Texas' top narc to tell Congress about snitching

Texas Department of Public Safety Narcotics Division Commander Patrick O'Burke and Grits' favorite thinker on the subject of police informants, Alexandra Natapoff, highlight the list of those testifying in Congress tomorrow at a "Joint Oversight Hearing on Law Enforcement and Confidential Informant Practices."

The joint hearing will consist of members of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties in the House Judiciary Committee. See the website of the House Committee on the Judiciary for more details, and for a live webcast Thursday, July 19, at 10 a.m. EST, 9 a.m. CST.

UPDATE: See more from the Innocence Project blog. And here's the written testimony posted on the Judiciary Committee website from the hearing:

• Loyola Law Professor Alexandra "Sasha" Natapoff

• Texas DPS Narcotics Division Commander Patrick O'Burke

• Ronald Brooks, National Narcotics Officers Association Coalition

• Wayne Murphy, Assistant Director, Directorate of Intelligence, FBI, USDOJ

• Dorothy Johnson Speight, Mothers in Charge, Philadelphia PA