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Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Mexican Cartels in US, Pimping by Cell Phone

MEXICAN SINALOA CARTEL BODYGUARD PLEADS GUILTY TO MURDER IN TEXAS from Breitbart
A Mexican Sinaloa cartel bodyguard living in Denver, Colorado plead guilty to murdering a fellow member of the same transnational criminal organization, according to an FBI press release obtained by Breitbart Texas. The guilty plea came in a federal court in El Paso, Texas. The cartel killer is a Mexican citizen.
The Sinaloa cartel's Rigoberto Ruiz-Alatorre, age 32, admitted in federal court that he was a drug trafficker and bodyguard for the Sinaloa cartel. He also admitted to trafficking narcotics in West Texas and New Mexico—and to murdering a resident of New Mexico for reportedly communicating with law enforcement officers. The New Mexico resident was also described by U.S. authorities as a Sinaloa cartel member.



MEXICAN CARTELS: THEY'RE HERE
from BreitbartTexas
Alleged enforcers for a Mexican cartel were reportedly involved in the kidnapping and torture of U.S. teenagers over methamphetamine in St. Paul, Minnesota, according to the local St. Paul Pioneer Press. The U.S. Attorney’s office omitted Mexican cartel involvement in their official press release on the case.
The official press release from the DOJ agency described the horrid alleged crimes and wrote:
On April 14, 2014, defendants Ramirez and Alvarez flew from Los Angeles, California to Minnesota in response to a report that approximately 30 pounds of methamphetamine had been stolen from the stash house two days earlier. On the evening of April 14, the four defendants kidnapped two victims at gunpoint and held them captive against their will at the stash house. The defendants bound and beat the victims and made violent threats against their lives and the lives of their family members, while demanding information about the missing methamphetamine. According to the indictment, Villalvazo cut one of the victim’s fingers, nearly severing it, while Ramirez held the victim down.


From the leftist Daily Beast:
The Twin Pimps Who Just Needed a Smartphone to Do Business
Convicted of trafficking in 2010, Tyrelle and Myrelle Lockett, 21, are in jail again, accused of luring girls on social media—part of a new generation taking pimping completely digital.
Tyrelle Lockett and his twin brother, Myrelle Lockett, were just 17 years old when they became the first individuals charged under a 2010 Illinois statute against human trafficking.

Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Houston Based Energy Law Firm Bankruptcy - Shades of 2006 ??

About this time last year I began to regret my decision to leave Houston to move to Kerrville. Not that I prefer the day to day struggle of living in Houston to a pretty laid back lifestyle here in the Hill Country. But, I kept reading about the boom in the Eagle Ford shale play, and about the law firms in Houston getting fat and happy doing deals and title opinions, and wished I could get in on the play. I even drove down to Cotulla and explored opening an office there. At the time it had no lawyers in the whole county.

The boom may be over, and there may be some lawyers and firms that are going to get slammed, like they did in the busts in 2002 and 2006. I joined the American Association of Professional Landmen last year, and get its journal, Landman. The Feb./March issue has  full page ad by the Sadler Law Firm, signed by its managing partner Randall K. Sadler. The gist of it is, they expanded big time, opening branch offices in Texas and other states. Mr. Sadler writes, "Our projections of future industry needs proved to be more aggressive than necessary, and the result is that the prudent course of action for us became reorganizing the firm." Translation: they filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy in the Southern District of Texas. " The petition says they owe more than $10 Million.

The Statement of Financial Affairs shows the firm's income for the three years before it filed the BR:
2011 - $19.6 MM
2012 -   24.2 MM
2013       8.7 MM

I am not mocking the Sadler Firm, rather, I am thinking, there but for the grace of God go I. My dad worked in the oil industry his whole life, and when times were good, everything was coming up roses, and when they were bad, it was pretty depressing around our house. When I went to college, he told me he didn't care what I majored in as long as I stayed away from the oil and gas industry.




Monday, May 12, 2014

Berkeley Law Grad Off to Great Start After Conviction for Animal Cruelty; South Texas Money Laundering State Trooper

Univ. of  California at Berkeley Law school grad gets probation in Vegas bird death
From S.A. Express
Justin Alexander Teixera

Is this geek going to be a:
a)  prosecutor
b)  criminal defense lawyer
c) plaintiff mass torts lawyer
d) federal judge
e) state court judge
f) none - hopefully he will never get a law license

I vote (f)

I hope everytime this creep applies for a job the employer does a background check and this comes up, and is saddled with a couple hundred thousand in student loans.

Former Texas trooper pleads to money laundering
From S.A. Express
McALLEN, Texas (AP) — A former Texas state trooper and sheriff's deputy pleaded guilty to money laundering Monday, two years after a traffic stop revealed more than $1 million in the trunk of his car.

Robert "Bobby" Maldonado, who was running for constable in Hidalgo County at the time of his February 2012 arrest in Victoria County, spent about 12 years working as a courier bringing drug proceeds back to the Texas-Mexico border from the U.S. interior, according to prosecutors.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Henry Sturgis said Monday that Maldonado, 49, would buy one-way flights to cities including Detroit, Chicago and Birmingham, Alabama, rent cars and drive the money back. He generally received about 3 percent of the money he carried as payment and invested it in properties and other assets disguised under other names, Sturgis said.

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Kerrville Paper Publishes Names and Photos of Hispanic Suspects in Child Sex Assault Cases, But Not Anglos. Why?


Why does Kerrville Daily Times Publish Names and Photos of Minority Suspects in Child Sex Abuse Cases But Not Anglos?

