U.S. Department of Homeland Security

Dallas' Effort to Relocate the Ebola-Exposed Family Might Not Be So Easy

For now, the occupants of the Vickery Meadow apartment where patient Thomas Eric Duncan was staying are hunkered down in their ebola-tainted quarters while a Hazmat team scrubs the unit and the rest of Dallas preps for the end times. Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins told reporters in a conference c ... More >>

Dallas ISD's Own iWatch Allows Kids to Tell On Each Other for Way Less Than $350

For Dan Elliott, his life's work and now-generous income was born out of a horrendous family tragedy 25 years ago. "I got 'the call' from my mother, who told me that I needed to go tell my younger brother that his fiancee had been murdered," says a stoic Elliott. "Someone had decided that he wanted ... More >>

Rocket Dockets for Kids in Immigration Courts Raise Doubts About Fairness

Last week, we told you about 13-year-old Gaby, who was given an order of deportation from immigration Judge Michael Baird. Gaby is from Honduras, and will be sent back this fall after having been in the United States for less than a year. Her court appearances will have taken place in the course of ... More >>

Out in The Colony, an Undercover Sting and a Sex-Trafficking Ring in an Unlikely Place

The Colony has steadily moved up in the prestigious ranks of best DFW suburbs, and it's been designated as a "Playful City USA," which means the Humana Foundation thinks there are lots of playgrounds here. But the suburb's idyllic veneer was cracked this week when 14 johns, seven escorts, two undera ... More >>

Sex Offender Faces up to 40 Years after Being Nabbed in Online Child Porn Sting

Michael O'Connor used Motherless.com much like other people use Facebook. He set up a profile, messaged other users and uploaded pictures. The pictures, though, were not of him. In May, O'Connor came across a profile he liked. It was of a 31-year-old woman who listed her interests as incest and mol ... More >>

Lured to Dallas and Forced into Prostitution, a Victim Finally Finds (Some) Justice

Back in 2005, a woman, living on disability in Chicago, was contacted online by a man, he apparently as lonely as she. He promised to marry her, said he could cure her health woes, according to the case laid out by prosecutors. Before they could be together, though, he told her she had to prove her ... More >>

Several Garland Teachers May Get Deported Amid Trouble with the District's Visa Program

It's not entirely clear why Garland ISD turned an internal investigation into its H1-B visa program over to the feds. The district's official line was that it "felt obligated" to tell the U.S. Department of Homeland Security based on the "recommendations of third-party legal counsel," which was rat ... More >>

Weeks After Dallas PD First Began Using Tourniquets, One Saves a Cop's Life

Dallas police officer Joshua Burns is alive right now in part because he was wearing a bulletproof vest, because alleged shooter Rakeem Perkins didn't hit his head, because he was rushed to Baylor Medical Center, where trauma doctors tended the wounds on leg and shoulder. He's also alive because, w ... More >>

Ex-Cowboy Sam Hurd Gets 15 Years For Selling Drugs, Really Loves Marijuana

Sam Hurd was never destined for the Cowboys record books. An undrafted wide receiver out of Northern Illinois, he recorded a modest 45 catches and 630 yards and excelled on special teams during four seasons with the team before he was traded to the Chicago Bears in 2011. What Hurd will be better re ... More >>

As North Texas Preps for Massive Counter-Terrorism Drill, Protestors Decry Police Militarization

This weekend, heavily armored police, SWAT teams, bomb squads, and paramedics will descend upon 20 sites in North Texas--Irving's Stipes Elementary, Tarrant County College's Northwest Campus, Baylor hospital in Dallas, and some barns in Duncanville among them--for the region's inaugural Urban Shield ... More >>

A Tarrant County Couple Pimped Out a 15-Year-Old Girl for Four Months, the Feds Say

The ads left little to imagination. The young teen was invariably positioned in soft-porn poses, standing with her hands covering her otherwise naked breasts or lying on the bed in bra and panties or bending over with nearly bare buttocks to the camera. "EXTREEMLy HOTT & HigHLy ADDiCTiVE," screamed ... More >>

Arlington Police Now Have FAA Approval to Use Those Drones They Bought

Last month, we told you that the Arlington Police Department submitted an application to the Federal Aviation Administration in 2012, asking to please be allowed to use the two small remote control drones they bought. The drones were purchased for a little over $200,000 from Leptron Industrial Robo ... More >>

