'Affidavit: Texas constable admits ordering bugging'

Out of the East Texas town of Tenaha, another remarkable story from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about an asset-forfeiture scandal, this time centered around an elected constable. The story opens:

A small-town Texas constable told the FBI he secretly bugged other officials' offices after they were accused of illegally forcing motorists to forfeit their cash, according to a search warrant affidavit.

The affidavit, based on interviews conducted by FBI agents and Texas Rangers, quotes Shelby County Constable Fred Walker as saying he authorized the installation of hidden surveillance cameras and digital recorders even though he didn't have legal authority. It also includes a statement from a witness who claims Walker helped organize a scheme to sell drugs seized from suspects.

It's just another chapter in a longtime drama in Tenaha, a town of 1,160 near the Louisiana border, where nearly $800,000 in cash seized from motorists stopped for traffic violations along U.S. Highway 59 has led to lawsuits and a federal criminal investigation of the county's former district attorney and other officials.

Walker, 53, was Tenaha's city marshal at the time the alleged bugging occurred. He was elected constable in 2010. ...

According to the affidavit, McClure told authorities that Walker had him install surveillance cameras disguised as smoke detectors and hidden voice-activated digital recording equipment in the offices of Tenaha Mayor George Bowers and deputy city marshal Barry Washington. Walker said he wanted to "cover" himself over the traffic stops, most of which were conducted by Washington, McClure said in the affidavit.

Walker acknowledged in an interview the same day that he had authorized the installation of the devices in Washington's office and at City Hall, the affidavit states.

What a pit! This story just keeps getting worse and worse.

On texting, driving, fact checking, murder rates, borderline competency and global security

A few, disparate tidbits:

Houston 2011 murder rate nearly as low as Mexico City
The murder rate in Houston is at its lowest since 1965,  (and nearly the lowest since data began to be recorded), with 198 murders last year compared to a high of 701 in 1981, reported KUHF radio. Still, the murder rate of 9.4 per 100,000 is substantially higher than the statewide murder rate of 5.0 in 2010, according to DPS data (pdf). To put that number into perspective, Mexico City's murder rate is 8.3 per 100,000, so in that light 9.4 perhaps isn't exactly being all you can be. Still, Less Murders = Good. MORE: From Kuff.

After death, inquiry finds most youth at Granbury juvie detention in isolation for unjustified reasons
Now that the new Texas Juvenile Justice Department is up and running, there's no time to lose in exercising its oversight function. Reports the Weatherford Democrat, "A state investigation of the Granbury Regional Juvenile Justice Center following the death of a 14-year-old Cleburne boy in October has raised questions about the role of the facility’s non-compliance with detention facility standards in the boy’s death." Said the paper, a TJJD "report released last week found several violations related to keeping the juveniles in isolation nearly all day on Oct. 10 outside of the physical presence of a juvenile supervision officer. The 11 residents of 'Alpha Pod' were kept locked in their rooms most of the day, not allowed to participate in educational and other activities as required and left without the supervision level required during daytime program hours, the TJJD investigation found." Further, "Investigators found that only one of the 11 residents of 'Alpha Pod' was 'confined for a reason justified by standards, namely the resident’s disciplinary seclusion status.'" In other words, 10 of the 11 kids in isolation at the time of the boys death shouldn't have even been there.

Borderline competency: Good question, no easy answers
Asks a prosecutor on the DA Association user forum, "What do you do with those VERY low functioning defendants who are already receiving services from MHMR and whose competency is borderline?... Seems they are getting more plentiful." While one wag replied, "Send them off to law school?," others including John Bradley noted there are no easy answers, particularly in the wake of budget cuts to mental health services in the most recent legislative session.

Constable resigns in lieu of prosecution
The DA in Lubbock won't pursue criminal charges against a local constable in exchange for his resignation and lifetime ban from serving as a peace officer.

H-Town burglar alarm fees don't pay for city services
In Houston, according to HPD's website, "The cost of responding to alarm calls for service in FY2007 was approximately $11.8 million dollars and exceeded the City's total annual revenues in that fiscal year ($7.99 million dollars) derived from permit fees and penalties associated with burglar, panic, holdup and similar alarm systems."

Balko: Anger vs. Lykos stems from 'efforts to change the culture'
Radley Balko suggests that in the Harris County District Attorney primary, "intra-party anger seems to stem mostly from [Pat Lykos'] efforts to change the culture in the Harris County DA’s office." Exactly. There's an odd nostalgia among her most ardent critics which Grits suspects can never be satisfied. It's a new century, and whatever happens in April or November, Johnny Holmes won't be walking through the door anytime soon.

Problem with texting while driving is the driving, not the texting
Fascinating. Fewer teens are driving and studies say cars are no longer the status symbol of freedom that they once were among young Americans, particularly in cities. Texting while driving is bad, argues Lisa Hymas at Grist, but more importantly, "we need to work urgently on making driving less necessary in the first place." Great line from Clive Thompson at Wired: "When we worry about driving and texting, we assume that the most important thing the person is doing is piloting the car. But what if the most important thing they're doing is texting? How do we free them up so they can text without needing to worry about driving?" How's that for reframing the question? I'm still rather amazed that Gov. Perry vetoed the texting while driving ban passed in Texas this year.

Iran, Pakistan, Mexico, None-Of-The-Above: Which is biggest threat to world stability?
This is nuts to me: From any rational American perspective - certainly for those of us living in border states - the biggest threat to stability in 2012 isn't Iran, surely it's from drug violence and instability in Mexico and Latin America, arguably followed by anti-western sentiment in already-nuclear Pakistan, where our troops are entrenched across the border for the foreseeable future. In Grits' book, I'd put high food prices (at least) third on the list. Why downplay instability in a nation that already has nukes, much less massive corruption and bloodshed on the US southern border, to proclaim Iran the ultimate threat? That's the sort of demagoguery that makes people vote for Ron Paul. Which is more dangerous for world security: A nuclear Iran or a starving Africa?

Fact check this
Greg Marx at the Columbia Journalism Review has an essay articulating numerous criticisms which have been gelling in Grits' own mind in recent months about so-called "fact checking" services like Politifact and the limits of the framework under which they operate, particularly regarding legal issues. I finished his piece and thought, "Damn, I wish I'd written that," which of course is the highest compliment one writer can pay to another. My biggest frustration with Politifact, et. al.: Grits despises the notion that fact checking should be somehow considered specialty work among journalists, implying that most journalists are mere mouthpieces for special interests who don't provide a significant truth filter between their sources and the public. That may be accurate as a practical, workaday matter, but it's not a model to aspire to.

