DMN INVESTIGATES

Did I read that right? A 45-year-old Dallas businessman with 14 convictions? Living free, with luxury cars and a plane, recruiting investors?

The Securities and Exchange Commission identifies the guy as Alan Todd May and is suing him, alleging that his Prosper Oil & Gas is a Ponzi scheme.

Prosper's Web site includes lots of pretty pictures of drilling rigs. DMN reporter Eric Torbenson says the company started up after May was released from prison in 2007.

May made the news at least once before: While locked up for credit card fraud and parole violations, he was suspected of using a jail pay phone to set up "bogus trade shows in Houston, Austin, Dallas and Denver and getting people to mail him entry fees," the Houston Chronicle reported in 1995.

We get complaints pretty much every day about utility bills and power companies. So do legislators, the Public Utility Commission and, of course, the utilities themselves.

Now one of the biggies, Oncor, is asking the PUC for independent testing of the accuracy of its new smart meters (right), Dallas Morning News reporter Eric Torbenson says.

State Sen. Troy Fraser, chair of the Senate Business and Commerce Committee, recently responded to complaints about the meters by asking that their installation be halted. He also urged the PUC to suspend the monthly fee consumers pay for the meters until independent testing is conducted.

Oncor, in its letter to the PUC, says the meters are accurate and blames an unusually cold winter for higher bills.

John Galligan (right), the attorney for Fort Hood massacre defendant Nidal Malik Hasan (lower right), has started a blog and is poking away at the prosecution.

Galligan complains, among other things, that the Army is gearing up for a death-penalty trial but has refused his request for a "mitigation specialist" -- an expert who could address extenuating circumstances that might spare Hasan from capital punishment.

Col. Morgan Lamb denied the defense request "because the mitigation specialist also happens to be an attorney," Galligan writes. "Obviously, Colonel Lamb was not properly advised that this same mitigation specialist has also been requested and approved in another Army capital murder case now pending at Fort Lewis, Washington. In short, the US Army is operating with a double set of standards....

"What is the rationale for such disparate treatment? One can't help but wonder - is it because [Hasan] is Muslim?"

Elsewhere on the blog, for reasons I don't understand, Galligan uses President Obama's middle name (Hussein) when referring to him and misspells his first name.

How does the Army respond to the defense claims? "Fort Hood officials have no plans to comment on personal blogs related to the November 5, 2009 incident," says an e-mail I just received from post spokesman Tyler Broadway.

DMN reporter Kevin Krause had an astonishing story in Saturday's paper: Some Dallas Country criminal court judges have been handing out virtual pardons for years when releasing convicts from probation. And these elected officials are not explaining themselves.

A little-known provision in the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure lets judges turn back the hands of time. They may "set aside the verdict or permit the defendant to withdraw the defendant's plea," the code says, and they can "dismiss the accusation, complaint, information or indictment against the defendant, who shall thereafter be released from all penalties and disabilities resulting from the offense or crime of which the defendant has been convicted or to which the defendant has pleaded guilty."

Caveats: People convicted of certain violent or sexual crimes are not eligible. Also, judges and licensing agencies who later deal with pardoned probationers may consider their criminal histories.

Here's the fallout, as reported by Kevin: Former Constable Aurelio Castillo was convicted in 2000 of receiving an illegal campaign donation but now is free to run for county clerk, thanks to Judge Ernest White (above right).

And David Chang, a former Dallas police officer who was convicted in 1996 of stealing from motorists during traffic stops, was free to run for Balch Springs mayor in 2008 (he lost). His pardon came from Judge John Creuzot (lower right).

Gov. Rick Perry has had some bad luck recently when appointing prominent Dallasites to state posts. Two of them soon got themselves arrested on charges of misconduct around young people.

The latest mess involves businessman Lee William "Bill" McNutt III (right), whom Perry named Texas Commission on the Arts chair in December. McNutt has since been arrested for trespassing at Southern Methodist University, reports Lori Stahl of The Dallas Morning News.

SMU says it warned him to stay away in 2008 after getting "multiple student complaints against Mr. McNutt alleging behavior that violates University policy, such as offering alcohol to minors."

McNutt, 54, graduated from SMU and was founding president of its Young Alumni Association, a governor's press release said. He worked in the administrations of Ronald Reagan and the first President George Bush, according to the arts commission.

McNutt has resigned from the commission, The Daily Mustang is now reporting.

He's also a deacon at Highland Park Presbyterian Church.

The previous Perry-appointee mess involved Catherine Evans, a former Dallas County state district judge.

Perry named her Texas Youth Commission ombudsman in September. Several weeks later, she was charged with trying to smuggle a knife, a cellphone and prescription drugs into an East Texas TYC facility.

Please let me know if you get more information about what's going with either of these matters.

One of Texas' top tourist attractions opens for the season Saturday. But will SeaWorld San Antonio's best known show go on?

Company officials aren't saying what the future holds after a killer whale lived up to its name yesterday at SeaWorld Orlando. Horrified tourists watched as trainer Dawn Brancheau (right) perished, the Orlando Sentinel reported.

Tilikum, the orca that killed her, had been involved in the deaths of two other people -- a trainer in 1991 and a visitor who sneaked past security in 1999.

SeaWorld isn't saying much today on its Web site -- just this: "SeaWorld Orlando and SeaWorld San Diego will be open Thursday, February 25 as scheduled (SeaWorld San Antonio is not yet open for the season) but Believe shows and Dine with Shamu experiences at all SeaWorld locations have been suspended; no decision has been made for future dates at this time."

Do you have a tip about amusement park safety? Send me an e-mail or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Rarely have I talked with someone who speaks so unflinchingly as retired Army Capt. Shannon Meehan (right).

First he wrote the book Beyond Duty, explaining how he accidentally killed a family in Iraq and how depression nearly killed him afterward.

Then, shortly after the Fort Hood massacre, he told me that shooter Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan had been seeking to have psychiatric patients on the base prosecuted for war crimes.

That wasn't a popular thing to say at the time, given that a Hood higher-up had recently called Hasan a "hardworking, dedicated young man who gave great care to his patients." Speaking up also meant Meehan had to reveal that he had been a psych patient at the Central Texas post.

His latest soul-baring appears this week in The New York Times, where he also issues a challenge to us civilians:

"In recent months I've been trying to honor the lives I took by writing and speaking in public about my experience, to show that those deaths are not tucked neatly away in a foreign land," Meehan writes. "They may seem distant, but they are not. Soldiers bring the ghosts home with them, and it's everyone else's job to hear about them, no matter how painful it may be."

Last week's fire at Dallas' Samuell High School exposed the "fairly common" practice of chaining school exit doors, The DMN's Diane Rado reports today. Her main source: the State Fire Marshal's Office.

Principals, it seems, are creating firetraps in the name of preventing crime.

A chained door at Samuell temporarily trapped people who were trying to evacuate Thursday, though no one was hurt. The DISD Blog gave one teacher's scary account of the mess.

A Samuell official says the door was chained because locking it from the outside didn't provide sufficient security. Students inside would open the door, sometimes allowing weapons into the school.

Do you have a tip about fire safety? School security? Send me an e-mail or join the conversation by commenting below.

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East Texas church arson suspect Jason Robert Bourque (right) calls himself "Mr. Brightside" on his MySpace page, lists his religion as "Christian -- other" and prominently displays this quote from the 19th century anti-Christian philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche:

"Never give way to remorse, but immediately say to yourself: that would merely mean adding a second stupidity to the first. -- If you have done harm, see how you can do good. -- If you are punished for your actions, bear the punishment with the feeling that you ARE doing good -- by deterring others from falling prey to the same folly. Every evildoer who is punished may feel that he is a benefactor of humanity."

On his Facebook page, Bourque says he's a fan of bonfires. A couple of clicks takes you to hundreds of photos of blazes.

Bourque was arrested Sunday with Daniel George McAllister (lower right). The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives blames the two for a string of 10 recent church fires in East Texas.

The two men used to attend a Baptist church in the East Texas town of Ben Wheeler that was not torched, says Dallas Morning News reporter Richard Abshire.

The New York Times has a fascinating background piece today on the tax law that software engineer Andrew Joseph Stack III (right) blasted in his suicide note.

The 1986 legislation started as a favor to IBM and "made it extremely difficult for information technology professionals to work as self-employed individuals, forcing most to become company employees," The Times reported. "Many software engineers and other such professionals say that the law denies them the opportunity to become wealthy entrepreneurs and that it makes it harder to increase and refine their skills, eventually diminishing their income."

Joe Stack, in the note he posted online before flying a plane into IRS offices in Austin yesterday, said those who wrote the law "could only have been more blunt if they would have came out and directly declared me a criminal and non-citizen slave."

Not a rant -- a tip.

Send me an e-mail or join the conversation by commenting below.

What we have so far: A small plane crashed this morning into the Echelon office complex in northwest Austin. Austin TV station KVUE says the building that was hit is at 9430 Research Blvd.

The IRS has offices there, according to the Austin American-Statesman.

And the FBI has a field office elsewhere in the complex, at 9420 Research Blvd.

CNN, citing an unnamed official, says: "The pilot of the plane had set his house on fire beforehand, stole the plane and crashed it intentionally."

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Texas nursing-home investigators usually miss deadlines for responding to complaints with a "high potential of harm," the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports.

Chris Traylor, the new commissioner of the Department of Aging and Disability Services, vows to improve response times soon.

The agency says it "expects to complete 1,550 nursing home investigations during a two-week, statewide blitz later this month" and will start hiring 35 new investigators next month.

Do you have a tip about a nursing home? Regulators? Send me an e-mail or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Now that my power's back on and the igloo in the front yard is melting, I'm catching up on some news from late last week. One item near the top of the pile: Federal authorities released sketches of three men they want to identify and question about the East Texas church fires.