Texas Wants 'In' on National Immigration Database, But Why It's Necessary Is A Mystery

Yesterday, Texas Secretary of State Esperanza "Hope" Andrade requested access to a federal database of immigration records as a way to ensure that voters are here legally. It's a little like putting border patrol agents at polling stations -- but without the threat of deportation, at least for now. ... More >>

Texas Rep. Blake Farenthold Thinks Undocumented Teens "Had A Say" In Coming To U.S. (Video)

Corpus Christi Congressman Blake Farenthold appeared on CNN yesterday to tell Soledad O'Brien that he disapproves of President Obama's recent executive order, which will keep the Department of Homeland Security from deporting some undocumented immigrants who were brought here as children (for now, a ... More >>

A Guide to How Obama's New Immigration Policy Will Work, And a Word of Caution

President Barack Obama announced Friday afternoon that the Department of Homeland Security will no longer attempt to deport young undocumented immigrants brought here as children, signaling a compassionate shift in an immigration policy whose hallmark was aggressive enforcement and record-shattering ... More >>

When Arizona's Immigration Law is Upheld, the Floodgates of Hate Will Swing Open

The U.S. Supreme Court and President Obama leave the undocumented and their allies no choice but to escalate civil disobedience.

State Rep. Rafael Anchia: Republicans Vulnerable as the Face of Texas Changes

Unfair Park dropped by the Democratic New Leaders Texas PAC meeting at The Kessler last night. The group is billed as a statewide network of Dems "nurturing and promoting the next generation of principled, capable Texas leaders" -- like, for example, the affable and polished state Rep. Rafael Anchia ... More >>

SEC: Local Man Used Phony Cred to Steal Real Millions From Former Dallas Cowboy, 12 Others

​According to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Christopher Love Blackwell was -- and remains -- a very good salesman. He told would-be investors he had master's degrees and a PhD from a "prestigious university in Spain." He told them he was a veteran trader. He said he's worked at both Gold ... More >>

It Took a Football Game, But Oncor's Turned On All the Lights On Commerce Street Bridge

Red Oak Kid​Ashley Burton, an Oncor spokesperson, just called with the news: "All of those lights on the Commerce Street viaduct have been repaired and turned on.  I just spoke with someone who was out there to check last night, and they're energized and turned on."Me too, Ashley. After all, ... More >>

Yahoo! Them Huddled Masses Sure are Good for Texas!

Mass deportation, strict border enforcement, amnesty. What will comprehensive immigration reform look like if the feds take action--or if they don't?

The Census Taketh, and the Census Giveth

Illustration by Curt Merlo​More illegals! More illegals over here, please! Ah, you'll have to excuse me. I have been away from my column for weeks with my nose in numbers for an immigration story that appears in this week's paper version of Unfair Park. I may be a little stat-blind. The Census re ... More >>

FAIR-y Tales

Russell Pearce and Other Illegal-Immigration Populists Rely on Misleading, Right-Wing Reports to Scapegoat Immigrants and Terrify Penny-Pinched Americans.

Cowboy Down: Murdered Southern Arizona Rancher Rob Krentz's Family Talk About His Life and Death

For Now, And Who Knows For How Long, Dallas County Is Good and Shut Down

​I called over to the Dallas County Commissioners Court a few minutes ago to get an update on clean-up efforts at the Records Building, which flooded last night following a water main break. Good thing I called too: Peggy Lundy in County Judge Jim Foster's office said she's just about to start cal ... More >>

Buzz Gives '09 a One-Fingered Wave Goodbye

Homeland Security Now Considers Dallas One of the "Nation's Highest Risk Urban Areas"

​The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced yesterday that it's giving Dallas $25 million in grant money -- more than in previous years. Why the bump? Says here that's because Dallas, along with Boston and Philadelphia, has been promoted to a "Tier 1" city -- "the highest-risk tier for ter ... More >>

How a Heartwarming, Kick-Ass Father's Day Photo Shoot Ended Up Face Down in Handcuffs on the Addison Airport Tarmac

Danny HurleyThe B24 Liberator offering rides for Father's Day, save for one Observer photographer for whom the name proved ironic at bestSaturday afternoon, friend of the show Danny Hurley sent word that they were offering quite the Father's Day gift out at Addison Airport -- flights on a B-24 Liber ... More >>

License to Drive? Not So Fast, Even If You're a Legal Immigrant With a Valid Work Visa.

