Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins won’t go so far as to compare his support to the near-divine fervor of President Obama’s. But Watkins, who gained national prominence for using DNA evidence to exonerate nearly two dozen wrongfully convicted people in one of Texas’ notoriously tough-on-crime jurisdictions, will come close. “It’s a religious experience to vote for Craig Watkins,” Texas’ first African-American D.A. says without irony. Like Obama, he says, other Democratic candidates are “hanging their hats” on his re-election — and on the minority voters he draws to the polls. Like Obama, he’s got “a big target” on his back. “I’ve got to fight the political attacks coming at me from all directions," he insists. “I’ll say it publicly: If you throw punches at us, we’ll drop a bomb on you.”

Hank Skinner was set to die Wednesday for the 1993 murders of his live-in girlfriend and her two mentally disabled adult sons — a crime he insists he did not commit. About an hour before he was to have poison pushed through his veins, the U.S. Supreme Court spared his life.

Thevenot on the non-stop wonder that is the State Board of Education and its latest efforts to set curriculum standards, E. Smith's post-election sit-down interview with Bill White at TribLive made some news and got the November pugilism started, Ramshaw on whether it makes sense for the state to call patients and remind them to take their pills, and on the state's botched attempt to save baby blood samples for medical research, Hamilton's interview with Steve Murdock on the state's demographic destiny, M. Smith on whooping cranes, fresh water, and an effort to use the endangered species act to protect them both, Grissom on potties, pickups, and other equipment purchased with federal homeland security money and Stiles' latest data and map on where that money went, Aguilar on the "voluntary fasting" protesting conditions and treatment at an immigrant detention facility, Kreighbaum on football, the new sport at UTSA, and Philpott on Rick Perry and Bill White retooling their appeals for the general election. The best of our best from March 8 to 12, 2010.

State agencies are expected to submit their budget cuts today.

Twenty percent of the nation's 17,000 human trafficking victims each year come through Texas, and Attorney General Greg Abbott said today the state should take the lead in collaboration among agencies to fight the scourge of modern-day slavery.

In response to shrinking budgets, there's a risk that lawmakers might feel compelled to scale back funding for treatment and diversion programming. Instead, it's time for the state to seriously consider closing one or more of the 112 prison units it currently operates.

A posthumous pardon is possible after all, according to an opinion from Attorney General Greg Abbott's office. This clears the way for the possible post-death pardon of Tim Cole, who was exonerated of a sexual assault conviction in a Travis County court last year, but had died in prison many years prior.

Three years after a sexual abuse scandal rocked the Texas Youth Commission, one in five juvenile offenders in Texas youth lock-ups report being forced into sexual acts.

Stiles and Thevenot collaborate on the salaries paid to superintendents, and even compare them on price per student… Ramsey’s look at redistricting and next year’s elections… Aguilar’s report on jails, brought to you by the federal agency that’s in the ag business… Rapoport’s peek at the power behind Texas pre-kindergarten programs… Smith’s conversation with Dan Patrick, in three parts… Grissom’s narrative on a circular immigration and deportation route financed by two governments… Ramshaw finds doctors agreeing on public policy and split on strategy and tactics… Hu’s latest Stump Interrupted puts the camera on Farouk Shami… Hamilton’s story on two retired cops who are taking on cargo theft in Texas… And Kreighbaum and Stiles pop open the itineraries of your folks in Congress. The best of our best from December 12 to 18, 2009.

Texas has the worst rates of cargo and heavy equipment theft in the country. Yet while criminals are raking in billions of dollars each year, the state has never had an organized system to address the problem.

"If the prison administrators cannot get the job done, we need to find some who can."

Criminal justice blogger Scott Henson is reporting on Grits For Breakfast that lawmakers put 59 new felonies on the books during the last legislative session.

Should the Texas Forensic Science Commission meet in private? The new chairman, John Bradley, says there's a good argument for it.

In some places, the governor's border security efforts have led to a reduction in crime — in rural counties, for instance, where there aren't many people and there wasn't much crime to begin with. But in large urban counties like El Paso and Webb, it's a different story.

Experts from around the U.S. and Mexico are debating the War on Drugs and its affect on violence south of the border. Some of them wonder whether decriminalization is the answer.

As news of the Fort Hood shootings unfolds, we'll be adding links, maps, audio, photographs, and other information from around the web to this post.