Click on the link and see if you recognize them. Use the magnifying glass icon to blow up the images and check out the tattoos -- one (at right) appears to be an upside-down cross, and the other looks like flames.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case. Around-the-clock tip lines include: 1 (888) ATF-FIRE (888-283-3473); (903) 675-0061 and (903) 675-0062.

Also, you can send me an e-mail or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Dallas lawyer Ralph Janvey is the court-appointed receiver assigned to recover money that disgraced Texas banker Allen Stanford (at right) allegedly obtained by defrauding investors. Among those Janvey is seeking funds from are the many politicians who benefited from Stanford's generosity -- members of Congress and fundraising committees for both major political parties.

Janvey started asking them to pay up a year ago. Many have not done so, reports Dave Michaels of the The Dallas Morning News' Washington bureau.

Click here for Janvey's list of who has paid and who owes what.

College presidents quit in mid-semester all the time, right? Two weeks' notice is standard, right?

So there's no need for the University of North Texas and its president, Gretchen Bataille (pictured here), to explain why she is suddenly resigning, right?

The taxpayer-funded school's Wednesday press release and Bataille's "message to the UNT community" total 755 words and explain nothing.

The stonewalling continues today at the UNT Board of Regents meeting, as the Denton Record-Chronicle is now reporting: "When approached at the meeting for comment as to why she is resigning mid-year, with only a few weeks' notice, Bataille only shook her head, making it clear she did not want to discuss her reasons for leaving."

Can somebody please shed some light on this situation?

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Some blame Muslims for the East Texas church fires. Some blame Palin-hating liberals. Some blame the devil.

The online speculation was enough to make me call Tom Crowley, spokesman for the Dallas office of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Here's a quick summary of what we talked about:

Q: Does any evidence point to Muslims, liberals or Satan?
A: No.

Q: Any sense of what's motivating the arsonist(s)?
A: "We just don't know ... I wouldn't rule anything out."

Q: What do you see as the possible motives?
A: "It doesn't have to be a hate crime." Thrill-seeking vandals might be responsible. The fires might be set to cover up other crime.

Q: What sort of other crime?
A: Non-religious items have been stolen from some of the churches.

Q: Where on church property were the fires set?
A: Various indoor locations; most cases involved forced entry.

Q: What types of churches have been targeted?
A: A wide variety of Protestant ones, including Baptist, United Methodist, Christian Scientist (pictured above, from a Jan. 17 fire in Tyler) and nondenominational. Most, but not all, have predominantly white congregations.

Q: What accelerants, if any, have been used?
A: No comment.

Q: Any advice for churches and their neighbors?
A: "Be aware of any activity around the church." Keep the place well lit. Keep vegetation trimmed.

Two more East Texas churches burned down Monday night.

Authorities aren't saying yet whether the fires are part of the string of several arsons plaguing Tyler and surrounding areas. But don't be surprised if they're connected -- these last two blazes broke out within 45 minutes of each other, just a few miles apart.

The first was reported about 8:45 p.m. at Dover Baptist Church (right). The second was reported about 9:20 p.m. at Clear Spring Missionary Baptist Church.

Last week, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said it was activating a national response team after Russell Memorial United Methodist Church in Wills Point was torched.

Tips? Send me an e-mail.

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan wasn't the only guy with extremist ties counseling soldiers at Fort Hood last year, as my story in Sunday's Dallas Morning News shows.

There was at least one more: Louay Safi (shown at right). A month after the worst military-base massacre in U.S. history, he taught Islam to officers who were deploying to Afghanistan. He'd been doing this work on bases around the country, as a military subcontractor, since 2005.

That same year, federal prosecutors named Safi an unindicted co-conspirator in the terrorism-support trial of his old buddy Sami al-Arian. The reason: a wiretapped phone call in which the two men mocked a U.S. order banning dealings with foreign terrorist groups and agreed that Jews controlled the White House.

Al-Arian has since been convicted. But he still faces criminal contempt charges for refusing to testify before a grand jury about the International Institute of Islamic Thought -- a northern Virginia think tank that counterterrorism agents raided in 2002, when Safi was its research director.

Safi now faces a criminal inquiry by the military but has never been criminally charged. He denies wrongdoing. He also has described post-9/11 counterterrorism crackdowns as a "campaign against Islam."

I've found there is very little help out there for people who owe money on old bills.

There are a number of churches and charities which help when a current utility bill is beyond a person's resources. That helps keep the lights and water on.

But in the case of Todd and Shirley Ritrovato of Greenville, the utility debt was 14 years old. and created when their daughter was undergoing chemotherapy for cancer.

The Ritrovatos have known they owe the money for the past two years, but have not had much extra money to pay it. The couple lives on less than $700 a month, along with food stamps and housing assistance.

I've had some readers interested in helping out. If that's you, Hunt County Shared Ministries is willing to handle any donations for the couple. The address is 3724 Oneal St
Greenville, TX, 75401. Make sure you mark it for the Ritrovatos.

As I read the court records today from State Rep. Terri Hodge's guilty plea on tax fraud, one sentence contained a detail that seemed new and intriguing.

Federal prosecutors noted that some of the $73,000 that went unreported on her tax returns was "campaign contributions made by various donors to Hodge, which she used for her own personal benefit ... ." But that's where they left it.

I re-read the 2007 indictment against Hodge, as well as a 2008 filing citing supplemental evidence that authorities had gathered. I didn't see anywhere allegations of her using campaign contributions for personal use.

Prosecutors say in today's plea agreement that they will present later a routine supplement. Perhaps that's the time and place when they will elaborate on the contributions. For now, they remained focused on the rent payments Hodge received -- and failed to report to the IRS -- from Dallas developers Brian and Cheryl Potashnik, whose low-income housing projects needed her support for millions in public subsidies.

Until we hear more from the prosecution, I'm left wondering who made these campaign contributions, were there any strings attached, and how did Hodge use them for her personal benefit?

Over the weekend, fire departments in two of Texas' biggest cities were in the news again over allegations of employee misconduct.

The News' Selwyn Crawford told us about the lawsuit headed to court accusing some inside Dallas Fire-Rescue (Chief Eddie Burns shown at right) of "rampant sexual and gender harassment." One female worker claims she was touched and sent a photo of a naked woman. Another was "repeatedly propositioned," according to the lawsuit.

The Houston Chronicle followed with a story that summed up the issues there in the first sentence: "Racist graffiti, threats, profanity and a noose hanging in a locker; claims of harassment and a culture of accepted sexism, evidenced in part by a topless female firefighter posing in panties on a widely distributed calendar."

Fire officials in Houston and Dallas say these allegations are not indicative of their departments. Dallas, in addition, disputes the lawsuit allegations and cites an internal review that found some to be uncorroborated.

Do you have thoughts or tips to share? Leave a comment or e-mail me.

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Different types of concerns are on residents' minds in two different suburbs:

1. Arlington's mayor and council members have reaped free tickets and food at the city's luxury suite at publicly subsidized Cowboys Stadium, the Star-Telegram reports. The market value of the "perk of the office," as one leader called it, is around $400,000. Some observers fear this creates a conflict of interest.

2. In Frisco, residents living near a battery-recycling plant continue to worry that their health is at risk. The News' Valerie Wigglesworth and Matthew Haag cite study results from 15 years ago that found 45 children had "lead levels that today are linked to myriad health issues, from learning disabilities to behavior problems to brain damage."

Do you have thoughts or tips to share? Leave a comment or e-mail me.

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Robert McKenzie continues to struggle after being declared dead accidently by a local hospital. Most recently, he had problems trying to get his health care coverage reinstated.

The 72-year-old man was working with the Social Security Administration to get his Medicare card back, but instead got an expired Medicaid card in the mail. I made a call on his behalf and I've been promised he should get the correct card in the next few weeks.

McKenzie may actually qualify for Medicaid though, so his case worker is looking into that for him. He and his wife support their grandchildren on limited funds.

Dallas-Fort Worth commuters have begun paying tolls in recent years because, they were told, tax dollars were too few to expand all the congested roadways and build new ones.

The Star-Telegram did a nice job this weekend showing how there has been, in fact, public money to spare. Since 1991, nearly $1 billion has been dedicated to projects that had "little to do with mobility," the newspaper reported.

Two examples: $16.1 million for the Battleship Texas restoration project on the Texas coast and $262 million spent on highway rest stops across the state, including one for $10 million off Interstate 35 with Wi-Fi connections (shown at right).

Who's to blame? Texas transportation officials say the federal government ties their hands by requiring spending on enhancement projects, as these are called, in order to get a much larger chunk of construction change. Once the money is here, state lawmakers then push to use it on pet projects, such as $2 million for a Houston fire museum.

Do you have thoughts on how government is deciding to spend these transportation dollars? Leave a comment or e-mail me.

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UPDATED FRIDAY, JAN. 22

Although her actions were "not exemplary," Judge Sharon Keller can continue presiding over the state's highest criminal court after a special master found that her decision to close her court hours before a death-row inmate's execution did not keep his attorneys from using other options in filing last-minute appeals.

The special master wrote that the "majority of the problems" that 2007 day were in fact the "responsibility" of the attorneys for the inmate, who had raped and murdered a Houston woman.

Among other things, the attorneys "untruthfully told the media" they were ready to file 20 minutes after Keller closed her doors, the special master found. They also could have contacted other Court of Criminal Appeals judges for help after she was gone -- a point Keller had previously made.

The decision now has one of the inmate's attorneys, David Dow, playing defense, as colleague Diane Jennings is blogging today.

An environmental group says yes -- and that adds to the list of concerns about gas drilling activity in the lucrative Barnett Shale covering western Dallas-Fort Worth.

