stopped doesn’t mean it doesnt still exist. There are new programs that allow deposit of up to entire payroll being placed in retirement annuities for HPD. The main reason drop was stopped is because other city employees such as fire , ems , sanitation etc… were not alotted such a beneficial program, again predjudicial treatment that benefits HPOU and it members over other people. And no matter what you say you can’t white wash corruption in the legislature and the fact that the police unions lobby pays millions out in bribes to benifit their members and pass laws to oppress their competition.
If you think private interest giving money to legislators is better government then your just another problem to deal with. Apparently you have something to hide and you are part of the problem. Your rhetoric doesn’t even make sense. No other city employee has access to the drop program and has their deposit matched 2 to 1 by government funds. If so prove me wrong and post an authenticated copy of a sanitation workers deposit and highlight where the 2 to 1 matching government funds show. Then show me the 45 dollar an hour extra job that the sanitation worker gets to go out and work in his take home city garbage truck. No police officer in my rural area makes any where near what you greedy SOBs make. Unions are the downfall of fair trade and equal opportunity. 40 years ago we needed unions but now they have be one another big business and another private interest to stear the government for their own private interest. You keep white washing it any way you want Kev but the laundry is still dirty. HPOU and its members actively oppress the competition using color of law and abusing their arrest authority either to arrest the competition or to refuse to arrest or transport detained individuals that their competing security company or out of county officer has with cause detained. Don’t say it doesn’t happen regularly because it does, people come to me daily with stories of these abuses. You are right I don’t use my name , I’m in the line of fire here and I know what you people are capable of I’ve seen it time and time again. Innocent peoples lives utterly destroyed by these abuses, but rest assured I’m working in the background and I will put a stop to it. I have already been instrumental in dethroning 5 state and local officials for these abuses Larry , Clint, Joe , and Leon are you familiar with these agents of HPOU ? In fact Larry was a TCPS investigator that went to DPS when it changed over. His boss at TCPS had him under control for a while until DPS took over then DPS saw its chance to monopolize the security industry state wide now that they have regulatory control over and industry that they compete in. Hell let’s just hand over regulation of the automobile industry to Ford , then lets see how long any one else stays in business. Under the gestapo style regulation of DPS the security, lock smith industry, towing industry, have all shrunk by over 300,000 workers. That’s 200,000 just from the security industry. Let’s see that means that 200,000 security jobs have been brought into the police union monopoly. Let’s do the math. 200,000 x 40 hours weekly = 8,000,000. That times 40 dollars an hour is 320,000,000 annually. No its not big business is it Kev? The statistics are available just look and see how many registrants TCPS had in the year 2000 and look at the number of registrant there are now. So back to Larry. During his tenure at DPS used to contract with the HPD academy to teach a course to HPD cadets on regulation of the private security industry. Why does an HPD cadet need to be advised on administrative rule enforcement and private security statutes ? I can answer that, its so they can arrest their competition and extinguish it. And again its not just HPD that does this it is the majority of the union and trade associations and their members within the police industry. That being said I see HPD officers out violating the private security act in the downtown Houston area regularly. They are exempt from obtaining a license to preform guard work or executive protection , but any other section they must comply and have a registration. A courier license is required by the private security act to be a courier. Any person who delivers money to an ATM must have a couriers license a violation under this section is a class A misdemeanor. I see HPD officers all the time delivering money to ATM machines and servicing the machines regularly. As petty as it sounds it is a class A MISDEMEANOR. This crime is serious enough to suspend their TCOLE (peace officers) license for 10 years just like they do to out of county officers or officers from less prominent agencies that they change with private security act violations, but I don’t see the DA taking action on these violations. There are many more examples but you get my point here. devon123.org
John, I don’t pretend to know inner circle state politics or union stuff that offends minimum wage security guards but you make all sorts of specific claims that are not true. You aren’t even internally consistent with your numbers so I’m not going to argue with you. If you think police officers are retiring with 25 million or that deputies will only work for 45 dollars an hour, you have been misled. If you think Governor Abbott or Perry before him were elected solely on the basis of police voting for them, again, you are wrong. The city police do not get matching funds for their drop program, that is money they would get if they left going into an account instead of a bigger percentage, and the county guys get matching funds for their primary pension to buy an annuity but have no drop. Good luck!