Trouble tracking heavy hitters in Dallas justice system

The feds have been looking into unspecified and possibly unrelated public corruption allegations involving Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price and Dallas DA Craig Watkins, according to various media reports. FBI agents from the public corruption unit visited the DA's offices this week, and Price was the subject of a recent search warrant seeking evidence related to alleged theft from programs receiving federal funds, a nonprofit with seemingly shady financial records, and other possible offenses. Reported the Dallas News:

The warrants [for Price], written by veteran FBI corruption-unit agent Don Sherman, address possible violations, including:

•  Theft or bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds.
• Attempt to evade paying taxes.
• Fraud and false statements.
• Structuring transactions to evade reporting requirements.
• Money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
• Engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity and conspiracy to commit the same crime.

The warrants also said agents are seeking computer data and other evidence dating back to 2001.

Supposedly investigators found more than $100,000 cash in Price's home, which his attorney insists can be explained. There's also been speculation the investigation could relate to Price's role as a power broker on the county bail bond board. Or to his serving as "handmaiden to the Perot family" in opposing a job creating inland port in his precinct. Without question the feds are investigating how it is the commissioner owns more than a dozen luxury/classic cars, many of which were acquired from inmates or otherwise obtained under under odd and questionable circumstances.

The investigation at Craig Watkins' office hasn't been nearly as high profile as that of Price, but the luster has clearly worn off the Dallas DA's rising star. Certainly the Dallas News won't be naming him "Texan of the Year" again (2008) anytime soon, and his days as a Golden Boy among Dallas pols clearly are now clearly behind him, largely for reasons of his own making. Most recently, before the FBI sent their public corruption unit to his offices last week, the former bail bondsman DA had come under fire for failing to collect up to $35 million owed to the county by bail bond companies whose clients never showed up for court. (The amount actually collectible may turn out much lower than that.) But a story today on the public portion of the Dallas News site relates a longer litany of complaints which have been simmering for the last several years, which I won't bother repeating since many of them have been aired on this blog. Watkins rarely appears in public these days, by all accounts, and has cut off contact completely with the Dallas News and most other media to the point that prosecutors are no longer allowed even to confirm the spelling of their names to reporters. Complicating matters, Watkins' top lieutenants all departed the office in recent weeks, an event  more or less coinciding with the oddball decision to stop communicating with the media.

Price is the point person on the commissioners court for the county jail and a heavy hitter in the bail bond business, while Watkins, obviously, is the county's top prosecutor, so these are two of the most important figures in the Dallas criminal justice system who both appear to be in for an awfully rough ride over the next couple of years.

Dallas News: De-fund constables, then eliminate them

The Dallas News this week published an editorial advocating for de-funding Dallas County constables, shifting as many of their functions and as much of their budget as possible to the Sheriff, and seeking their outright abolition through a constitutional amendment in 2013. Said the editorial ("Time to unplug constables?," May 20):

The county has evidence that at least 36 deputies may have lied about attempts to serve residents with eviction notices or documents regarding other civil actions. If the accusations are true, residents have been penalized — in some cases, kicked out of their homes — without proper notification, and taxpayers countywide have been paying salaries of deputies who are lazy or incompetent.

The law gives the county commissioners so little authority here that all they can do is urge the elected constables not to look the other way.

At the very least, the deputies — who represent more than half of the 70 who serve civil papers — should be placed on paid administrative leave until the investigation is completed. Depending on the results, resignations, firings or prosecutions may be in order.

But this would only address the latest in an outrageous pattern of behavior in the constable offices that stretches over the past decade. In that time, news stories have documented towing irregularities, campaign contribution scandals and assorted charges of DWI charges, sexual assault and bribery.

Although the constables have proved themselves incapable of legally and effectively managing their operations, this branch of county government can’t be eliminated without the time-consuming process of passing a constitutional amendment.

Beginning immediately, the Commissioners Court can begin dismantling these virtually unaccountable fiefdoms by cutting the constables’ budgets and shifting essential duties to the sheriff’s department.

Grits has long considered constables a pointless anachronism. Their primary function is supposedly serving civil papers, but on paper and in reality they're full-blown peace officers with the same authority as sheriff's deputies or municipal cops. Many constables have evolved into sizable, autonomous, mini-police departments, where mission creep has expanded their role to mimic (and thus duplicate) the day-to-day work of municipal police and sheriffs, but often with a much lower level of professionalism and accountability. Such redundancies are the source of Grits' usual objections, but this scandal takes the issue to a whole new level, with more than half the Dallas deputy constables who're supposed to be performing that primary function allegedly claiming to do the work but just spending time at the donut shop, perhaps the golf course, etc.. The idea that people were kicked out of their homes without ever receiving eviction notices is a particularly horrifying result.

Summer is budget-making season for counties across the state, who generally prepare their annual budgets over the summer for approval in September. So in the coming months there will be an opportunity to strip down Dallas constable budgets to bolster funding at the Sheriff's department or perhaps shift to other priorities. Most of what they do can be performed by other agencies, and should be. The serving of civil papers is their only function that's not redundant with other agencies, and in Dallas they're apparently not even doing that worth a damn.

Budget crisis forces schools to consider cutting campus cops

I'd earlier suggested that the growing budget crunch could force cutbacks of campus police based at public schools, and a story in the Houston Chronicle today ("Schools scramble after budget ax falls on security") confirms that school-based police are facing the budget axe as school districts prepare for massive state-level cuts. In Harris County, "Budget cuts have led two Harris County constables to cancel their security contracts with several area school districts, leaving the districts scrambling for a fix to cover the end of this school year and beyond," wrote reporter Mike Morris. As it turns out, constables' offices had been providing those services at a subsidized rate:

Cy-Fair is facing the loss of a 38-deputy contract with Precinct 4 Constable Ron Hickman. Galena Park will lose its existing 11-deputy contract with Precinct 2 Constable Gary Freeman.

In both cases, the districts reimburse the county for 80 percent of the $91,000 cost of a deputy's salary, benefits and equipment. The full cost of the deputies come out of the constables' budgets, and the reimbursements from the school districts go into the county coffers.

Hickman's contract with Cy-Fair, for example, represented a nearly $3.3 million expense on his $29 million budget this year; the district's cost would have been about $2.7 million.