I posted on this blog about a recent trial where an older Anglo man was convicted of continual sexual abuse of his four year old step-granddaughter. Kerrville Daily Times  wouldn't identify him, claiming the paper wanted to protect the child's identity. If that's so, why did it run a front page article with the Hispanic suspect's name, and his mug shot? Does a Mexican-American child not deserve the same consideration as an Anglo child? I wrote a letter to the editor, which so far, has not been published. 

SAN ANTONIO — An off-duty deputy charged last week with driving while intoxicated had fallen asleep inside a Whataburger before he was found asleep again — this time behind the wheel of a running pickup — with a cold, open “tall boy,” according to a newly released police report.
Ricardo Sanchez, 37, of Universal City, was arrested outside the Pat Booker Road restaurant on April 30.
The restaurant manager told police that after the food was brought to Sanchez, the deputy had trouble finding it on the table, according to the report released Tuesday. Sanchez also walked behind the counter and into the kitchen while he was looking for the bathroom.
SAN ANTONIO — A Helotes police lieutenant is on an unpaid suspension after surrendering to the Bexar County Sheriff's Office on a charge of choking the mother of his child.
An arrest warrant affidavit says Elliot Rodriguez, 42, came home from work at about 3 a.m. Sunday and began going through his girlfriend's phone while she slept.
The woman, who shares a West Bexar County home with him in the 10700 block of Vollmer Lane, told deputies “he did not like a text message conversation” he saw between her and a male friend. Rodriguez woke her up and started arguing with her while their 1-month-old baby was asleep in the same room, according to the affidavit.


HEARNE, Texas (AP) — A 93-year-old Central Texas woman was fatally shot at her home by a police officer when after she allegedly brandished a gun, the Hearne Police Department said Wednesday.
Pearlie Golden, a longtime resident of Hearne who was affectionately known to her neighbors as Ms. Sully, was shot Tuesday night by Officer Steven Stem, Robertson County District Attorney Coty Siegert said. Stem was responding to a 911 call about a disturbance involving a woman with a gun.
The Hearne Police Department said in a written statement that Golden "brandished a firearm" when Stem encountered her. He then shot her multiple times.







Monday, May 5, 2014

CIA Weapons Depot in Boerne?

CIA in Boerne, TX?
The New York Times reports that for years the CIA has maintained a weapons storage facility at Camp Stanley, between Boerne and San Antonio.  Arms Cache Most Likely Kept in Texas by the C.I.A.
"WASHINGTON — In passing references scattered through once-classified documents and cryptic public comments by former intelligence officials, it is referred to as “Midwest Depot,” but the bland code name belies the role it has played in some of the C.I.A.’s most storied operations.

From the facility, located somewhere in the United States, the C.I.A. has stockpiled and distributed untraceable weapons linked to preparations for the Bay of Pigs invasion and the arming of rebels and resistance fighters from Angola to Nicaragua to Afghanistan.

Yet despite hints that “Midwest” was not actually where it was located, the secrecy surrounding the C.I.A. armory has survived generations of investigations. In a 2007 essay on the 20th anniversary of the Iran-contra affair, for example, a congressional investigator noted that the facility where the C.I.A. had handled missiles bound for Iran remained classified even as other “incredible things were unveiled during the hearings.”
But three years ago, it became public that the C.I.A. had some kind of secret location at Camp Stanley, an Army weapons depot just north of San Antonio and the former Kelly Air Force Base, though its purpose was unclear. And now, a retired C.I.A. analyst, Allen Thomson, has assembled a mosaic of documentation suggesting that it is most likely the home of Midwest Depot.

Members of Panama Unit Sentenced; Former Hidalgo County Sheriff Awaits His Day in Court
Texas Observer reports on the law enforcement scandal in Hildago County:
"One by one, members of the disbanded Panama Unit, a street level drug trafficking task force, stood before U.S. District Judge Randy Crane in a McAllen courtroom this week to receive their sentences. The longest sentence—17 years—went to Jonathan Treviño, the leader of the task force and the son of Guadalupe “Lupe” Treviño, the former sheriff of Hidalgo County.
"Instead of busting drug dealers, the task force devoted itself to stealing from dealers and reselling the drugs for a profit. Jonathan surrounded himself in the unit with close friends, including Alexis Espinoza, the son of Hidalgo Police Chief Rudy Espinoza and five deputies who worked under his father. For a while the rogue task force was the worst-kept secret in Hidalgo County, at least among law enforcement and local drug dealers. Then, in December 2012, the FBI indicted Jonathan and other members of the Panama Unit, following a nearly year-long investigation.

"But the scandal only widened from there to include two deputies, Jorge Garza and J.P. Flores, from the sheriff’s crime stoppers program who worked in tandem with two drug dealers, Fernando Guerra Sr. and Fernando Guerra Jr. The crew would fake police stops in order to rip off other local dealers trying to move their product north, according to court documents. Eventually, Flores introduced the Guerras to the Panama Unit, which also included deputies Gerardo Mendoza, Claudio Mata, Eric Alcantar, Sal Arguello and Fabian Rodriguez, who had until then sold their stolen drugs to various local dealers."

Accused Killer Fears 'Murder' Tattoo Sends Wrong Message
GREAT BEND, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas man charged with first-degree murder is afraid the tattooed mirror-image letters spelling out the word "murder" across his neck might prejudice a jury, so he is asking for a professional tattoo artist to remove or cover it up.