So kev first of all you started out degrading security guards that just shows me what I’m saying is true you must resent them otherwise you would be more respectful. I know many security company owners that are former police officers or retired police officers and they don’t work for minimum wage, however what they earn in the private sector as a business owner is still highly disproportionate to what public servants are making now. My close friend recently sold his security company to a large corporate operation. He is a former Harris county deputy and has tons (sorry I can’t be more specific than tons) of experience. He was recently interviewed for a managers position with a large security firm and the pay offered was 32k. The average public police officer makes 3 times that much just on his primary job. A chief of police in a small community makes on average 32 k that is also highly disproportionate compared to City of Houston and Harris County officers. Then you want to monopolize all the extra work for yourselves and arrest hard working decent people for competing with you. Look at the lawsuit filed by off duty services against the PSB and its agents Larry Shimek and his supervisor Lt . Adam Parks. Shimek has had numerous law suits filed against him for oppressing HPDs competition but this one was the most blatant. The suit is public record. There are also other suits that are public record. You can deny the facts but you can’t hide them.
John, I’ve hired security guards before and I wasn’t belittling them when I said minimum wage because that is what the worker drones typically start out at. The owners of such companies, whether they are former deputies or not, make far more but I stopped hiring the low paid guards as it was a case of getting what you pay for, at least as far as what the guards were paid. If the companies hired better people and did not consume so much of the fee in overhead, I’d be willing to try again but for the same 25 to 30 dollars I pay the company to send 9 dollar an hour guards, I can get a state certified deputy and promote good will with all his peers in the community. I don’t know why you think they get paid twice that because I couldn’t afford that much but there isn’t a set price, it is what both sides agree upon.
I would expect the police chief or sheriff of a major metropolitan area to get paid more than a small town chief or sheriff just as I expect the head of Microsoft is paid more than a company with five employees too. But the head of security for the Texans makes more than the local sheriff, as do many others in big companies, just as those at Coots & Boots make more than city firemen across the state. As far as your legal troubles are concerned, they are no business of mine, that is why I pointed out you have better places to complain if you think they are breaking a law. If you are upset because laws were passed that give them special authority, you’ll need to take that up with the state legislature but there is no monopoly as I can pick up the phone right now and hire as many security guards as I am willing to pay for.
No your twisting what I said I didnt compare small town chief to metropolitan chief I compared metropolitan regular patrol officer to small town chief but I see you like to take much of what I said and put a twist on it. Your not a straight shooter kev.
Your right about the problem with the overhead being to high in the security industry though. And again I will refer you back to lobbiest Kieth Oakly and the police unions. Oakly also happens to lobby for ASSIST and TIPSA the two leading security associations and he makes sure his buddy state rep Joe driver who was chairman of the house law enforcement committee pushed through all of these ridiculous statutes in the private security act that raise costs and restrain trade for private companies. In fact while Driver was in office ha also owned an insurance agency and he was responsible for introducing the bill that required the minimum lines of required insurance to increase from 100 k per occurance and 200k aggregate to 1 million per occurance and 2 million aggrigate. This increased the price of my operations insurance from 150 dollars per month to 1700 dollars per month. He also introduced other legislation that he claimed would ” raise the bar ” and provide so called excellence in the industries education standads on back ground. All it did was make the process more difficult and reduced the industry work force so only the large corporations and ASSIST members could afford to compete.Joe Driver is now a convicted felon proven to be a thief and removed from the house of representatives.
What does a reduction in the security work force mean as side from only the large companies competing ? Oh I know its an increase of the number of extra jobs that are available for the large police unions.
As far as you picking up your phone and hiring as many guards as you want well you can’t. And if you try it will be from one of the ASSIST member companies that are part of the monopoly, it won’t be from a small independent. As far as my problem with the legislative body the majority of them are corrupt and will do anything for money you know that already but apparently what they are doing benefits you some how so you are defending them and their actions. This is only an example of what is going on in big business and big government across the country. It violates federal trade law, its racketeering, violation of the federal Rico act , and unconstitutional. And thanks for telling me how you think I need to handle my business. I am more that capable of handling this situation and I have the solution under way. You will get to see some of the players go to the federal penitentury soon.
John, you make all sorts of contradictory claims and I can’t answer things I don’t know about. All I know is that I can call a security company and hire people if needed. I can also ask deputies I hire if they can find more friends to work. The costs are about the same. At no time do I call a police union, nor would I, and if I was going to hire guards from a company, I haven’t seen any incentive to go with a smaller company. If deputies started charging twice as much like you claim or the prices were much better to hire an independent guard of equal quality, I’d be all for that to save money. I certainly wish you well if your goal is to deregulate the field.