At $91K per year, one campus cop costs nearly as much as two fired schoolteachers, and if the Cy-Fair district has to pay the full freight, the expense would increase from $3.3 million to $4.125 million. Instead of spending that money on police, it'd probably be cheaper and more effective to hire one more assistant principal at each campus and just call 911 if there's ever an immediate threat. In Austin if they did that, odds are there'd be a cop parked right outside the door writing tickets for cell-phone use in a school zone, which is apparently a bigger priority than investigating burglaries or just about anything else. (Of course, eliminating campus cops risks having no one available to mace any threatening baby squirrels who wander onto campus, but I'm not sure that service is worth $91,000 per year to taxpayers.)

My hope is that the budget crunch prompts a complete rethinking of campus security and school discipline. With exceptionally good timing, Chairman John Whitmire and Sen. Juan Hinojosa have suggested eliminating or radically scaling back the amount of ticketing at schools, which raises the question, if they're not going to be writing tickets, perhaps school police aren't needed at all?  The bill is pending in Whitmire's Senate Criminal Justice Committee after receiving a public hearing March 29 (see video of testimony here beginning at the 1:15:15 mark).

RELATED: Thanks to a commenter for pointing out that the McAllen Monitor ran a story about the bill to reduce school ticketing over the weekend.

See related Grits posts:

• Eliminate school police for budget savings?
• Reducing the role of ticketing in school discipline
• Whitmire: 'Ticketing Students at School Teaches the Wrong Lesson'
• Mounting school arrests, more school police criminalizing youth misbehavior
• TX Appleseed: Don't put misbehaving kids with criminal ones
• Replacing school discipline with criminal enforcement

Dallas constable investigations of illegal towing should be replicated elsewhere in state

Here's an intriguing story out of Dallas where, despite murky details, on the surface the county's position on vehicle towing doesn't seem to pass the smell test. Reported Kevin Krause (whose articles on these subjects have been absolutely first rate):

Accion America, a small Dallas-based group formed to protest restrictive laws proposed in Farmers Branch and Irving, threatened to file a class-action lawsuit against the county on behalf of vehicle owners.

Carlos Quintanilla, the group’s leader, said Friday that [former Constable Jaime] Cortes, who left office last summer, racially profiled Hispanics and essentially stole their vehicles by using his towing contractor, Dowdy Ferry Auto Services, to impound the vehicles.

Most owners, Quintanilla said, were never contacted about where their vehicles were — a violation of state law. By the time some found out, the towing and storage fees were too high for them to claim the vehicles, he said.

“That’s what angers us,” he said. “It’s an atrocity.”

Precinct 5 Constable Beth Villarreal, who defeated Cortes last year and is responsible for the vehicles, had wanted to halt the auctions until she saw paperwork on all of the more than 5,000 vehicles impounded under Cortes.

Dowdy Ferry, however, declined to comply, leading to a stalemate and further delays.

This whole profligate, praetorian saga over towing contracts with Dallas constables just gets uglier with every new twist. It's disgraceful that county commissioners are pushing to sell impounded cars so quickly. It makes it appear that they're more worried about getting their hands on the money than figuring out if the vehicles were taken as part of some kind of scam. Neither the constable nor the towing company can provide any "report showing how many vehicles were towed, how many were claimed, how many were sold and other relevant information." Whether it's from fraud, incompetence or some other reason, that's pretty pathetic.

BTW, I've never met Dallas News reporter Kevin Krause face to face, but IMO he's the best beat journalist covering county government in Texas. Over the last year or so, he's done Dallas a great mitzvah by doggedly pursuing allegations of improprieties in towing contracts, reporting which in part led to the ouster of a couple of Dallas constables. At this point, Kevin's work is so far out on the cutting edge of the topic, I'd like to see him author a how-to piece aimed at other journalists - perhaps published somewhere like the Columbia Journalism Review, or he's always welcome to do a guest post on Grits - to spread the specialized knowledge about how to investigate similar situations in other jurisdictions. The public pays far less attention to counties than city government, and less attention still to constables, who usually fly under everybody's radar. I suspect that, if similarly diligent and skilled reporting tactics were applied in other jurisdictions around the state, such problematic towing contracts - like commissary graft scandals at jails few years back - would turn out to be a recurring problem elsewhere, not just a one-off in Big D.

Roundup: Assorted facts and heresies

Here are a few disparate items that merit Grits readers attention before I turn mine for the day to college hoops:

Constable pursues truancy make-work to justify staff increase
Usually it's a mistake when the criminal-justice system seeks to solve social problems unrelated to traditional "crime," and that certainly applies to using constables to enforce truancy laws instead of investing in schools until the product they offer is valuable enough to students to make them want to go. Here in Austin, a local constable wants to hire four full-time deputies to enforce truancy laws. This is make-work and another example why I'd prefer constables were simply eliminated or radically scaled back instead of giving them leeway to seek out new missions to justify their anachronistic existence. State Sen. John Whitmire is right that ticketing under criminal laws will never be a true solution for what ails Texas' school system.

DWI supervision on a budget more difficult in age of media hype
The death of a police officer killed by a drunk driver in San Antonio has spawned absurdist commentary in the Alamo City that somehow Texas doesn't "take DWI seriously," when really the situation bemoaned may be attributed to the shortcomings of two decades of unrealistic, media-driven git-tuff efforts that prioritized rhetoric over reality. The driver was already on probation with an ignition interlock mandated for his motorcycle, but he was driving another vehicle he owned. The fact is, so-called "technocorrections" like ignition interlocks or GPS monitoring are not cure-alls. They require substantial investment in human resources to monitor the data generated by the electronics, and cuts to investments in supervision - e.g., proposed elimination of state funding for misdemeanor probation - exacerbate that already serious shortcoming. It doesn't make sense, for example, to expand ignition interlocks to first-time offenders when cases like this one show local departments can't effectively supervise those with interlocks now. Talk is cheap, but rhetoric doesn't pay to supervise high-risk probationers. For that you need probation officers with manageable caseloads. Meanwhile, such rhetorical broadsides fail to address the biggest problem with DWI enforcement in Texas: Declining conviction rates attributable to the so-called Driver Responsibility surcharge. We're arresting more people than ever for DWI, but securing fewer convictions. The House Public Safety Committee has a chance next week to address that problem when it considers legislation by Rep. Leo Berman to abolish the surcharge, but unraveling that public policy mess isn't nearly as sexy, it seems, as shaking one's fist at the devil over the most recent tragedy of the day.

