While delivering their report, members of the subcommittee charged with reviewing the Cameron Todd Willingham case said that though they believe the science used to convict the Corsicana man was flawed, they aren’t prepared to say the fire investigator, whose testimony was used to convict him, committed professional misconduct.
Morgan Smith
Morgan Smith was a reporter at the Tribune from 2009 to 2018, covering politics, public education and inequality.
In 2013, she received a National Education Writers Association award for “Death of a District,” a series on school closures. After earning a bachelor’s degree in English from Wellesley College, she moved to Austin in 2008 to enter law school at the University of Texas.
A San Antonio native, her work has also appeared in Slate, where she spent a year as an editorial intern in Washington D.C.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
TribBlog: The Karate Kid
Supreme Court Justice David Medina can throw a punch — and take one too.
Posted in
Higher Education
Hopwood 2.0
A court case involving two University of Texas applicants who believe they were denied admission because they’re white threatens to reinvigorate an ideological skirmish that peaked in the late 1990s. The first lawsuit of its kind brought against a university since a pair of landmark U.S. Supreme Court decisions in 2003, Fisher v. Texas has observers everywhere wondering if the state’s troubled history with race-based admissions makes it the ideal incubator for the next round of affirmative action battles.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
TribBlog: A “Public Warning” For Keller [Updated]
Sharon Keller got a “public warning” from the State Commission on Judicial Conduct for refusing to keep her office open past 5 pm on the day a Texas death row inmate was scheduled to die.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
TribBlog: Cornyn Says No to Kagan
The senator says Kagan has not made clear she would “protect the fundamental rights written in our constitution.”
Posted in
Criminal Justice
The Long Arm of the Law
Curbing the practice of barratry — “ambulance chasing,” in the vernacular — has prompted an uneasy alliance between tort reformers and the Texas Trial Lawyers Association: They agree on reform … just not on the form it should take.
Posted inState Government
2010: Ciro’s Tantrum? [Updated]
A clip of U.S. Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, in which he apparently flares up at a constituent questioning him on health care, is making the rounds in the conservative blogosphere.
Posted inState Government
Making Nice
A brief meeting in a judge’s chambers Wednesday cut short a brewing turf war between HillCo Partners and two former lobbyists it had sued after they quit and took a stable of clients with them.
Posted inState Government
TribBlog: It’s Over, Says HillCo
HillCo Partners dropped its lawsuit against Brandon Aghamalian and Snapper Carr this afternoon — the surprise result of a hearing scheduled today to address HillCo’s request for a temporary restraining order.
Posted inState Government
TribBlog: Focused Advocacy Responds
The defendants in the HillCo lawsuit filed their answer in court today, denying all charges against them and calling them “meritless.”