There has to be some form of regulation but not under the auspice of DPS and their gestapo style regulatory crime services division. Most other states regulate private security under a benign licensing commission without all the agents of enforcement that come to your office every 3 months looking for violations so they can criminally charge you and close down your business. For example in Florida security is regulated by the department of agriculture and licensing. If you are not in compliance with something they send you a letter and ask you to comply, unlike here where the DPS or local DA investigators come and arrest you on a meat allegation and then summary suspend your licensing based on that allegation and starve you and your family. Then the local DA here drags these cases out making a defendant and their attorney appear in court over and over resetting the case until the defendant runs out of money, because he has to keep paying he attorney for more and more appearances and then the DA and the courts just extort a plea from the company owner and his professional life is gone. I know dozens of people in this field that this has happened to. And they are not prosecuted by a regular division of the DA s office they are prosecuted by theHarris County public integrity division the most secret prosecutorial authority in Texas. WIRE TAPPING !!! For example, covert surveillance on security companies and out of county police officers all public money being spent. Again http://www.devon123.org. Shimek was caught obtaining wire tapping warrants illegally in Jefferson county but the DA there in Beaumont wouldn’t tolerate it and when he found out he contacted the executive director of DPS and told him either Shimek is terminated or he was going to grand jury to charge him. Shimek was terminated from DPS for this. Shimek was going after a liberty county constable and one of his reserve deputies for working a traffic control job not even regulated by the private security act and lied to the court in his affidavit alleging criminal conspiracy by public servents . what a f&${997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} joke. The reality of the situation was that the reserve was foreman of the liberty county grand jury and was about to investigate a crooked liberty PD officer and a crooked Texas cattleman’s association peace officer when they called their friend Shimek with the DPS regulatory crimes services division to arrest the reserve (and grand jury foreman) to circumvent the investigation. Well it back fired on Shimek. Shimek is a former HPD officer and was an extra job coordinater before he left under questionable circumstances his pesonel file is public information and I have seen it. His lieutenant when he was brought up on departmental disciplinary administrative charges for falsifying a police report (a felony that was filed because at the time it was not popular for the DAbto file charges on police officers) he was characterized by Lt Gains as the kind of person that would manipulate the facts of an incident for personal gain. This person left HPD and eventually became the Cheif of investigations for the defunct Texas Commission on Private Security. While in this position he waged a war against security company owners and any one that would compete with HPD for extra jobs and he did this with the help of his friend Ed Porter a former investigator with the public integrity division of the HCDA office.he tenured under Holmes and Rosenthal. lykos was smart enough to get rid of him and it all died down when Lykos stopped prosecuting private security act violations involving reserve or less that full time paid police but as soon as Anderson took office it all started right back up again. Anderson being a former colleague of Rosenthal.
If you think I am in consistent then point out specifically what you think is not consistent and I will be happy to clarify.
Now that the HPD unions chair enforcer Shimek is unemployed and can no longer abuse his state regulatory position HPD had suddenly formed new undercover investigative unit who’s primary directive is to enforce the private security act and seek out so called violators. This unit will sweep the industry clear of HPDs competiters in the local market.