Fewer than 300 graff convictions statewide in 2010
How many graffiti crimes do you suspect are committed in Texas each year? Tens, possibly hundreds of thousands, right? Most of it is never reported to police as a crime, just cleaned up by property owners (or not). But Texas cities spend millions collectively cleaning graffiti at thousands of sites across the state. So how many people do you suppose are convicted of graffiti crimes each year? The answer comes from the Criminal Justice Impact Statement for a recent graffiti enhancement bill (discussed in this Grits post): "In fiscal year 2010, 212 offenders were placed on misdemeanor community supervision, 56 offenders were placed on felony community supervision, and 21 offenders were admitted to prison or state jail." So that's 289 people total convicted and sentenced for graffiti crimes in FY 2010 statewide! And most of them received probation. Two recurring themes on this blog are that criminal penalties can't solve every social problem and that criminal penalty enhancements have little effect on crimes with low clearance rates. Both observations apply in spades to graffiti crimes.

A brief (passing) moment of economic realism on closing the border
People who say the want to "close" or "shut down" the border over immigration, drug smuggling, etc., simply have no clue about the interconnectedness of Texas border economies with Mexico or the astonishing volume of goods and people that travel each direction through the checkpoints. This story from the El Paso Times provides a glimpse of that hidden but critical relationship which a) is growing at a vast rate and b) benefits the United States at least as much as our southern neighbor. The more ideologically driven and detached from business interests calls for immigration enforcement grow, the more explicit this tension will become, but do not doubt that Texas' economy will be harmed if the search for solutions to black markets cause our legal markets to become less competitive or generate fewer jobs. You could never hire enough Border Patrol agents to make up for the economic and employment growth along Texas' southern border over the last decade. Bottom line: One may become frustrated with a goose laying golden eggs, but that won't make it wise to cook it for supper.

Prisoners can pay more if allowed to earn
Here in Texas, legislators have proposed increased prisoner copays for healthcare. In Ohio, the Governor wants prisoners to pay part of their electricity bill. But in Canada, I learned, prisoners are paid minimal wages and charged part of their rent if the take exceeds a certain amount during a pay period. Prisoners in Canada are paid as an "incentive to invite them to actively take part in their rehabilitation." In Canada, prisoners "generally make, before deductions, $35 to $40, every two weeks and that’s for 12 hours a day, generally six days a week," and their advocates are pushing for their first raise in 25 years. Ten percent of their earnings is put in a savings account, but the amounts aren't large enough to be significant upon reentry. The Canadian example struck me as interesting because, whenever prisoner pays ideas are proposed as in Texas and Ohio, I often think they're either trying to get blood from a stone or will wind up mulcting families instead of the person who committed the crime. But if prisoners can earn, it's less problematic to require them to pay. Henry Ford wanted to pay his employees enough where they could buy one of his cars from him, and similarly if states want inmates to help solve their budget crises, it might behoove them to allow inmates to earn more money so they can pay more of the freight.

Army rocked by crime lab scandal
Read about another ugly crime lab scandal, this time from the military courts.

Jury out on effectiveness of faith based prisons
A comprehensive meta-analysis of research regarding the benefits from faith based prisons found, unsurprisingly if unhelpfully, that "based on current research, there’s no strong reason to believe that faith-based prisons work. However, there’s also no strong reason to believe that they don’t work." The author concludes "with thoughts on how faith-based prison programs might be improved, and ... a strategy that would allow such experimentation to proceed consistent with the Constitution." Via Sentencing Law & Policy.

Constable layoffs due to budget cuts not necessarily a bad thing

We've already witnessed Dallas constables laid off in the budget cycle last fall, and Harris County Constables in Precincts 2, 4, and 5 are now laying off officers because of the budget crunch. It occurs to me that as counties begin to cut their criminal justice spending in light of declining tax revenues - given their constitutional obligations and the practical necessity of running local jails - it will probably be constables' offices, particularly those which have assumed day-to-day law enforcement functions, that take the biggest hit in the coming round of county budget cuts this fall.

That doesn't bother me much because, save for their process serving functions, I consider constables an anachronism that in an ideal world would not be a separate office from the Sheriff operated by independent elected officials. Quite frankly, the talent pool of politicians from the law-enforcement world who run for these jobs in most counties isn't deep enough to ensure quality people at the top, and they receive far less media attention or other public scrutiny than the sheriff or municipal police. Moreover, their disciplinary processes, internal affairs, etc., typically aren't very robust and often reek of good ol' boy-ism. Constables don't need traffic divisions or investigative units - that's what the municipal police and Sheriffs are for - and counties would be wise to take the opportunity this year to scale back these agencies to their essential, constitutional functions.

RELATED (3/15): Why Barney Fife kept his bullet in his pocket. 

Dallas constables' traffic units on chopping block thanks to budget crisis

In the bloated, over-funded arena of criminal justice, budget crises may frequently succeed in forcing politicians to focus on public policy over special interests where rational arguments have failed. Such is the case with constables' offices in Dallas County, where commissioners will likely vote Monday to eliminate 80 positions devoted to traffic enforcement. Though constable deputies facing job loss accused the commissioners court of retaliating against whistleblowers, reported the Dallas News ("Livid Dallas County DA Craig Watkins fails in bid to save jobs from budget ax," Sept. 14):

Commissioner John Wiley Price, who has opposed the Defenbaugh investigation, said there is no attempt to retaliate against those who spoke up.

"That has nothing to do with it," Price said. "I don't know where they worked – whether it was traffic or civil [divisions]. We have no way of knowing who spoke to [investigator Danny] Defenbaugh."

In Defenbaugh's reports, witnesses who were interviewed are referred to by coded numbers. County officials say that was done to protect them.

Price said the constables can "write all the tickets in the world," but that the collection rate for those tickets is very low. As a result, the traffic units more or less break even each year, county officials say.

"It's just a business decision," Price said about the constable cuts. He and fellow commissioners Maurine Dickey and Mike Cantrell have sufficient votes to eliminate the traffic deputies.

Commissioners have slowly whittled down a $60 million budget shortfall in the $450 million general fund with cuts to every county department. Eliminating the 80 traffic deputies would save the county about $2 million, officials say. Commissioners can only eliminate positions. They cannot target individual deputies.

If the cuts were narrowly targeted at the 3-4 deputies who reported wrongdoing, I'd certainly be against the firings. But the idea that commissioners - including those who opposed the investigation - would eliminate 80 positions just to go after a handful of whistleblowers makes little sense. I feel sorry for the individuals who may lose their jobs, but from a public policy perspective it's the right move.

The fact is, constables' offices frequently suffer from a relative lack of competence and professionalism, as evidenced by 5,600 old warrants recently found in a box at one Dallas constable's office that were never entered into the computer system. Dallas Sheriff Lupe Valdez also recently questioned the relative physical fitness of area constables.