The News' Randy Lee Loftis writes that companies can use a certain type of unregulated fluid that has high levels of benzene -- which can cause leukemia and other disorders -- as part of the drilling process. Some residents in Denton and Tarrant counties were already worried about drilling's impact on the air, drinking water and safety. In some cases, research backed up their worries.

A spokeswoman for the Texas Railroad Commission told Randy that state rules have prevented cases of groundwater contamination. So the agency "does not see a need to monitor fracturing fluids," she said.

Do you have thoughts on drilling in the Barnett Shale or have tips on other stories? Leave a comment or e-mail me.

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A reader signed up for a fixed-rate electric plan, but was surprised to see an "Oncor Delivery Rate Increase" show up on the bills.

Can they increase the fee with a locked-in rate, she asked?

The answer is yes.

According to the Public Utility Commission, retail electric providers are allowed to increase the bills if transmission rates increases. There are other instances as well, such as charges for "storm recovery."

A new report Tuesday reiterates what anyone who drives by the Trinity River in Dallas and inhales already knows: It's icky. Filled-with-junk-from-sewage-treatment-plants icky.

The News' Randy Lee Loftis reminds us in his story that this is merely the latest dinging the Trinity has taken.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality -- an agency frequently accused of having a light touch -- previously deemed the river unsafe for extended human contact because of a high level of pollutants.

Not the kind of assessments Dallas city leaders want to hear as they seek to develop the Trinity into a business and recreation destination.

New technologies are causing fits for open government advocates everywhere.

Up until recently, it was arguably easy to apply the Texas Public Information Act to access government communication using modern technologies. E-mails sent between public officials could be accessed relatively easily because they were stored on servers owned and usually maintained by government bodies.

Now we have Facebook, Twitter, text messages, instant messages --- all sorts of communication that isn't stored where government officials can easily retrieve copies when requested by the public. Now a story from South Florida shows the issue's importance (Full disclosure: The South Florida Sun-Sentinel is my former employer).

Dave Michaels just sent me this dispatch from The Dallas Morning News' Washington bureau:

FBI agents who discovered Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan's extremist ties before the Fort Hood massacre may not have had access to key Army records on the psychiatrist, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (right) said today.

That's because some information counter-terrorism investigators need stays in military education or training files "and does not make its way to the personnel files" that intelligence agencies would get for an initial review, said Collins. She's the top Republican on the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, which is investigating how pre-massacre intelligence about Hasan was handled.

Hasan's colleagues and superiors repeatedly raised concerns about him during his psychiatric training in the Washington area, as has been widely reported since the Nov. 5 slaughter. Issues included his fundamentalist Islamic leanings, religious proselytizing, commitment to the Army, poor work performance and mental stability.

"It doesn't appear that the military has updated its personnel policies to reflect the threat of Islamic extremism," Collins said after a closed hearing with Defense Department officials. "There appears to be a real gap in the protocols in the personnel procedures, and that is an issue we're exploring."

Army spokesman George Wright said he couldn't comment on Hasan's personnel file. But in general, he told The News, a soldier's supervisor decides whether to include letters of counseling or reprimand in the soldier's personnel file.

A decade ago, federal transportation officials hired Traffic.com to install high-tech sensors that measure freeway speeds and volume. The data can trigger traffic-jam alerts to electronic signs and other equipment.

But state and local governments can't post the alerts unless they pay the contractor a fee, The New York Times reports today, citing a non-yet-public audit by the U.S. Department of Transportation's inspector general.

Never mind that taxpayers have committed more than $50 million to the project.

The transportation department responded to the audit, according to Times, by citing "nine letters from members of Congress -- many of whom had received frequent campaign contributions from executives at Traffic.com -- who demanded, among other requests, that it skip a competitive bidding process and give more money to Traffic.com."

The story does not identify the politicians. It says Traffic.com, a subsidiary of Chicago-based Navteq, didn't respond to a request for comment.

In case you're wondering, yes, Traffic.com alerts do appear on dallasnews.com.

Do you have a tip about traffic? Government contracts? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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The FBI announced an independent review today of its "policies, practices and actions prior to the tragic events at Fort Hood" -- in other words, the Nov. 5 massacre that Army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan is accused of perpetrating.

Federal Bureau of Investigation boss Robert Mueller said the review will be conducted by William Webster (right), who formerly headed the FBI and the CIA.

FBI officials have acknowledged that one of its terrorism task forces intercepted e-mails a year ago between Hasan and an extremist imam in Yemen. The officials say no investigation resulted because the correspondence was consistent with Hasan's psychiatric research on Muslims in the military.

Intelligence experts consulted by The Dallas Morning News say any contact with the imam, Anwar al-Awlaki, should have been pursued.

The FBI said it has completed a preliminary review of its pre-massacre actions and policies. A spokesman declined to comment today on what that probe found.

"We must be sure that the systems we have in place give investigators the tools they need to carry out their responsibilities. At the same time, we must ensure constitutional protections and the confidence of the American public we serve," Mueller said. "It is essential to determine whether there are improvements to our current practices or other authorities that could make us all safer in the future."

Webster will coordinate his work with reviews being conducted by the military and will seek not to interfere with the ongoing criminal investigation, the FBI said.

I wrote a column on Sunday about a reader's interest in getting AT&T's U-verse, a high-speed Internet service.

It obviously brought up a sore subject for numerous readers who are waiting for any type of broadband product in their neighborhood -- let alone one that is considered cutting edge.

"I live in Henderson County off a very populated state highway south of Athens. We barely have telephone service, much less broadband," one reader wrote. "Where on earth do rural residents have access? I currently subscribe to a dial-up service."

The state of Texas applied for stimulus funds to find out exactly. At the end of July, a contract was awarded to map broadband availability in the state. A statement from the Department of Agriculture at the time said that the "initial phase of broadband mapping" should be done by the beginning of February.

Authorities captured prison escapee Arcade Joseph Comeaux Jr. (right) this morning in Houston, Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokeswoman Michelle Lyons says.

Comeaux, 49, a child rapist who's spent much of his adult life behind bars, reportedly was armed with two pistols when captured.

Last week, he used a smuggled pistol to overpower prison officers who were moving him between units.

"TDCJ officials are conducting a thorough review of the incident and have taken the immediate action of placing the Estelle Unit on lockdown," Lyons writes. "All individuals entering and exiting the facility are required to undergo a pat-search, and additionally, a walk-through metal detector has been installed."

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Dave Michaels, my colleague in The Dallas Morning News' Washington bureau, just sent in this dispatch:

Almost a month after the Fort Hood massacre, lawmakers investigating it still don't have information from federal agencies regarding what they knew in advance about shooter Nidal Malik Hasan.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman (right), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, said today that his investigators haven't been able to interview members of an FBI-led joint terrorism task force who knew about Hasan's contact with a radical imam before the Nov. 5 shootings.

Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut, said his committee also requested documents that haven't been produced. "Put me down as restless right now, but still understanding that they have a lot they are doing."

Today's a waking nightmare for the Texas officials who are paid to keep dangerous folks locked up:

1. Catherine Evans (right), a former state district judge in Dallas County, faces a felony charge of trying to smuggle a knife and other contraband into a Texas Youth Commission facility, reports Christy Hoppe of The Dallas Morning News. That's embarrassing all by itself. It's made worse by the fact that Gov. Rick Perry recently named Evans TYC ombudsman -- a job in which she was supposed to make sure that juveniles in state lockups were kept safe from harm. Evans has resigned and could not be reached for comment Monday. Why do we need an ombudsman? Well, the agency has a history of physical and sexual abuse scandals, as The News showed in a 2007 series of investigative reports.

2. Arcade Joseph Comeaux Jr. (right), a repeatedly convicted child rapist, used a smuggled gun Monday to overpower state prison guards and escape in southeast Texas, The Associated Press reports. TDCJ has a wanted poster up on its Web site but no information today about where Comeaux is or how he got the gun, prisons spokeswoman Michelle Lyons tells me.

Do you have a tip about TYC? TDCJ? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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The air near a North Texas natural gas drilling operation had over five times more benzene than the state considers safe for short-term exposure, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports today.

A Texas Commission on Environmental Quality official told the paper that the level "is the equivalent of a person sniffing a can of gasoline." Benzene can cause leukemia and other disorders.

The air sample was taken near a tank that collects drilling byproducts. The tank was described as being seven miles west of the tiny Denton County town of DISH (right) -- near the Denton-Wise county line, in other words, and a few miles north of the Tarrant County border.

DISH commissioned its own tests and posted results on its Web site.

TCEQ says it doesn't know how widespread the problem is and wants to do more tests. Drilling has become quite common in the Barnett Shale gas field, sometimes very near homes.

Drilling companies say they support more testing. Some have questioned whether their wells emit hydrocarbon vapors.

Do you have a tip about drilling? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

If you're on Twitter, follow our blog at DMNInvestigates. You can also check us out on Facebook.

Only one of the 13 people (right) killed in the Fort Hood massacre was a civilian. And that's no accident, The Austin American-Statesman reports today.

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan apparently targeted soldiers and avoided others nearby, U.S. Rep. John Carter and an anonymous source close to the investigation told the paper.

The story makes sense in light of previous reports that Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, had ties to a radical Muslim cleric in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki. Before the massacre, the imam advocated killing soldiers who fight against Muslims; afterward, he called Hasan a hero.

Do you have a tip about Fort Hood? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

If you're on Twitter, follow our blog at DMNInvestigates. You can also check us out on Facebook.

Every follow-up story on last year's 17-fatality bus crash near Sherman seems scarier than the one before. In October, it was the National Transportation Safety Board's long list of crimes and errors that preceded the disaster.