Cheif enforcer
HPOU successfully lobbied the Texas Legislature to enact laws that established:
•State Civil Service Law for Texas Police and Firefighters
•The Houston Police Officers’ Pension System
•Independent third-party hearing examiners for disciplinary appeals
•Bill of Rights and Grievance procedure for HPD officers
•Protections for police officers’ permanent personnel file and photos
•State-protected anti-residency requirements
•$250,000 line-of-duty death benefit for all Texas law enforcement officers
•Banned reserve officers from working police extra jobs
•Guaranteed health care benefits and costs for retired officers
•Sole and Exclusive bargaining rights through meet and confer
This taken directly from HPOU web site. What possible public interest does this union have to ban others from working ? Its about the money and control end of story. Mafia style tactics, gestapo style enforcement, and the obliteration of innocent peoples lives and careers. I am a free born United States citizen and accordingly I have the freedom and liberty to work in the career field of my choice without private interests like unions and their bought and paid for legislators and prosecutors arresting me for supporting my family with a license that .says I have the right to work. Texas is a right to work state, this was established to keep unions and corporations at a distance and create equal opportunity in the work place. HPOU and the other unions and trade associations have circumvented this law with back door legislation and secret investigations. We may as well bring back witch trials, the current prosecutorial method is very similar. example: A local commissioned , licensed, trained, insured security guard while on duty on his assigned post was inspected by a TCPS investigator whos supervisor at the time was Larry Shimeck. Upon inspection the investigator discovered the guard was carrying pepper spray. Many people carry pepper spray and it is perfectly lawful. The guard produced proof that he had been through a valid certification class and was properly trained with the use of this less than lethal weapon.. The investigator upon advisement of his superior arrested the guard for unlawful carry of a prohibited weapon because the bottle of pepper spray was marked by the manufacturer ” FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT USE ONLY ” . This does not mean that there is a statutory law in Texas that prohibits non law enforcement personnel from carrying this product or using it, the label is a private label printed by the company that is a manufacturers suggestion only. Needless to say the guard went to jail and was found guilty in the Harris County courts. All the while the guards license and right to work was summary suspended by the TCPS because of the allegation from the time of his arrest. Other occupational licensing authorities in Texas are prohibited to summary suspend licenses based upon a charge or allegation, only upon final conviction can these authorities take disciplinary action against an occupational license. TCOLE the licensing authority for police officers cannot take action to suspend a police officers license even if he is charged with a felony offense. This case was appealed and overturned at the appellate level in the Texas supreme court. My grandmother carries a can of pepper spray in her purse, should we go and arrest her for it?
There is a current pending case now against a police chief from a small town outside of Harris County where he was working at a night club. He is a full time chief of police licensed and commissioned as a peace officer. The Harris County D.A. ‘s office specifically the head of the civil rights division who by HCDA policy is to investigate only on duty incidents has filed felony charges against this police chief for carrying a prohibited weapon (his firearm) in a prohibited place ie: a liquor establishment. How many HPD officers do we see working liquor establishments? How many HPD officers are charged with this fictitious crime ? the answer is non because it is not a crime, unless you are a police officer from a less prominent agency or from out of the county.
How many times do we see deputies from less prominent constables offices charged with double dipping ? I know quite a few. There was recently an instance of a Deputy who also worked for the housing authority as a maintenance worker he had the maintenance job for about 15 years before becoming a full time deputy. Hel elected to keep both jobs as they did not conflict. He was working maintenance one evening and had to enter an apartment for maintenance. out in plain view on the dinning room table was 5 lbs of marijuana. The deputy who is bound by law and who lawfully entered the residence then arrests the occupant for felony possession. he calls in to his dispatcher and signs on duty to affect the arrest and book the suspects into jail. The deputy is later charged for double dipping. Now I want to ask how many times any of you attorneys out there have ever seen a judge call for a recess in a hearing and go to their office in the back to preform a private marriage ceremony that they get paid for ? it happens all the time , but does the DA ever stop the event and charge one of them for double dipping ? There is a new class of people in this country known as the political class and we are all just a sub class to them.
The new political class insulates themselves by making sure their arm of enforcement is well paid and willing to do almost anything they are told to do hence HPD and the union. There are other ways the wealthy and political class control police enforcement lets look at Harris County pct 4 constables office. they are in essence and in fact the largest private security operation in the state, if not in the country. They have privatized public police service, provide these services for private neighborhoods and private business’s and mostly on public money. the contracts they write pay 70 percent of the cost of a deputy, but the county is paying the other 30 {997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} and is liable 100{997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} for all incidents as well as injuries. Add to that the benefits that the deputies receive (PCT 4 will tell you that its deputies wave benefits but that is not the entire truth). This agency is not a civil service agency either so the deputies are employed at will which is at least the one thing that the agency is doing right. this situation in its entirety does not promote equality within the general community and provides public police services only for those who can afford it. Meanwhile the poor communities that border these areas whose residents are equally deserving of police protection just don’t get it, but they still have to pay their taxes that go in part to the wealthier community getting privatized premier police service, and since there is no civil service the second a deputy tries to enforce the law with one of these social elite he can be fired immediately. Does any one remember when Hickman got into trouble? basically 2 deputies went to one these social elites home on an allegation of assault family violence. Upon arrival they saw that the husband had marks consistent with an assault. Going by the law the deputies arrested the female spouse for assault family violence. before the deputies could even get to the station the chief deputy had already made arrangements for the suspect to be released and the video to be taken from the deputies. when the deputies tried to blow the whistle they were terminated and threatened. The now sheriff of Harris County had one of his reserve deputies who was an attorney (Clint Greenwood) pull strings with the DA’s office to quash the charges. This same attorney soon after received a political appointment as the chief prosecutor of the public integrity division of the Harris County DA’s office until he was terminated and now he has received a political appointment as head of the Harris County Sheriff’s Dept. ‘s internal affairs office. Mr. Greenwood is a defendant in a federal civil rights violation case and according to Harris County Sheriffs Dept. policy and procedures it is prohibited to hire some one with pending charges or litigation, yet that policy has been ignored. Of course 5 months after his appointment at the sheriffs office he became a defendant in yet another civil rights violation complaint that also now involves the sheriffs office. So hire some one with a pending suit that arose from his last political appointment and go figure here he has created another such situation in his new appointment.