A lawsuit filed in Austin on Wednesday has found its way to the Courthouse News Service: Miguel Salazar and Edgar Soria, both of whom live in Dallas County, and Avila Trejo, currently a resident of Denton County, are suing the Texas Department of Public Safety because it refuses to issue them a driv ... More >>

Gustav Isn't Screwing Around, and Neither is the City of Dallas

National Weather Service About an hour ago, city officials gave local media members a tour of the Dallas Convention Center, in which Dallas expects to hold folks fleeing Hurricane Gustav, which is close to reaching Category 5 status as it approaches the Louisiana coastline. Only, the city keeps in ... More >>

On the Border, Off the Fence

After Being Drugged and Dragged to DFW, A Stay of Execution

Rrustem Neza's case was front-page news in his native Albania. Eight years ago in the paper version of Unfair Park, now-editor Mark Donald wrote about Dallas immigration attorney John Wheat Gibson, who, back then, was sparring with Immigration and Naturalization Service over the fate of seven Yugosl ... More >>

Border Residents Feeling Kicked in the Hunt Over That Danged Fence

Bet you didn't know Ray Hunt owned a bunch of land down in South Texas -- like, oh, 6,000 acres known as the Sharyland Plantation development, where Hunt's touting "gentle gulf breezes ... swaying palm fronds ... the delicate scent of hibiscus and bougainvillea flowers." It's a massive multi-use dev ... More >>

When Will the Story of Rrustem Neza Get Made Into a Movie?

Who's the Boss?

Local restaurant owners and other employers worried about being forced to fire large numbers of workers can rest easy, at least for the moment. A California judge yesterday granted a temporary injunction against the Department of Homeland Security’s efforts to crack down on employers who have ille ... More >>

New Immigration Rules Could Empty Local Kitchens

Tough rules leave restaurants looking for cooks with green cards

No Sanctuary

Long delays in processing asylum claims leave Guatemalans in a bind

"They Treat Us Like We're Nothing"

In lawsuits filed today, 10 children and their parents describe horrific conditions in the T. Don Hutto Family Residential Facility -- or prison, for short -- in Taylor. We told you it would happen yesterday, and it has come to pass: Today down in Austin, the American Civil Liberties Union filed law ... More >>

In Case of Emergency...

The Department of Homeland Security today officially released a report in which it details just how well prepared 75 U.S. metropolitan areas in case of an emergency. Specifically, the DHS wanted to whether cities' emegency agencies were able to talk to each other in case of some kind of a disaster, ... More >>

Grateful Dead

Dead Rising's zombies will eat your brain--and your free time

Screwdriver of Fact

Over at the self-proclaimed "libertarian-leaning" blog Hammer of Truth--which, again, was my nickname in kindergarten--local contributor Michelle Shinghal complains that Aaron Russo's documentary America: Freedom to Fascism has been "pulled from Dallas Angelika." No doubt, The Man didn't want you to ... More >>

And The Truth Shall Get Ye Out Of A Ticket

Our Belo-bound (and other downtown day-dwelling) readers are probably familiar with the Women in Black, the group of ladies (wearing guess what color) protesting war, evil and other crappy stuff outside the Federal Building at 207 Houston Street. They're not exactly formidable by numbers--sometimes ... More >>

Fake I.D.: Good for Business, Bad for Nation

See, illegal immigration is good for business. A fascinating piece out of Knight-Ridder's Washington bureau outlines how forgers are making tens of millions--"and possibly billions"--selling counterfeit versions of official documets (including Social Security cards and driver's licenses) to some 12 ... More >>

Soft Target

Arlington's "high-threat" status yields a big bump from Homeland Security

Go Greyhound

Federal security team gets the wrong man

Letters

A Texas Welcome

Two UTA students make a wrong turn, end up jailed in Arlington

Sacrificed Fly

What factors make for the ideal wingman?

:cueless

Buzz hacks through the past in search of the cool cats and fools of the year that was

If you crow, you go

Dallas' rooster ban gets a man thrown into the INS tank