Now here's the latest, from Dallas Morning News reporter Jason Trahan: Texas DPS officials say 5-Minute Inspections, the Houston company that issued the bus' inspection sticker, routinely awarded such certificates without actually inspecting the vehicles.

5-Minute Inspections' Web site says: "need a quick inspection? tired of dealing with crooks? Come see the 5 Minute Inspection TEAM!"

Readers, do you know of other businesses that are doing this? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

If you're on Twitter, follow our blog at DMNInvestigates. You can also check us out on Facebook.

Here are the key links:

1. A Texas congressman says Nidal Malik Hasan wired money to Pakistan, which Muslim extremist groups use as a base to raise funds and carry out terrorist attacks.

2. Hasan is permanently paralyzed, one of his lawyers says today.

Here it is mid-November, and the state health department's Web site still doesn't say which private health-care providers have received swine flu vaccine. See the "Vaccine Locations" section on this page? There's no link -- just the words "Coming Soon."

Coming soon? Now that about 22 million people have gotten sick around the country and 3,900 have died?

The Dallas Morning News got tired of waiting for the state to provide data. So reporter Jeffrey Weiss wrote an open-records request for vaccine shipment information. What resulted is our own searchable database of providers in the Dallas area who are supposed to have the shots and mist. Check it out.

Do you have a tip about swine flu? The Department of State Health Services? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Here are the latest developments regarding last week's slaughter at Fort Hood:

* Formal charges were filed against Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan -- "13 specifications of premeditated murder, in violation of Article 118, Uniform Code of Military Justice," as the Army puts it. More on this below.

* The White House released a copy of a memo that President Obama sent to the secretary of defense, the director of national intelligence and the head of the FBI. It reads: "On November 6, 2009, I directed that an immediate inventory be conducted of all intelligence in U.S. Government files that existed prior to November 6, 2009, relevant to the tragic shooting at Fort Hood, Texas, especially anything having to do with the alleged shooter, Major Nidal Malik Hasan, U.S. Army. In addition, I directed an immediate review be initiated to determine how any such intelligence was handled, shared, and acted upon within individual departments and agencies and what intelligence was shared with others... Preliminary results of this review shall be provided by November 30, 2009."

* The Dallas Morning News' Dave Michaels reports that authorities have been looking into whether Hasan wired money to Pakistan, which is battling a massive Islamist insurgency and is widely believed to be Osama bin Laden's hiding place.

Was Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan insane?

Officials discussed the question last year at his military medical school and the Army hospital in the Washington, D.C., area where he later worked, National Public Radio is reporting.

My fellow investigative reporter Lee Hancock and photographer Courtney Perry got a look today inside Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan's apartment (right), now that criminal investigators in Killeen are done with it.

There were no obvious clues left behind, of course. But there was a plastic container for this LaserMax sight -- the kind of thing you might buy if you were planning to shoot a bunch of people. ("FIRST SHOT CONFIDENCE," the manufacturer advertises.) Price tag: $229.99.

Guns Galore, the Killeen store where Hasan bought a handgun in August, sells the product for that price.

Lee says they also saw several old bottles of prescription pills. One, from early 2001, was for the HIV medication Combivir.

Combivir (in combination with another anti-HIV drug) was a popular weapon against HIV in 2001. That's according to Dr. Brady Allen, a Dallas HIV specialist who just spoke to my colleague Sue Goetinck Ambrose.

Combivir sometimes was prescribed to health care workers immediately after they feared they'd been exposed to HIV via needle stick or blood splash.

Hasan graduated from a military medical school in Maryland in 2001. For reasons that aren't immediately clear, the prescription came from a pharmacy on Lackland Air Force Base, in San Antonio.

Also in Hasan's apartment were Jordanian and Israeli coins, a high-grade paper shredder and a book from India called Dreams and Interpretations.

Hasan, you may recall, moved out of the apartment last Thursday, a few hours before the shooting rampage. The complex manager gave journalists permission to view the unit today.

Some stories about the Garland animal shelter generated pictures in the facility. Included in that was a trio of kittens.

Patsy Thompson wrote to Problem Solver saying she would like to take all three. She has a piece of land and several other animals. She would have been happy to add the mix.

"You just want to take them all. I'll drive up there and get them," she said.

I contacted the city of Garland immediately and they checked for me and the kittens were no longer there. Unfortunately, the city was unable to say where they went without identifying numbers. They may have been adopted. They may have been euthanized.

My co-worker Holly Hacker recently introduced me to a terrific do-it-yourself reporting tool called Institutions Whose Degrees are Illegal to Use in Texas. It's maintained by the state's higher education board and contains a long list of unaccredited schools, diploma mills and more.

Holly used the list most recently for a story about Carrie Gordon, who is mayor of the little Dallas suburb of Balch Springs and a Dallas city planner. She likes to call herself Dr. Gordon, though her degree comes from a defunct correspondence school on the state list.

Previously, Holly wrote about Juanita Wallace (right), a local NAACP leader who recently lost a run for Dallas school board. She likes to call herself Dr. Wallace, citing a degree from a still functioning school on the state list -- Madison University.

Using degrees from such places is a crime if it helps you obtain any financial benefit "or gain a position in government with authority over another person, regardless of whether the actor receives compensation for the position," the state says. These ladies have not been charged with wrongdoing.

Do you have a tip about people using questionable degrees? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Fort Hood massacre suspect Nidal Malik Hasan (right) is a Virginia-born Army psychiatrist who counseled soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Authorities initially said they killed the major after he took part in a shooting rampage that left about a dozen colleagues dead at the Central Texas base. Tonight, inexplicably, they are saying that Hasan was wounded but survived.

Hasan worked at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in the nation's capital for six years before being transferred to Texas in July. He was going to be sent into a combat zone overseas soon and didn't want to go, relatives and other said.

Hasan graduated in 2003 from the F. Edward Hébert School of Medicine in Bethesda, Md., which is part of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. Its curriculum is longer than those found at other U.S. medical schools, with students getting training in areas specific to career-oriented military physicians.

Virginia Board of Medicine records say he completed his residency in psychiatry in 2007 at Walter Reed. He recently completed a fellowship there in disaster and preventive psychiatry.

The Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress, which is part of Uniformed Services University, lists Hasan as a member. The organization describes itself as "one of the nation's oldest and most highly regarded, academic-based organizations dedicated to advancing trauma-informed knowledge, leadership and methodologies."

Do you have a tip (as opposed to a rant) about Hasan? Email me, please.

Here are the numbers of swine flu vaccine doses that state health officials have allocated to Dallas-area counties, per 100 residents:

Dallas County: 8.3
Rockwall County: 7.5
Tarrant County: 6.5
Collin County: 5.6
Kaufman County: 5.1
Denton County: 4.6
Ellis County: 4.6
Parker County: 3.2
Wise County: 2.9
Johnson County: 2.0

Dallas County's rate is also higher than that of major urban counties elsewhere in the state:

Travis County (Austin): 7.7
Harris County (Houston): 7.1
Bexar County (San Antonio): 6.1

The allocation figures only cover shipments to private health-care providers. They have received the vast majority of vaccine in Texas.

Want to check my math or look up another county's allocation? Click on the "Doses by County" link on this Department of State Health Services site. Then look up the county population total on the U.S. Census site.

State health officials say they consider several factors when allocating vaccine, including its current scarcity, providers' requests and the need for geographic balance.

Do you have a tip about swine flu vaccine allocation? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

If you're on Twitter, follow our blog at DMNInvestigates. You can also check us out on Facebook.

The Dallas Morning News' front page today features two examples of government spending that wasn't all it was cracked up to be:

1. Officials overstated the number of Texas jobs created or saved with federal stimulus funds, reports Dave Michaels, who does investigative work in our Washington bureau. Want to check out stimulus spending for yourself? There are plenty of search tools on this Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board site.

2. Texas' $300 million investment in teacher merit pay did not boost student achievement, researchers from Texas A&M and other universities conclude.

Do you have a tip about stimulus spending? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

If you're on Twitter, follow our blog at DMNInvestigates. You can also check us out on Facebook.

You're a high-risk patient. You need a swine flu vaccine. Your doctor has none. Where can you get help?

We're hearing this anguished question over and over again. The Texas Department of State Health Services knows the answer -- and isn't sharing it.

Its Web site has the obligatory FAQ section, but this question isn't on the list.

Another section of the site is labeled "H1N1 vaccine distribution," with categories for allocations by county, to local health departments and to private providers. But there are no links -- only the words "coming soon."

Early this morning, my colleague Jeff Weiss asked state health department spokeswoman Carrie Williams: "Why does the state not post on its Web site the names of every provider that you've ordered vaccine shipped to and the amount of vaccine that you have had shipped there to date?"

Her only responses:
* "We are working on a county-by-county list of totals. Hopefully we will be able to post those numbers soon."
* "Providers receiving vaccine at this point are getting amounts to serve their own patients. They are reaching out to their own high-risk patients and are quickly exhausting their supplies, which are limited right now due to national production."

So all most people know is what we've been able to figure out so far: Dallas County's health department is having a mass clinic tomorrow, aimed at high-risk people without insurance. And Farmers Branch entrepreneur Jeff Vitt (right) is selling vaccines for $20 a pop to anyone who walks through his door.

As of the weekend, state health officials were accusing a Farmers Branch business of misrepresenting itself to get a huge stash of swine flu vaccine.

Now a spokeswoman for Jeff Vitt's Star Medical Group says he did nothing wrong and blames the dispute on a communication problem -- failure to clarify the distinction between Star Medical and another Vitt company called Flu Shots of America.

Texas health department spokeswoman Carrie Williams said Friday that Star claimed to be a private medical practice, making it eligible for an early shipment of vaccine. The state's theory has been that such practices are the best way to reach the highest-risk patients first.