This blog has long held that it's unwise and wasteful for constables to take on everyday policing duties normally performed by municipal police and sheriffs' deputies. In Dallas, traffic enforcement has frequently come at the expense of constables' traditional duties like serving papers in civil proceedings. That's redundant and expensive for taxpayers, but it's taken a budget crisis to get Texas counties to reconsider this ill-conceived trend.

The chance to shake up distended, anachronistic government agencies like constables is a silver lining to the current budget crunch, and I hope Dallas isn't the only county taking the opportunity to scale back tumid constable budgets.

Constables' roles debated in context of budget crisis

County-level budget crises are raising long-simmering questions about the proper role of constables and whether they should act as mini-Sheriff's departments or stick to serving civil papers and acting as court bailiffs. In Van Zandt County in East Texas:

Precinct 4 Constable Pat Jordan spoke earlier this week about the history of the office of constable in Texas.

"The first form of law enforcement in Texas, as it was being settled, was the constable," Jordan said.

"The state constitution gives us the rights and duties of any other peace officer," he continued. "Really, the only difference between a constable and the county sheriff is that a constable is given the duties of bailiffing the precinct (justice of the peace) court and serving civil process papers, and the sheriff is the keeper of the jail."

Van Zandt County Sheriff Pat Burnett sees things differently, and it underscores a longstanding tension between he and Jordan, a former Van Zandt County Sheriff.

Returning from a statewide sheriff’s convention in Fort Worth on Tuesday, Burnett said the issue of whether a constable should go beyond court bailiff and civil paper serving duties is not unique to Van Zandt County.

"It’s a statewide problem.," he said. "A constable’s constitutional duties are acting as bailiff for the justice of the peace in their precinct, and to serve civil process papers.

"When you have a constable or one of his reserves getting out of those realms and wanting to be a sheriff’s office, that is when things start getting off track," Burnett added.

It is a sentiment that was echoed Tuesday by comments from Precinct 2 Commissioner Virgil Melton Jr., one of three members of the commissioners’ court who voted to reduce the reserve deputy constable program to one position in each of the four precincts.

With Jordan sitting adjacent to him at the table, Melton Jr. criticized the constable for "running a mini-sheriff’s office" in Precinct 4 and interfering with investigations being handled by Sheriff Burnett’s staff.

Similarly, in Corsicana Navarro County officials rejected a request to increase constable pay so that constables could perform policing duties in addition to bailiff work and process serving:

[Constable David] Foreman appeared before county commissioners Tuesday requesting a salary of $35,000 on top of expenses, even though his salary is budgeted at $12,651. He made a similar request of commissioners in the 2009 budget discussions, as did two of the other three county constables, including Precinct 4’s Tommy Grant and Precinct 1’s Mike Davis. Brad Butler, Precinct 3 constable, did not request a salary increase.

Foreman argued that he carries out more than his standard duties and should be paid in the same way as other elected county officials.

“I have never spent my budget in wages because it is just sitting there,” said Foreman. “You are stewards of the tax payers money and I am as well. I don’t agree that I am part time. I spend a lot of time patrolling and answering calls.”

County budget figures show that there could now be a budget deficit approaching the $1.5 million mark, and [County Judge H.M.] Davenport defended fending off further expenses.

“The statutes say you should serve the papers and bailiff duties,” replied Davenport. “It doesn’t say anything about patrols or anything else. Honestly, I don’t think that it is fair to tax payers who would pay the money for work only carried out every now and again. With this economy it is best to just hang on to what we have got.”

This blog has long held that it's extremely problematic for constables to take on everyday policing duties, in both big counties and small. So I was pleased to see, for example, that in Dallas this week the commissioners court supported:

creating more stringent hiring requirements for deputy constables, a response to corruption allegations surrounding certain constable offices.

Applicants currently don't have to take a written test, physical assessment or polygraph test – all of which are required to be hired as a sheriff's deputy. Commissioners said they favor adding those tests for constable deputies.

They had asked the county human resources department to study the job qualifications and hiring process of deputy constables earlier this year after a Dallas Morning News investigation in February. ...

A recent state audit of the personnel files of several Dallas County deputy constables in Precinct 5 revealed that the files didn't contain required documentation, such as criminal background checks and confirmation of previous employment.

Indeed, Dallas is also likely to scale back constables' office budgets in the face of declining tax revenues:

Also Tuesday, during a budget discussion, county budget director Ryan Brown said that eliminating 30 of the 40 constable warrant deputy positions would save about $3 million. Each constable precinct has eight warrant deputies.

Brown is trying to close a $23 million budget shortfall. The constable traffic units are also among the items facing elimination.

Perhaps the budget crisis will succeed in scaling back constables' roles where good judgment and common sense could not prevail. At the end of the day, though, what's IMO needed is a new law or constitutional amendment expressly limiting constables to process serving and bailiff's duties and flat-out removing them from the list of officers exercising a full range of police powers.

Bilking Crimestoppers, the Invisible Informant, Constables Gone Wild, and Book 'em Horns

A few disparate items that deserve Grits readers attention:

'Forgiving My Daughter's Killer'
From the Washington Post, see "Forgiving My Daughter's Killer," which offers praise for a victim-offender mediation program at TDCJ based on restorative justice principles.

Dallas: Budget shortfall = Fewer cops
Dallas PD may shrink its police force through attrition to avoid cutting officer pay during a time of budget crisis. I still believe smarter policies can increase police coverage without adding more officers to the force, but it would require more political courage than Dallas city leaders have demonstrated in the past.

Bilking Crimestoppers
In Dallas, the head of the CrimeStoppers program was allegedly engaged in an elaborate fraud scheme in which she would feed an accomplice information allowing them to collect (and presumably split) reward money to which they weren't entitled. I wonder how often (and how well) these funds are audited? It seems like, with payouts going to anonymous tipsters, there is an inherent risk of fraud from several potential angles.

The Invisible Informant
Following his high-profile extradition, Osiel Cardenas has gone from Gulf Cartel drug kingpin to the Invisible Man, and there are no records in the courts or the federal prison system saying where he is or what happened to him. Said one observer, "He has clearly become a useful informant and is being treated as such." Meanwhile, 2,200 people were recently arrested, including more than 400 last week, in a crackdown on cartel distribution networks. I wonder a) if the two stories are connected and b) whether even 2,200 arrests will make a dent in US drug distribution? UPDATE: A small-town South Texas police chief was among those arrested in the sweep.