I think I’ve found a new place for Devon Anderson. Bell county Tx. Would be a perfect fit for her. She would fit right in there. A few years ago a friend of mine a a city police officer in Bell county was involved in a motor vehicle pursuit. The vehicle fled to a residence and two DPS troopers were assisting in the pursuit. The vehicle pulled into. The driveway of the esidence and the female driver parked and continued to evade by foot into the residence locking the door behind her. The two troopers stood idly by while my friend while in fresh pursuit lawfully forced entry to the residence and arrested the intoxicated suspect and charged her with DWI as well as felony motor vehicle evasion. The suspect just so happened to be the County Criminal Court at Law Judge. All charges were dropped and my friend was terminated from his employment. The next issue is overwhelming a scout master was on a 10 mile hike with his son a scout member who was looking to receive a merit badge. The area was rural and the scoutmaster had a Texas concealed carry license and was concealed carrying a pistol. He also had a long gun that was in a sling over his shoulder. He had an encounter with Bell County sheriffs deputies and was arrested for carrying the long gun openly. There is no violation of law but he was prosecuted and found guilty in the Bell County Criminal Court of Law any way. The only person in Texas to ever be prosecuted for open carry of a long gun. The case is now on appeal and hopefully the appellate court will reverse the conviction. Here a man has been unlawfully and maliciously prosecuted and his life ruined. These prosecutors must have taken lessons from Harris County. Perhaps the toxic disease is spreading. Harris counties corrupt tenticles are far reaching. This brings me to my next point Devon Anderson’s town hall meeting about open carry of hand guns along with the Houston police chief and the city attorny . This meeting was a joke and they must have selected and paid some of the idiots that got up and asked questions. It was all in an effort to circumvent stae law and try to dumb down the population by adding her little spin on how to disperitly interoperate a law that allows citizens to protect themselves. Anderson doesn’t want you to protect yourself the Houston police chief doesn’t want you to protect yourself because they have a money making monopoly on protection. Why would you need them if you could protect yourself ? The city attorney is trying to circumvent your right to carry on public property. And is advising business owners locally to discourage it as well. That’s not the job of government to influence privet parties. Anderson and HPD want you at their mercy and they want to profit from all the criminal activity because without it we don’t have a use for them, and we take away their elitist power and hurt them economicaly . Anderson should move to Bell county so she can prosecute lawful open carry and take that POS HPD chief with her when she goes.
Devon Anderson is just the type of person that would stand behind a bad conviction , no matter how ludicrous , far fetched , forced , or even fabricated just to save face for some one that works for her and insulate her office from liability. There is no accountability in the Harris County DA office , there is certainly no integrity and the intent geared by this office is to one use the system like a meat grinder to extort guilty pleas and extract money from the working and middle classes, and secondly to use the office to eliminate political and economic enemies using selective enforcement techniques.
Has anyone seen the story of the dog on the balcony ? Of course you have. Ron Hickman arresting the woman that complained about the abuse because she posted it on Facebook. Well a little known fact the owner of the dog is the child of a Houston Police Officer with political ties to the union and Ron Hickman and his hinchman Clint Greenwood ( Greenwood former Cheif of the Harris County District Attorneys Office Public Integrity Division who left that much higher paying job to become the head of internal affairs for the sheriffs office). How do you arrest someone for posting a non threatening blog on Facebook. Hell they will probably orchestrate a way to arrest me for posting this. They tried to arrest the author of the devon123.org website which is political free speech.