But Vitt's business turned out to be what the state calls a mass vaccinator, and it was selling shots to anyone willing to pay $20.

Vitt's spokeswoman, Elaine Vitt, said in an email today:

Flu Shots of America clinic owner Jeff Vitt tells The Dallas Morning News that he has received 11,570 doses of swine flu vaccine. That's more than the Dallas County Health Department has.

And Vitt's clinic (right) has been vaccinating anybody willing to pay $20 -- not just those in highest-risk groups who are supposed to be first in line. They are, according to the Centers for Disease Control, "pregnant women, people who live with or care for children younger than 6 months of age, health care and emergency medical services personnel with direct patient contact, children 6 months through 4 years of age, and children 5 through 18 years of age who have chronic medical conditions."

The state health department says it is investigating. Vitt says he has done nothing wrong.

Do you have a tip about Flu Shots of America? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Texas has no shortage of amazing criminal justice stories. Here's the latest to hit my radar screen: State law says it's OK to show pornography to children -- as long as they're your children and the stuff is otherwise legal (no kiddie porn, in other words).

Now a Panhandle prosecutor wants the Texas attorney general's office to check his reading of the penal code section on showing harmful material to minors. An AG's spokesman said the matter is under review and declined further comment.

Randall County District Attorney James Farren's request grew out of a divorced Dallas-area woman's experience. Her three grade-school-aged daughters were living with their dad earlier this year when he allegedly got liquored up late one night and showed two of them porn on his computer. They later told a counselor, who alerted authorities. Amarillo police investigated, found the girls believable and sought advice from the DA's office before proceeding.

Farren concluded that that his hands were tied. No search warrant ever got issued, so there's been no independent look at evidence.

"We have to convince the Legislature to review this issue," Farren told me.

State Sen. Bob Deuell, a Republican from Greenville, said he will push for change in the next legislative session.

"It's not going to be an easy issue," he warned. Why? There will be talk that the state is trying to dictate what parents can teach their children.

There's an astonishingly long list of crimes, errors and other things that went wrong before last year's bush crash near Sherman killed 17 people, Dallas Morning News reporter Todd Gillman details today.

Here's a partial list of National Transportation Safety Board findings, in chronological order:

* Federal authorities ordered the bus company off the road because of safety violations.
* Owner Angel de la Torre re-registered it under a new name, ignored the order, and was operating without a permit or insurance.
* A Houston garage that inspected the bus about a week before the crash didn't notice an illegal retread tire on the front axle and wasn't equipped to inspect heavy vehicles.
* Bus driver Barrett Broussard drank alcohol and used cocaine shortly before departing Houston. He had previously been fired from another bus company after testing positive for cocaine.
* The tire suffered a puncture and operated -- underinflated and undetected -- for many miles. Pressure gauges aren't required for pre-trip inspections, and older buses such as this one don't have pressure warning systems like those in newer cars.
* The bus lacked seat belts, and some passengers were ejected in the crash.

Do you have a tip about transportation safety? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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The front page of Sunday's Dallas Morning News was one of the strongest we've had in a while. Highlights:

1. Death-penalty opponents such as the Innocence Project say Texas executed an innocent man in Cameron Todd Willingham. Not so fast, concluded an investigative report I co-authored with Steve McGonigle and Gary Jacobson. We found that Willingham did much to incriminate himself after the 1991 Corsicana house fire that killed his three little girls (right). And the Fort Worth Star-Telegram published a long statement from Willingham's ex-wife, Stacy Kuykendall, that reinforces our findings.

2. Police-beat reporters Tanya Eiserer and Steve Thompson raised new doubts about Dallas crime statistics. They found that DPD doesn't consider crimes such as this to be attempted burglary: Masked men are seen on video attacking a business entrance with bolt cutters and an ax. Because they failed to get inside and fled when an alarm sounded, police said it was only "criminal mischief."

3. Dallas County constables have dramatically increased traffic enforcement, Ed Timms and Kevin Krause reported. They followed up today with a look at other types of expansion that have essentially turned constables' offices into their own police departments.

Do you have a tip about a capital case? Crime stats? Constables? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Let's play a little game. Pretend I'm a famous columnist who covers pro sports. My boss is running for governor. In all my spare time, on my own personal stationery, I start asking the teams I write about to give money to the boss' re-election campaign.

Now let's look at some facts. Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission chairman Jose Cuevas is asking owners of the bars and restaurants he regulates to donate to Gov. Rick Perry's re-election campaign, reports The Dallas Morning News' Wayne Slater.

The solicitations are legal. They don't name Cuevas, a Midland restaurant owner, as TABC chairman (although he admits the obvious: recipients recognize his name). The Perry campaign says there's no problem.

Having trouble reading the four words under the TABC logo pictured above? They are service, courtesy, integrity and accountability.

Do you have a tip about political fund-raising? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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There were no clear procedures for monitoring a North Texas soldier who was known to be unraveling mentally before he allegedly killed five colleagues at a counseling center in Iraq, according to a new military report.

Sgt. John Russell is accused of the deadliest soldier-vs.-soldier attack in the six-year war.

His father, Wilburn Russell of Sherman (right), told The Dallas Morning News back in May that macho military culture inhibits men from seeking help: "If a guy actually goes to the clinic and asks for help, they think of him as a wimp, and he's got something wrong with him and try to get rid of him."

But the military report also notes: "There is no clear procedure ... for managing soldiers identified as 'at risk' for suicide or the proper way to conduct suicide watch."

Do you have a tip about mental health and the military? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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"Ouch" is the Hot Links word of the day. Ouch. Ouch.

Less than two weeks ago, my newspaper published a glowing feature story about Catherine Rohr (right). She's attracted widespread coverage for founding and running the Prison Entrepreneurship Program, or PEP, which trains inmates and parolees to start free-world businesses. Now comes word that Rohr was having "inappropriate relationships" with some of the guys and has resigned as PEP's CEO.

PEP's chairman says Rohr disclosed the inappropriate relationships to her board a month ago. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice sent her a letter Sept. 9 banning her from prison units, spokesman Jason Clark told me today. Now, he added, TDCJ will take a fresh look at PEP's programs.

Man, it's a long way from 2007, when PEP won the governor's Criminal Justice Volunteer Service Award.

Do you have a tip about Catherine Rohr? PEP? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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I received a call from a reader that an elderly woman's caregiver was not taking care of her. The reader said the caregiver wasn't showing up daily, but she was frightened of the worker and was afraid of a confrontation, so didn't want to say anything.

So, she asked me to look into the situation. I reported the problem to both the caregiver's employer and to Adult Protective Services. The state investigated the situation and said that the elderly woman is getting adequate care. The reader agrees that the situation is better for the elderly woman and that the caregiver is now coming to work.

If you see an abusive situation of the elderly, children or the disabled, you can call APS to investigate. Their toll-free number, 1-800-252-5400, is answered round-the-clock. You might experience a wait though. It took about an hour for me to get through.

The liberal Center for American Progress is calling out Texas lawmakers who voted against the $819 billion stimulus in January - and are now asking the Obama administration for $3 billion in stimulus funds to bolster the budget of NASA, a major Texas employer.

This comes on the heels of a September audit that questioned the use of federal tax dollars by another Texan who scorned the stimulus: Gov. Rick Perry. The federal audit found that the Texas Health and Human Services Commission under Perry had billed the Medicaid program for nearly $300,000 in care and prescription drugs it shouldn't have given legal and illegal immigrants.

Public Citizen's lawsuit against the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, filed Tuesday in Travis County District Court, cites arguments identical to those that the U.S. Supreme Court endorsed in a 2007 federal case.

That case was Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency. Public Citizen also added some twists to reflect Texas law.

"We just took a page out of Massachusetts v. EPA, said Tom "Smitty" Smith, Public Citizen's Texas director.

In brief, the suit says the law requires Texas regulators to take action to curb any harmful emissions, including carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases -- harmful, the argument goes, because global warming brings a host of problems for human and ecological health.

The TCEQ has declined to do so, and Gov. Rick Perry, who appoints the state agency's commissioners, strongly opposes regulating CO2.

TCEQ Chairman Bryan Shaw, Ph.D., issued a statement in response to Public Citizen's suit. Here it is, in full:

"The science on global warming is far from settled. Neither Congress nor the EPA have been able to promulgate final rules on greenhouse gas regulation. What is certain is that if done incorrectly, CO2 regulations will impose great costs on Texas, without any guarantee of a measurable environmental benefit. Reducing CO2 in Texas will do nothing to lower CO2 globally, but will have the effect of sending U.S. jobs to China and India."

In fact, as today's stories remind us, we've got a ways to go until these big news events conclude.

1. As a now-convicted Don Hill wonders why jurors and God did not "give us this one," I wondered when the other public official enmeshed in the FBI's bribery investigation will go on trial. The News' Gromer Jeffers Jr. happened to report today that the judge is asking about possible courts dates for State Rep. Terri Hodge (shown at right). Meanwhile, it appears some are already trying to undercut her 2010 re-election opponent. Their argument: He's too educated.

2. On the list of people who can consistently strike fear into Child Protective Services, state Sen. Jane Nelson has got to be near the very top. She has long led reform efforts targeting the agency. Now she is questioning whether four recent deaths of children while under CPS' watch, including that of an Arlington toddler, is a broader pattern, report The News' Brooks Egerton and Scott Goldstein.

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You missed a lot if you missed the paper this weekend. You can catch up quickly with these Hot Links:

1. Yes, utility operator Ken Weaver (right) really was a stock car driver. But college football star? College baseball star? College degree? That stuff was all made up, my colleagues Steve McGonigle and Ed Timms discovered. They found that Weaver also has a record of plane and car theft. But the Texas Public Utility Commission didn't seem to notice. It let him run Freedom Power, which sells prepaid electricity to the poor and amassed the highest rate of consumer complaints of any electricity provider in Texas.