Constables Gone Wild
A constable in San Angelo was indicted for writing a traffic ticket under false pretenses. In Dallas, a deputy constable accused of sexual assault is out on bond. A constable in Midland is under fire because two deputy constables weren't licensed earlier this year and all the cases they'd worked on (mostly traffic tickets) had to be dismissed.

Minor drug cases don't trigger deportation
The US Supreme Court ruled in a Texas case that minor drug violations don't automatically trigger deportation for immigrants.

Book 'Em Horns
UT football legend and Tennessee Titans quarterback Vince Young was charged with a Class C misdemeanor assault for an altercation at a Dallas strip club with a man who taunted him with an upside-down Hook 'em Horns sign. I suggest Young offer the same defense as the great Billy Joe Shaver when he was put on trial earlier this year for shooting a man in the face during a fight outside a bar. Asked by the prosecuting attorney why he didn't leave upon realizing the argument was escalating, Shaver replied, "Ma'am, I'm from Texas. If I were chickenshit, I would have left, but I'm not." The jury acquitted .

Constablegate in Dallas getting special prosecutor

Instead of handing the constable corruption cases off to the Attorney General, Dallas District Attorney Craig Watkins yesterday assigned a special prosecutor to the case, Ted Lyons\, who is a former Democratic state senator and reportedly a contributor to Watkins' campaign. (See the Dallas News coverage.) Further muddying the waters, though, the DA's office claimed without documentation or any specifics that there was a conspiracy to lie to accuse public officials of wrongdoing, including Watkins. They've primarily asked Lyon to investigate THAT, judging by comments from the DA's first assistant, treating as an afterthought allegations of kickbacks to constables first reported to the DA's office by the county auditor back in February 2008.

Watkins' handling of this case continues to appear hamhanded, seemingly unconcerned with the appearance of impropriety or conflicts of interest. I respect Lyon and have no reason to think he won't perform the task with integrity. But there's no denying he's a well-known partisan.

If he'd appointed someone viewed as truly independent - or just given the case to the AG as he did under identical circumstances with then-Constable Mike Dupree - Watkins could have put this issue firmly behind him. As it stands, independent voters will see this as partisans protecting partisans, and since any litigation won't be resolved by November, that's the impression voters will have going into the general election.

IMO Watkins has consistently been the recipient of extremely poor political advice on these matters. I continue to believe the US Attorney should step up to the plate so there's a credible, independent investigation of the allegations in which the public can have confidence.

UPDATE (6/4): Friggin' unbelievable, from Kevin Krause at the Dallas News:

The man who claims that Dallas County's constable investigator was behind a plot to concoct lies about District Attorney Craig Watkins is in jail facing numerous felony charges.

Information from Gale Corbett Hutchinson, 44, who has a lengthy criminal history and suffers from mental illness, led Watkins to hand off his constable investigation this week to a special prosecutor, Ted B. Lyon.

The district attorney's office said it asked for an outside prosecutor because Watkins apparently is the target of a scheme to drive him from office.

Hutchinson, of Allen, has been in the Collin County Jail since April 1 on felony charges including making false statements for property credit, credit card abuse, theft and impersonating a lawyer.

He has said in court documents that he suffers from several mental-health disorders and was placed on suicide watch while in custody.

MORE: I agree with what Michael Landauer says about this. I'm amazed Watkins let things get this bad. To me, and I had the opportunity to say so to him personally several months ago, the consequences of failing to recuse himself in the constable corruption cases were as predictable as the sunrise. If Watkins had passed off the allegations to the AG when the Defenbaugh report was released, he'd be cruising easily toward reelection right now. Instead, he's in for a serious fight and this issue isn't going away.

New revelations mean it's time for Craig Watkins to give AG constable corruption cases

After initially denying it, Dallas DA Craig Watkins acknowledged this week that his office was notified in early 2008 about corruption allegations regarding Dallas County constables - in particular alleged kickbacks from a towing company employed without authorization. A Dallas News editorial rightly says the revelation wounds the DA's credibility.

The DA continues to dodge all the hard questions about this story, but according to columnist Gromer Jeffers, Jr. (who seems to serve the role of a Watkins campaign flak though he's paid by the Morning News), Watkins' official spokesman "Eric Celeste scoffed at the GOP criticism. 'If they want to use an issue Craig has already addressed, that's fine,' Celeste said."

That's flat-out delusional. It's sure not just Republicans critical of Watkins. The whole constable mess was dug up and forced onto the table by Democrat County Judge Jim Foster, and Democratic primary voters ousted one of the embattled constables primarily over these allegations.

I've long argued that Watkins should either hand off these cases to Attorney General Greg Abbott or the US Attorney should step in. This revelation that Watkins sat on corruption allegations for so long leaves him in an untenable position as prosecutor: If he fails to act he'll look like he's covering up corruption. If he moves forward it will keep the issue in the news with his name attached to it and none of the questions about motive will be adequately answered until the cases are finally complete, perhaps years from now. Neither are tenable options.

This week's revelation should spur Watkins to reconsider immediately his decision not to pass the constable cases off to the Attorney General. He's said before he thinks the AG has partisan motives, but in this instance I don't believe that's true. It's Abbott's job to step in when the local DA is conflicted, and at this point Watkins (or his critics) could cite a long list of conflicts.

Politically, handing off the cases to the AG would take some of the immediate heat off the DA. When asked about the cases, Watkins could credibly refer all inquiries to the AG instead of saying "no comment" over and over to the same, obvious questions. Instead, he and his spokespeople keep digging him a bigger and bigger hole.

The status quo is untenable. Watkins should recuse his office, send the cases to the AG, and get out from under this mess before it tears down his administration and his reelection chances.

Auditor: Dallas DA told of constable allegations in 2008

The County Auditor says Dallas DA Craig Watkins' office was told two years ago about alleged "unreceipted" payments from a towing company to Dallas County constables, reports the Dallas News ("Auditors office says it can prove Dallas DA's office got towing memo in 2008," May 26):

The Dallas County auditor's office said Tuesday it has proof that a memo outlining criminal allegations against Constable Jaime Cortes' precinct was hand-delivered to District Attorney Craig Watkins' office in February 2008.

Watkins, responding to criticism that he has been slow in reacting to corruption charges against constables, denied Monday that he or his office knew in 2008 about the allegations of kickbacks to Cortes' office from the Dowdy Ferry towing company.

He said his public integrity unit never received information about the allegations from the auditor in 2008.

