Last week State Rep. Tara Rios Ybarra, D-South Padre Island, was indicted on charges she engaged in Medicaid fraud — the second House member from South Texas to be indicted in less than a year. But their colleagues insist that such corruption isn’t a regional thing, no matter what the stereotype suggests.
Judiciary of Texas
Posted in
Criminal Justice
TribBlog: Tara Rios Ybarra in Federal Custody
The federal government’s roundup of dentists for medicaid fraud in South Texas has claimed its latest casualty: outgoing state Rep. Tara Rios Ybarra.
Posted inState Government
TribLive: Craig Watkins
Evan Smith’s 35-minute interview with Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins, from the Tribune’s TribLive event series.
Posted inState Government
TribLive: Craig Watkins, Full Audio
Full, unedited audio from Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkin’s appearance at the Tribune’s TribLive conversation series on Wednesday. Audio includes questions and answers from the audience.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
A Conversation with Craig Watkins
For the 11th event in our TribLive series, I interviewed the Dallas County district attorney about why and how he’s worked to exonerate the wrongfully imprisoned and whether he’s dragging his feet on a controversial corruption case involving county constables.
Posted inState Government
2010: Hold Your Green Horses [Updated]
The Texas Democratic Party won Thursday’s battle against the Green Party — but the war isn’t over yet.
Posted inState Government
Watkins: Other Elected Officials Implicated
At this morning’s TribLive event, Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins told the Tribune’s Evan Smith that the two constables in the crosshairs of a corruption investigation are not the only elected officials in Dallas he’s investigating.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Debra Lehrmann: The TT Interview
The Texas Supreme Court justice-to-be (she’ll take retiree Harriet O’Neill’s seat on June 21) talks about about judicial elections, the recent ethics complaint filed against her and what happens when she disagrees with the law.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
TribBlog: It’s Lehrmann
Gov. Rick Perry has appointed Judge Debra Lehrmann to the Place 3 seat that Harriet O’Neill will soon vacate on the Texas Supreme Court. Lehrmann, a Fort Worth District Court judge, won the Republican nomination for that seat in a runoff against former state Rep. Rick Green, R-Dripping Springs.
Posted in
Health care
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
Thevenot on the ideological backbiting at the internationally famous State Board of Education; Stiles, Narioka and Hamilton plumb employee salary data in Texas colleges and universities; Grissom looks at the problem of insufficient indigent defense; Cervantes on the push for “veterans courts” emphasizing treatment and counseling over punishment; Aguilar finds border congressmen asking the governor for a fair break on federal homeland security dollars; M. Smith on another BP rig in the Gulf; Ramshaw reports on nurse practitioners trying to get permission slips from doctors; Hu follows up with lawmakers poking at whistleblower allegations of trouble in the state’s workers’ compensation regulation; Hamilton stops in on Luke Hayes and his efforts to turn Texas into a political powerhouse for Obama; and Ramsey writes on generation changes at the Capitol and on political pranksters: The best of our best from May 17 to 21, 2010.