2. Comments posted on my colleague Dave Tarrant's report from Jordan suggest that many readers don't want any back story on Ellis County terrorism suspect Hosam Smadi. But for those of you who do, this piece is a must-read.

3. Keashia Matthews, the Arlington mom at the center of a scandal we exposed over how Child Protective Services works, is defending herself to Channel 8. Sort of, anyway. My favorite quote from the TV piece regards the thought that has haunted her since she left her toddler to die in a hot truck: "Just what I could have done different."

Do you have a tip about child welfare? CPS? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Child Protective Services is changing its tune regarding a neglect investigation that could have saved the life of Darrell Singleton (right) -- but didn't.

Yesterday, CPS spokesman Chris Van Deusen said that leaving a 1-year-old such as Darrell unsupervised all day in a home doesn't put the child at immediate risk of serious harm and thus is not a top-priority case for investigation.

Now he's just sent me an e-mail stating the opposite: "It is the agency position that allegations of pre-school children who are at home alone right now, or who are being left home alone regularly, constitutes an immediate threat to their health and safety, and those allegations require immediate investigation."

Another new position regards the May complaint about the welfare of Darrell and his two siblings, ages 5 and 6. Yesterday CPS said that someone who knew the children reported that they were being left home alone all day in Arlington while their mom, Keashia Matthews (right), worked in Bedford.

Van Deusen's new e-mail says: "The May intake we received did not allege that the children were currently in danger. The report was that one of the children said she had in the past been left with her siblings at home. There was no allegation that this was an ongoing practice or that children were currently home alone."

That's why CPS didn't consider this a top-priority case, the spokesman says.

What I still don't understand is why, regardless of whether this was Priority 1 or Priority 2, CPS closed the matter after mom arranged for day care. Consider:

1. Why is day care a solution if there was no ongoing problem?
2. Matthews had a known history of endangering other children and losing custody of them.
3. The May neglect complaint arose while CPS was investigating her for alleged physical abuse (later deemed unfounded, the agency says).
4. Why was Darrell in his mom's car all day in early September, dying, if she had day care?

I asked. They answered. And I still don't get it.

Yesterday my question was whether CPS alerted Arlington police in May that Keashia Matthews (right) was leaving her three little children -- ages 1, 5 and 6 -- home alone all day while she worked.

And as you can see in today's follow-up story, the answer is yes. But CPS didn't ask for police help, because it didn't think Matthews was putting the kids at risk of serious, immediate harm.

And so this woman, who had a history of neglecting other children and losing custody of them, never got charged with endangerment. That could have sent her to jail and given the three little kids some chance of finding a safer home.

Instead, CPS closed the books on the matter after she arranged for day care.

Now, of course, the youngest child, Darrell Singleton III (right), is dead, and mom has been charged with contributing to his demise by deliberately leaving him in a hot car.

Arlington police say they're now reviewing their actions to see whether they could have done more to prevent the death.

Do you have a tip about child welfare? CPS? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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President Obama has vowed to eliminate hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud as part of a proposed overhaul of the nation's health care system. A federal report released on Wednesday identified yet another area where investigators should start digging.

The report from the federal Government Accountability Office identified possibly widespread fraud in Texas and other states involving purchases of controlled substances under Medicaid, the federal-state medical program for the poor. Among the interesting Texas tidbits was a case of "doctor shopping" by a Medicaid beneficiary who used prescriptions from more than 70 doctors to obtain 4,700 pills of Vicodin from 40 pharmacies.

In our recent "Cost of Care" series on why health care is so expensive in North Texas, I touched on fraud in the home health industry. Medicare and Medicaid are lucrative targets for fraudsters. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General recently reported that state Medicaid fraud control units across the country recovered $1.3 billion in fiscal 2008.

Hot Links looks today at how money gets spent in Austin:

1. Gov. Rick Perry's re-election campaign is paying "volunteers" to recruit more "volunteers," The Dallas Morning News' Gromer Jeffers reports today. My favorite quote in the story is from Dallas County Republican Party chairman Jonathan Neerman (right), who was a volunteer in Perry's 2006 campaign and said there were no cash rewards then. "I want my check," he said.

2. The $19 billion Texas Permanent School Fund is the second-largest educational endowment in the country. It pays for textbooks and other school supplies. And the State Board of Education has taken to rejecting the investment advice of the fund's professional staff and hiring a consulting firm that cost much more than the competition, free-lance writer Jeff Horwitz reports in The News. The key advocate of these moves: board member Rick Agosto (right), a San Antonio Democrat who had prior business contacts with the consultant. He denies wrongdoing.

Do you have a tip about politics? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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Hot Links today make the world seem somehow upside down.

1. The more you need help, the less likely you are to get it. That seems to be the logic transportation officials are using in deciding how to spend federal stimulus money. Reports USA Today: "Dallas trails only Los Angeles in miles of bad roads, yet it has received less than 1% of the $530 million that Texas approved for road repairs." A TXDoT official says our roads are so bad that fixes would cost too much to be eligible for funds.

2. The Dallas Morning News' Victor Godinez has a fascinating back story today about the Perot family confidant who's accused of insider trading. Reza Saleh, it turns out, helped rescue Perot employees from a prison in his native Iran 30 years ago. Now he's adding to the embarrassment facing Perot-affiliated investments this year. My colleagues Gary Jacobson and Brendan Case wrote a few months ago about the multi-billion dollar collapse of a family hedge fund.

Do you have a tip about street repairs? Hedge funds? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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What a tangled web they weave in making money:

1. Maria Refugia Camarillo (right) gets to spend the next 44 months of her golden years in federal prison, a judge decided yesterday. The 72-year-old Fort Worth grandma arranged sham marriages for up to $12,000 apiece between many members of her extended family and green-card seeking immigrants. More details are in a Justice Department news release issued when she pleaded guilty in July.

2. Lubbock lawyer Kevin Glasheen stands to make millions representing 12 former prisoners who have been exonerated by DNA evidence and are seeking compensation from the state. But now, The Dallas Morning News' Jennifer Emily reports, one of the Dallas exonerees has hired a different lawyer to sue Glasheen. Lawyer 2 alleges that Lawyer 1 did no legal work and shouldn't collect a $1 million fee. Glasheen denies the claim.

3. Reza Saleh made about $8.6 million by trading on advance knowledge of Dell's purchase of Perot Systems, federal regulators alleged yesterday. Saleh's employer, according to The News' Victor Godinez: Parkcentral Capital Management, an affiliate of Perot Investments.

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Robert Crandall (right), AA's former CEO, is backing a U.S. Senate bill that would let passengers leave planes that have been stranded on the ground for more than three hours.

"Every responsible airline executive I know thinks these things are an outrage," he said yesterday, when he testified before Congress.

The bill was born in large part out of December 2006 storms in Texas, during which many people were stuck on parked American flights for more than eight hours. That led the Fort Worth-based carrier to talk of reform and a four-hour limit.

"Because no similar situation has occurred in the 80-plus years of American's history, it is a rule that may never be used again," the airline told Congress and reporters at the time.

But the rule soon turned out not to be a rule, as The Dallas Morning News' Terry Maxon reported in 2007.

The push for the federal law has largely been driven by California real estate agent Kate Hanni (right), who was among those stranded in 2006 and who founded FlyersRights.org.

The Air Transport Association, which represents major airlines, says new rules are a bad idea.

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Our first item in Hot Links explains what your bank account has probably been feeling.

1. The idea was competition would lower Texans' health-care costs. What patients got instead were fatter bills and less effective treatments, according to a Dallas Morning News multi-day series called "The Cost of Care" that began Sunday. Some of my colleagues who contributed reporting will be blogging here on their findings this week.

2. Closing arguments are expected to begin later this morning in the Dallas City Hall corruption trial, The News' Jason Trahan reports. After these end, jurors will deliberate on a verdict for what could be weeks.

3. I didn't hear NBC give a shout-out last night to the Arlington voters who agreed to subsidize the new Cowboys Stadium. The upshot: NBC did compare it to the pyramids, Parthenon, Great Wall of China, Taj Mahal and Roman Coliseum. We'll see if it attracts similar numbers of tourists so that Arlington can recoup the tax dollars residents are giving Jerry Jones.

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I aced college geography. But I wouldn't have been able to find Mbabane, Swaziland, on an African map before reading a Fort Worth Star-Telegram story about two Cowtown city council members who are traveling there this week at taxpayer expense.

The trip is part of Fort Worth's Sister Cities program, which sends a delegation to seven locales around the world to glad-hand and talk a little business. Fort Worth has provided about $350,000 in public funding toward this and usually pays the cost of a couple of elected officials to attend -- in this case, two to Swaziland at a cost of nearly $10,000.

The timing could not have been worse. Just last week, the council approved budget cuts and fee hikes for residents. One of the traveling council members insisted, "This is not about tourism. This is about AIDS in Africa and the significant issues that are faced in that part of the world. It is very important we have these exchanges."

The Sister Cities trip reminded me of other recent examples of big-ticket municipal travel -- Rowlett, Dallas and Mesquite. Leaves you wondering taxpayers believe they're getting a good value, or whether they'd like their neighborhood library open a few more hours.

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Hot Links today are all about capital punishment:

1. Charles Dean Hood (right) may well deserve to die for murdering two people in Plano. But I'd feel a whole lot better about killing killers if I knew they got a fair trial. And that's very much in doubt here. The latest: Texas' highest court said yesterday that it's too late for the defense to use evidence that the trial judge and Collin County's DA were, um, romantically entangled. Defense attorneys tried to work this angle earlier but lacked evidence -- the affair, like most, was secret. But now they have admissions from former DA Tom O'Connell (under Hood) and paramour Verla Sue Holland (below).