Not only does the auditor's office say it has proof that the information was passed along, but County Auditor Virginia Porter said Tuesday that Watkins' office last year blocked public release of the memo containing the kickback allegations.

In an October 2009 letter to Attorney General Greg Abbott, the district attorney's office argued that the document was confidential and should be withheld for various reasons after The Dallas Morning News requested information from the auditor about all five constables' offices.

Relatedly, county commissioners have offered a deal to Constable Derick Evans (the other accused constable lost his primary and resigned) that would force him to use a county-approved towing service and stop having deputies assist in campaign fundraising. He has yet to announce whether he'll agree to the terms.

County Judge Jim Foster continues to call on Craig Watkins to investigate alleged bribes at constables offices, but IMO if he was going to, he'd have moved by now if his office was informed two years ago. I continue to think the US Attorney should step in since Watkins won't act himself or pass the cases along to the Attorney General.

RELATED: From the Dallas News, "Dallas County DA quiet on whether auditor can release '08 memo on Cortes allegations."

Dallas commissioners to deputy constables: No lights, sirens in personal cars w/o permission, insurance

Here's another example how a relative lack of professionalism among constables and other peripheral law enforcement agencies creates liability for county taxpayers ("Dallas County deputies must get OK to put emergency police gear on personal vehicles, commissioners say," May 5):

Dallas County commissioners voted Tuesday to ban deputies and other employees from installing emergency police equipment such as lights and sirens on their personal vehicles without the court's permission.

The policy also requires employees to get permission from their elected official or department head before installing police equipment in personal vehicles.

The measure was needed, officials said, because some deputy constables have used their personal vehicles for law enforcement purposes while off duty, opening the county up to liability.

The policy also applies to vehicles that currently have the equipment.

Employees who request permission must explain the "public and official" purpose of the police equipment. If their request is granted, employees must get insurance for their cars so they can be used as police vehicles, and the county must be named as an insured party.

"This will help bring under control these renegades," said County Judge Jim Foster, a regular critic of some constable practices.

This is a curious situation which, as Judge Foster rightly notes, is rife with potential pitfalls and extra liability for the county. I wonder how frequently it happens elsewhere, particularly without a supervisor's permission? Are deputies charging the county mileage for using their personal vehicle for official duties? What police work are they doing off duty, writing tickets to people who cut them off in traffic? And if you're a deputy constable installing lights and sirens in your personal vehicle without the department's permission, where would one get them?

What do y'all think about this practice?

Op/ed: Constables redundant, expensive liability for communities

On the question of whether elected constables are still necessary in the 21st century, the Amarillo Globe-News published an op ed by an Amarillo police captain Jeff Lester, a 34-year veteran officer who was elected a Randall County Constable on a platform (which he fulfilled) that he would take no salary and shut down the office:

Each time a constable is elected to what was once a vacant office, voters have created another law enforcement agency that requires county commissioners to provide a reasonable salary, benefits, vehicle and training costs. Since constables are elected officials, they are the boss and don't have to answer to anyone but voters.

The Potter and Randall County sheriff's offices have always diligently handled the duties that can be performed by a constable. When the voters elect a constable, the counties don't reduce the number of deputies to maintain the previous year's budget, nor should they. As the investigative reporting showed, the sheriff's offices will still need the personnel to perform the duties of constables who don't work.

Unfortunately, a constable can be elected and never have had any previous police experience. Sure, they have to get a peace officer license within their first term of office, but do we as citizens really want this type of liability for our county government? Our hiring process for the Amarillo Police Department has rejected many cadet applicants who have received their peace officer's license. There are more important characteristics that a peace officer needs such as integrity, loyalty, truthfulness, trustworthiness and a desire to serve.

I have been an officer with Amarillo Police Department for 34 years and have interacted with other police personnel throughout the tri-state region and to my best recollection, Potter County's four constables did not have prior experience with any agency before being elected.

We have too many police agencies and there is duplication of services which is quite costly to the citizens. Amarillo has four police dispatch centers, three police photo and media labs, two county correctional facilities and the list goes on. Las Vegas Metro Police is an excellent example of where county agencies and local city and suburban police agencies were combined to form one agency, thus reducing the duplication of services and increasing communication, cooperation and supervision.

Am I advocating the combining of our local police agencies?

No.

But for example, Potter County needs a larger correctional facility and Randall County built a facility with ability to expand. With video arraignments and other new technology, Potter County might consider contracting with Randall County for prisoner housing. [Ed. note: Amarillo is the Potter County seat but extends into Randall County.]

Any time we as public servants can save taxpayers money for the services we provide, all options should be considered.

Now is time for Craig Watkins to hand corruption cases to AG

Dallas DA Craig Watkins is making a big political mistake if he fails to pass off two corruption cases involving local constables to the state Attorney General. He declined assistance last year and hasn't responded to a second offer by the AG more than a month ago, but now would be an excellent time to announce a change of heart and give those cases to somebody else.

Watkins' poor handling of alleged constable corruption puts him in a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. He's turned the imbroglio into a personal pissing match with the county commissioners court and appears to view the alleged bribe taking and abuse of office as a political instead of a criminal matter. That's not good enough. A prosecutor with a fresh perspective should take the case over. If Watkins won't let the Texas AG take the reins, I still think the US Attorney should step in - that is, if President Obama will ever appoint one.

The Dallas County Commissioners Court has also asked the AG to look into voter fraud allegations they say Watkins is ignoring.

The DA is already paying the price for arrogance in his dealings with the commissioners court: This week they hired outside counsel to advise them, replacing the services of the civil division at the DA's office, and presumably they'll be cutting Watkins' budget next year to reflect those reduced duties.

All of Watkins' good work on innocence issues can't overshadow the rapidly developing impression that the DA appears to be inexplicably ignoring credible allegations of corruption. Given other recent Dallas corruption scandals - including bribery charges that took down sitting state rep Terri Hodge - and the general anti-incumbent sentiment, one suspects that voters won't be in the mood to forget or forgive if they don't see the DA taking the problem seriously.

Watkins could easily solve this by letting someone else - like the AG - handle these cases, but his pride seems to be getting in the way. As I've written before of Watkins' increasingly dysfunctional spat with the commissioners court, "As an example of governance, of course, the whole situation is a disgrace. As political theater, though, pass the popcorn and sit back."

No consequences whatsoever for deputy constable tazing great-grandma

Tony Plohetski at the Austin Statesman reports:

A Travis County grand jury has declined to indict Deputy Constable Christopher Bieze on a charge of injury to an elderly person after he used his Taser stun gun on a 72-year-old woman last year.

