Last year, Texas police issued 300,000 students for offenses like chewing gum, truancy and cursing. The Senate Criminal Justice Committee today discussed a bill that would mean far fewer citations for youngsters in schools.
Criminal Justice
Get the latest Texas Tribune coverage on criminal justice, including crime, courts, law enforcement, and reforms shaping the state’s justice system.
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Criminal Justice
Death Row Inmates Sue Over Lethal Injection Drug
Two death row inmates sued the state today, arguing that the decision to use a new lethal injection drug was made too secretly and too hastily.
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Criminal Justice
Capitol Access Pass Moving Right Along
For those who frequent the Texas Capitol but don’t feel like sacrificing the time it takes to get a concealed handgun license, there may soon be a special pass allowing them to bypass the building’s metal detectors at Capitol entrances.
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Criminal Justice
AUDIO SLIDESHOW: Touring the Texas Prison Museum
Former “Walls Unit” warden Jim Willett narrates a photographic tour of the Texas Prison Museum, where he is the executive director.
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Criminal Justice
Looking Back on a Life as a Death House Warden
Jim Willett had not intended to spend the better part of his adult life working in Texas’ sprawling prison system. But the business student turned prison guard worked 30 years in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and oversaw 89 executions.
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Criminal Justice
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
M. Smith on the continuing controversy over Beaumont’s school administrators, Tan on the deepening divide over the consequences of the House budget, Hamilton on the latest in the fight over higher ed accountability, Grissom on young inmates in adult prisons, Aguilar on the voter ID end game, Tan and Hasson’s Rainy Day Fund infographic, Ramsey on the coming conflict over school district reserves, M. Smith and Aguilar on Laredo ISD’s missing Social Security numbers, Galbraith on environmental regulators bracing for budget cuts and Ramshaw on greater scrutiny of neonatal intensive care units: The best of our best content from March 21 to 25, 2011.
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Criminal Justice
Report: Hundreds of Youths in Adult Prisons
Judges across the state, and particularly in Harris County, are sending youth offenders to adult prisons even when they have few prior offenses, according to a study by a University of Texas criminal justice expert.
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Criminal Justice
Marc Mauer: The TT Interview
The Tribune sat down recently with national criminal justice expert Marc Mauer, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based reform advocacy group The Sentencing Project, to get his advice about how Texas can continue on its so-called ‘right on crime’ path even as lawmakers slice millions from the state budget. Mauer, who was in Austin for the Barbara Jordan Symposium at the University of Texas LBJ School of Public Affairs, talked about how other states have handled controversial prison closings, how others have reduced criminal justice costs and how the Right On Crime Movement — with support from conservative leaders like Grover Norquist and Newt Gingrich — might give lawmakers the political freedom to be more than tough when it comes to crime.
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Criminal Justice
Marc Mauer: The TT Interview
The national criminal justice expert on how other states have handled controversial prison closings and reduced criminal justice costs and how the Right On Crime Movement might give lawmakers the political freedom to be more than tough when it comes to crime.
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Criminal Justice
Brewpub Bill Gets Boost With Compromise
A bill that would give brewpubs more flexibility to sell their ales has been given a boost by a compromise with an influential beer lobby.