2. The appeals court decision comes at a particularly difficult time for Texas' image. I recently summarized three other ongoing capital punishment embarrassments, including two in which there's real doubt about a convicted man's guilt. In one of those cases, the defendant has already been executed.

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Today's Hot Links look at how the tables have turned on two former representatives of the Texas legal system.

1. Was he trying to make the Guinness Book of World Records? Michael Meissner (right) worked for 17 small-town police agencies in 18 years, The Dallas Morning News reports today. Now he's jailed, facing child-porn and organized crime charges in Dallas and Tarrant counties. He worked most recently for a town in Central Texas, but it's hard to understand how that was possible. WFAA-TV (Channel 8) reported two years ago that Meissner lost his peace officer's license in 2003, used a phony college degree and had an arrest record.

2. Former Dallas municipal court Judge Tiffany Lewis (right) pleaded guilty Tuesday to stealing tens of thousands of dollars while working as a private lawyer in a Tarrant County probate case, reports The News' Tanya Eiserer. Lewis was sentenced to 60 days in jail and 10 years of probation. The State Bar of Texas took away her law license in 2005.

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For today's Hot Links, let's catch up from the weekend:

1. Another family is accusing child psychiatrist William Olmsted (right) of misconduct with their daughter. And they're likewise mad at the Texas Medical Board, saying that it did nothing after they complained. Last week, Dallas Morning News writer Diane Jennings reported that the board let Olmsted keep his medical license after a Dallas County court put him on probation for molesting a girl. Board officials won't talk about why they chose this disciplinary route.

2. The Plano Chamber of Commerce wants residents to shop within the city, News reporter Theodore Kim reports. Seems that sales tax revenue has plummeted as new shopping magnets have beckoned further north. How long will it be, do you think, before Frisco starts losing out to the next big thing even further north? What will be the first Dallas suburb in Oklahoma?

Do you have a tip about doctor discipline? The Texas Medical Board? Other professional disciplinary issues? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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The results of Dallas Morning News investigations are all over the paper today:

1. A Dallas County court put child psychiatrist William Olmsted (right) on probation for child molestation. But he can still work as a doctor. That's because the Texas Medical Board recently decided not to take his license away, as Dallas Morning News reporter Diane Jennings shows today. The board decided it was enough to limit his practice to treatment of men, in a group setting. Olmsted must also get a psychiatric evaluation, attend "professional boundaries" courses and pay a fine. All of which recalls my colleague Doug Swanson's 2002 investigation showing that the board was reluctant to punish doctors who sexually assaulted or otherwise harmed patients. And it recalls Doug's 2007 follow-up on a Texas legislator who was in business with a doctor and called a special hearing to see whether the board was too aggressive in its discipline.

2. Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert says real police officers will begin checking out car-burglary complaints in person instead of letting civilian call takers handle the task by phone. And there will be a sweeping review of all 2009 reports that Dallas police labeled untrustworthy. The changes come in direct response to News reporters Steve Thompson and Tanya Eiserer's recent findings that cops weren't counting all crimes.

3. Today's update on the Dallas Episcopal Diocese's stockbroker-priest scandal: A second clergyman has left his pulpit -- and he's talking about suing parishioners who accuse him of investment-related misconduct.

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Difficult questions about pregnancy linger in my mind from the weekend papers, even though the newsprint's already on the recycling pile:

1. Why does Texas lead the nation in repeat teen pregnancy? Bob Garrett of The Dallas Morning News' Austin bureau looked at several factors in Monday's paper. Among them: Only Utah and the Lone Star State require state-funded clinics to get parents' consent before giving their teens birth control. And Utah at least tells young people on a state Web site to go to Planned Parenthood if they don't want to involve their parents.

2. Have you ever thought about what you'd do if you were pregnant and knew the baby was doomed? Over the past two Sundays, my colleagues Lee Hancock and Sonya Hebert traced one family's journey in words, photos and video. If thus stuff doesn't haunt you, have someone check your pulse.

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Today's main Hot Link highlights another case that gives Texas' capital punishment system a bad name.

1. Longtime death row inmate Michael Toney (right) is free on bail, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports. The Texas attorney general's office, following Tarrant County prosecutors' admission that they withheld evidence, moved to dismiss charges that he killed three people in a 1985 Lake Worth bombing. Beyond that, you're not going to learn much from the Star-Telegram story. Click here for the definitive series on the Toney case, written in 2005 by my Dallas Morning News colleague Doug Swanson.

2. Other recent death penalty-related messes: The top judge of the state's top criminal court, Sharon Keller, is facing possible discipline because she closed her doors instead of waiting for a death row inmate's appeal. And a study commissioned by the state Forensic Science Commission cast serious doubt on the science used to convict -- and execute -- a man whose three children died in a fire.

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Robert Peters (right), the former DISD principal we wondered about in this morning's Hot Links, has surfaced: He is a principal in the Manor school district, just outside Austin.

Officials there say he has "cooperated fully" with the Dallas district's investigation of TAKS cheating at Lang Middle School.

Dallas district boss Michael Hinojosa tells a different tale. He says Peters quit cooperating and bears some responsibility for the scandal, as my co-worker Tawnell Hobbs reported in The Dallas Morning News.

There's still no word on who at the East Dallas school actually changed hundreds of students' answers on the state test.

Watch this blog and Tawnell's DISD blog for more on this and other evolving stories.

Scam artists are going after consumers desperate to pay their bills. One reader wrote in to Problem Solver to say she had to borrow money from her in-laws to get out of a jam when she was conned out of $2,900 by a secret-shopper scam. Another said she, too, had lost money.

"Kate, is there anything that I can do to go after these people and get some sort of restitution?" one of the readers asked?

Columnist Pamela Yip wrote about this type of scam in June, but unfortunately the reader didn't see her warning. There are various twists to the shopping con. One has the shopper giving the con artist access to bank information to cash their "paycheck." Another has the shopper receiving a money order to buy several small items then sending back the cash to their "employer." The money order winds up as a fake and is later denied at the bank. The cash and employer are long gone by that time.

There is usually no recourse in getting any money back, but if you're caught up in something like this you should report it to the authorities, such as the Federal Trade Commission and Texas Attorney General's office. These scams seem to proliferate, but at least if the right people have the information a few thieves may get caught.

Two utterly unrelated spats caught my eye this morning in the back pages of The Dallas Morning News:

1. The controversy surrounding the car-towing practices of Dallas County constables Derick Evans and Jaime Cortes grows more interesting by the day. Evans has now hired powerful state Sen. Royce West (right) as his lawyer amid a corruption investigation by the Dallas County District Attorney's office, reports Kevin Krause. West has been a major donor and adviser to DA Craig Watkins. And Watkins' office, meanwhile, defends constables when they face civil lawsuits. What do you make of all these potential conflicts of interest?

2. Jaguar of North America filed a federal lawsuit accusing Plano-based Millennium Motor Cars of submitting more than $2 million in false warranty claims and other charges, Terry Box reports. Millennium owner David Stephens (right, with one of his babies) has counter-sued. He blames service department employees for any irregularities and accuses Jaguar of withholding information.

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Dallas Episcopal Bishop James Stanton (right) confirmed today that he has suspended a priest-stockbroker who, as I reported Sunday, owes an ex-parishioner/ex-client $50,000 for securities fraud.

Stanton said he was unaware of what I discovered late yesterday: A Dallas judge put the Rev. William Warnky (below right) on 10 years of probation in 2006 for contempt of court after he failed to pay about $50,000 in child support to his second wife.

Warnky should have disclosed this to Dallas Episcopal Diocese leaders, the bishop said.

"Mercy," he added. "That is a very serious matter."

This spring, the Texas attorney general's office sought to jail Warnky because of continuing child-support failures. The judge let him stay on probation. Warnky has been making payments since, the AG's office said.

The priest declined to comment today. He led services Sunday at his church, Good Samaritan, which is a few blocks south of White Rock Lake. Stanton said his suspension from ministry took effect Monday.

So many questions, so little time. A few of our favorite new ones arise in today's two Hot Links:

1. There is increasing support for the idea that the state of Texas executed an innocent man, reports Christy Hoppe of The Dallas Morning News' Austin bureau. Cameron Todd Willingham (right, in a photo being held by a cousin), of the North Texas town of Corsicana, was convicted of killing his three young children in a fire. He insisted that he was innocent but was put to death in 2004. A new study commissioned by the state Forensic Science Commission concludes that a fire marshal who investigated the deaths "seems to be wholly without any realistic understanding of fires and how fire injuries are created." The Chicago Tribune has been dogging this case for some time; click here for more detailed coverage.

2. Southwest Airlines' maintenance practices are facing new scrutiny from the FAA, reports Eric Torbenson of The News. This time the issue is whether the Dallas-based airline used unauthorized parts when repairing older Boeing 737s. Still no word on why a football-sized hole opened up during a Southwest flight last month.

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Today's Hot Links are swerving all over the road:

1. In January of last year, Dallas Plan Commission member Neil Emmons wrote Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert (right) a letter. He urged him to push for disclosure requirements for local lobbyists, as my colleagues Jason Trahan and Gromer Jeffers Jr. reported Sunday. Leppert wouldn't talk for that story. But today, lo and behold, with the City Hall corruption trial grinding on, he is proposing some reforms.

2. Here's the sound of another nail being banged into a box that looks a lot like Paul Quinn College's coffin: Dallas Morning News reporter Holly Hacker explains that the region's only historically black college has lost its accreditation appeal.

3. Why are all those baby bones lying around outside a mobile home in southern Tarrant County? The trailer sits on a street -- I'm not making this up -- called Tranquility Circle.