The incident, which was captured on a patrol car video camera, generated national attention. Kathryn Winkfein, who was stopped by Bieze on May 11, later appeared NBC's "Today" show.

In October, Winkfein accepted a $40,000 settlement from Travis County, although she had sought more than $135,000.

Bieze had stopped her on Texas 71 in western Travis County on May 11 for allegedly driving 60 mph in a 45-mph construction zone. Winkfein, a 4-foot-11 great-grandmother from Granite Shoals, told Bieze that she wouldn't sign the citation, video records show.

That led to a confrontation during which Bieze used his Taser on Winkfein, who was later jailed, charged with resisting arrest and released.

An internal investigation found that Bieze had violated no policies, and he was not disciplined.

Supposedly he violated no policies, violated no laws, and yet the officer demonstrated a complete lack of discipline and restraint, basically using force on the angry 4'11" woman because she "dared" him, not because she posed a threat to him or anyone else. This is one of several incidents that have led many to believe deputy constables should not be involved in day to day police work. For a refresher on the case, here's Stephen Colbert's take:

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Dallas DA should pursue removal petition against allegedly corrupt constable

I'd written earlier that the US Attorney should step in to prosecute allegations of wrongdoing by Dallas County constables if District Attorney Craig Watkins won't do so. But recent events have given Watkins a fresh opportunity (which I hope he takes) to take a stand against corruption and mitigate the impression that he's ignoring alleged crimes committed by Democratic elected officials. Reports the Dallas News:

A visiting judge ordered this week that a petition seeking to remove Dallas County Constable Jaime Cortes from office can proceed, but District Attorney Craig Watkins has not yet decided whether to accept the case, records show.

On Monday, Judge Richard Mays ordered the Sheriff's Department to serve Cortes with legal papers related to the removal petition filed last month by three deputy constables on the grounds that Cortes abused his office.

Deputies Guadalupe Frias, Lois Martin and Les Willie allege in the petition that the constable is guilty of misconduct, criminal conduct, retaliation, incompetence, official oppression and misuse of county property.

Cortes, who has denied wrongdoing, said Friday that he hasn't been served with court papers and declined to comment further.

Frias and Willie work for Cortes, while Martin is a former employee who was transferred to another precinct after alleging sexual harassment. The petition includes signed affidavits by two other deputy constables and a former deputy.

A little-used state law allows any county resident to file a petition to oust county officials for incompetence, official misconduct or drunkenness.

The process is similar to a civil action. If a judge allows it to go forward and the district attorney accepts the case, a jury trial will be held to determine whether the elected official should be removed from office.

But Watkins has not decided what he will do, said F. Benjamin Riek III, a Richardson lawyer who filed the petition on behalf of the deputies.

For my part, I hope Watkins accepts the petition and moves forward on the case this year. If the Dallas DA is vulnerable in November, it's mainly because he's mishandled this fiasco surrounding the constables so badly. By accepting this petition and pursuing what appears to be a pretty strong case against Constable Jaime Cortes, he'd quickly overcome the public impression that he's stalling the case to protect his friends.

I've praised Watkins' work on innocence issues in the past, and he deserves tremendous credit for all he's done to correct false convictions. But it's difficult to avoid an impression of indifference to credible allegations of corruption by Democratic constables on his watch. Now that a judge has opened the door to a removal hearing for Cortes, who appears to be the worst offender of the bunch, Watkins should step through it and pursue the case vigorously. Failing to do so risks his legacy and possibly his reelection.

Nueces constable cleaning up evidence room mess; how many others are just as bad?

One consequence of 21st century constables taking on workaday law enforcement duties outside their traditional process-serving functions has been that these small, independent agencies with little accountability or oversight become responsible for managing complex processes for which they're not equipped, like the ins and outs of keeping their own evidence rooms.

In Corpus Christi, when a constable elected in 2008 took over he found their evidence room a wreck, with drugs and guns that should have been disposed of (or in the case of some of the guns, returned to their rightful owners) a decade ago or more. Reports the Caller Times ("Precinct 5 constable cleaning evidence room," Jan. 28):

A World War II Japanese bolt-action rifle has been sitting in the Nueces County Precinct 5 constable’s evidence room since at least the early 1990s.

A .45-caliber submachine stolen in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in 1983 has been in the constable’s small closet gathering dust since 1997.

There is confiscated marijuana, heroine and cocaine, too, some aging for decades on shelves.

Constable Dionicio “Don” Ysassi had enough.

“It’s time for us to clean house,” he said.

The drugs will be burned, and the weapons will be destroyed or returned if the owners claim them.

People have been asking Ysassi about their weapons he may have, some taken during routine traffic stops years ago in the precinct’s 320-square-mile jurisdiction.

There are 140 weapons approved for disposal, Ysassi said Wednesday. Court orders have been obtained to destroy 70 guns. Five others are evidence in pending criminal cases, and 65 have serial numbers cleared by Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives for people to claim.

“We have worked with the sheriff’s department for weeks to identify weapons not related to any crime,” said Ysassi, who inherited the property room when he took office following the 2008 election. “So people can now come to our office and request them back.”

Those being destroyed may have no serial numbers, have had barrels sawed off or were confirmed stolen by people who no longer want them, said Deputy Larry Thieme, who has researched the weapons’ history the past six months.

Anyone claiming a gun will have a background check to ensure they have no present criminal court action, Ysassi said.

“We just want to do the right thing,” he said, “and get people’s property back to them.”

Needless to say, it's not good to have a bunch of street-ready drugs and guns with serial numbers filed off laying around for years on end when they're not needed for an ongoing prosecution. This was a recurring issue with Texas' old drug task force system. Small, independent agencies with no oversight often have extremely lax management standards regarding evidence retention, and the result was a lack of accountability and frequent thefts of drugs, often in significant amounts.

Charley Wilkison of CLEAT likes to point out that many police unions were originally organized out of the evidence room in their department's basement because an assignment there historically is how departments punish or sideline officers with a history of disciplinary problems, who also happen to be among the most likely to agitate for unionization in order to protect their jobs. Whatever the benefits for unions, though, the public is better served when evidence rooms are run by dedicated, civilian professionals with clear policies and procedures about what should and shouldn't be in the evidence room, when, and why.

How many more constables, school district police, and other tiny, sub-jurisdictions have their own musty, neglected evidence rooms that could use a similar housecleaning? Quien sabe? I'm certain this Nueces County constable isn't alone in presiding over an evidence room that could generate negative press if reporters took time to look.