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Ronnie Dawson of Greenville couldn't pay his electric bill and was worried about how he'd survive. It wasn't the heat so much as the lack of refrigeration for the insulin that he takes daily for his diabetes.

Dawson just bought and moved into his mobile home in May. He was floored by his first electricity bill when it arrived. "I got this high-dollar light bill, and it killed me," Dawson said. "I've gotten in over my head."

The bill from city-owned Greenville Electric Utility System was initially a little more than $365. But Dawson, 56, asked for another read of his meter. That did knock $89 off the total, but the clock was ticking. He now had fewer than 48 hours to come up with $276.

"It might not be much to you, but it is to me when I don't have [the money] and they won't work with me," said Dawson.

Does wearing a black robe mean never having to say you're sorry? Do you deserve a taxpayer-funded car allowance? Today's Hot Links make me wonder:

1. Sharon Keller says she would do it again. The presiding judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (at right, waiting for her misconduct trial to begin) testified Wednesday that there was no reason to keep the court open late in 2007 for a death-row inmate's last-minute appeal. Hours later, the killer was executed. Now that the tables are turned and she's facing trial, Keller faces possible removal from the bench. And this isn't the former Dallas County prosecutor's only legal woe; another stems from her failure to list millions in personal assets on a financial disclosure form, as my colleague Steve McGonigle's investigation showed.

2. The Dallas suburb of Richardson spends more than $800,000 a year on employee car allowances, Dallas Morning News reporter Ian McCann finds. Many of the employees do lots of on-the-job driving -- but some are just getting perks. How does this compare to what other cities do? Are city-owned car fleets a better alternative?

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Today's Hot Links focus on some lurking dangers:

1. A new study raises questions about the promotional campaign for a cervical cancer vaccine that Gov. Rick Perry unsuccessfully tried to mandate for Texas girls. Gardasil manufacturer Merck funded messages by medical groups that "did not address the full complexity of the issues surrounding the vaccine and did not provide balanced recommendations on risks and benefits," the study says. It was published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

2. Lake-wrecking zebra mussels are emerging in North Texas, WFAA-TV (Channel 8) reports. What is to be done about these little pests, which can clog public water-supply pipes?

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Two questions this morning: Is Texas using its regulatory resources wisely by focusing on small-time gambling operations? And does probation really mean anything in this state?

1. Execs of Dallas-based Aces Wired have pleaded guilty to running a gambling operation, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports. The company, which runs game rooms in several Texas counties, previously insisted that its machines met state requirements by not awarding cash prizes. Now it will forfeit more than $1 million, and the bosses will be put on probation. Prosecutors had planned to present allegations at trial that the execs bribed a Fort Worth police officer, the Corpus Christi Caller-Times reported recently.

2. Plano resident William Fletcher pleaded guilty to securities fraud three years ago and was put on probation. Now he's been charged with doing it again and using the proceeds to pay court-ordered restitution from the 2006 case, The Dallas Morning News' Elizabeth Souder reports. Will Fletcher -- who did business under the names Texas Oil Equities and Raptor Oil & Gas -- get probation again?

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Several items in the news today reminded me of the State of Neglect series that my colleagues on the investigations team produced earlier this year. That explored how Texas government, through its mangled bureaucracy or deference to big business, leaves the little guy lacking.

1. Oncor customers will pay a total of $115 million more statewide after the Public Utility Commission agreed to the company's request for higher rates, The News' Elizabeth Souder reports. That move ignored a previous ruling by a panel of administrative law judges that found Oncor should get only $30 million to subsidize an "imprudent" purchase of high-tech meters that didn't meet PUC requirements.

2. Star-Telegram watchdog columnist, Dave Lieber, has a nice piece on a 78-year-old military veteran who can't get his food stamps allotment renewed because of confusion within the Health and Human Services Commission. Some residents have sued to try and get results.

3. An employee who helped stage those infamous fights among the mentally disabled residents at a state-run Corpus Christi school was convicted Thursday. Those were not the only problems at the facility, which operates under the oversight of the Department of Aging and Disability Services.

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Testimony is reaching a critical stage in the Dallas City Hall bribery trial. Jurors will earn their $40-a-day pay after times like Wednesday.

1. Federal prosecutors, in the meat of their case, scored as developer-turned-informant James R. "Bill" Fisher testified about paying a load of money to Don Hill's associates and finally winning his vote. However, in a boost to Hill's defense, Fisher acknowledged Hill never asked for cash and Fisher never paid him directly. (Trial is recessed until Monday, fyi.)

2. We know Rick Perry is the longest serving governor the state's had. And we know before then, he toiled in Austin as well. So why was he also claiming a home in College Station to get a tax exemption? He dropped it after the Associated Press broke the story this week.

3. Now for a little media talk: The Texas House is apparently blocking a Houston-based online news organization from covering an upcoming session. I know this news org, Texas Watchdog, is a competitor to The News. But c'mon, House. We Texans need more -- not fewer -- journalists covering Austin. Give them access.

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Alan and Kathy Lynn Dieken of Kaufman did get their money back after taking a honeymoon cruise to nowhere. The couple booked a trip at the end of April on Carnival Cruise Lines out of Galveston that was supposed to port in Mexico. But when swine flu broke out in the country, cruise ships all headed to other ports.

Not theirs. It parked in the Gulf.

It also returned to Texas early because of a medical emergency.

Despite my intervention, Carnival only refunded the couple a total of $80 in port taxes and offered 50 percent off a future cruise.

So the Diekens disputed the remaining $1,770 they paid to their credit card. "They took it off completely," said Dieken. He said he is now satisfied with the result.

That's one takeaway, among many, that you should have from the Dallas City Hall bribery trial. Let's explore:

1. Co-defendant Allen McGill (shown at right) testified Monday that his sham Black State Employees Association of Texas opposed a housing developer's project to force the hiring of minority contractors who'd give it kickbacks later, The News' Jason Trahan reports. Once the developer played ball, the opposition lifted. McGill and his cohort, Darren Reagan, realized that they were ones worked over months later: The developer was an FBI informant.

2. The Hearst network of newspapers, which includes Houston and San Antonio, is wrapping up a series that finds about 98,000 people die each year from preventable medical errors. That echoes The News' State of Neglect investigative series, which earlier this year found that Texas lets hospitals hide their mistakes from the public.

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The state's academic testing program in grammar and high schools has fed a running argument over whether it puts emphasis more on scores or learning. Critics surely will seize on this data analysis by The News:

1. Holly K. Hacker's Sunday story found half of college-bound graduates from some North Texas high schools earned less than a C average their freshman year. That includes middling results from kids at Dallas' nationally recognized magnet school. The state's higher education commissioner said it was a "serious problem" that students are "stunned when they arrive on a college campus." Look up your school with this online database.

2. Current and former members of the non-profit that runs the Alamo has been squabbling over finances. That brings this to light: The state may own the landmark, but no agency provides management oversight. That worries San Antonio's mayor, The News' Marjorie Korn reports.

3. News reporters aren't the only ones who fight for records. An audit released this morning shows the FDIC wouldn't share documents with the State Auditor's Office as part of a review of the Texas Department of Savings and Mortgage Lending.

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You may have missed this item deep inside The Dallas Morning News' metro section today: The University of Texas at Dallas forwarded complaints against its own police officers to the Collin County district attorney.

The action comes two months after UT Dallas' police chief, Colleen Ridge, resigned. A few weeks ago, the assistant chief and an officer who had been on leave were fired. Another employee also quit, and one more remains sidelined.

That's a lot of HR paperwork. But what makes this potentially criminal?

UT Dallas and prosecutors continue not to discuss it publicly. News reporter Holly Hacker did manage to narrow things down after receiving a letter from the University of Texas System's lawyers seeking permission from the state attorney general to keep records about the complaints private.

The UT System lawyers indicate the police matters involve these multiple choices: a) ethical questions, b) standards of conduct, c) financial reporting and/or d) internal accounting practices.

If you know the correct answer, post a comment or e-mail Holly or me directly.

So will this be the day that the Justice Department's bribery case against former Dallas Mayor Pro-Tem Don Hill (shown at right) falls apart?

Or will it be the day that his smiling demeanor changes?

We're about to find out, as questioning of the low-income housing developer who has pleaded guilty to bribing Hill begins this morning. The News' Jason Trahan is stationed at the federal courthouse and live-blogging the developments.

In a News interview four years ago, lawyers for developer Brian Potashnik explained his role for the first time, framing him as a victim of opportunistic city officials.

Turmoil in the suburbs. A drug war near the Texas border. What's a politician to do?

1. Irving's power structure is under siege. The local icon, Texas Stadium, is turning into an eyesore. The Dallas Cowboys will soon be playing in Arlington, leaving behind controversy over their practice facility's collapse and the city's dubious role in inspecting it. Now comes a federal judge's ruling that the city's at-large system for electing the City Council is illegal, as reported today by Jeff Mosier and Katherine Leal Unmuth of The Dallas Morning News. Members of the all-white council said they thought things were working just fine. Hispanics are about 40 percent of the population -- the largest group in town.

2. The Los Angeles Times has a fascinating look today at possible ties between drug lords and elected officials in Mexico. Seems a recently elected member of Congress there, Julio Cesar Godoy, is now a fugitive. He has been linked to a narco gang that has killed at least 16 police officers in recent days. He is also a half-brother of Michoacan state's governor.

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There are flies in the ointment of some Texas crime-catching innovations, as today's Hot Links show.

1. We all know canines can help track escaped prisoners. But can they correctly ID crime suspects? There are growing questions about the only dog handler in Texas who does scent-identification lineups, the Victoria Advocate reports. A faulty dog ID recently sent a South Texas man to jail for a rape he didn't commit. Some judges have now barred the handler -- Fort Bend County Deputy Sheriff Keith Pikett -- from testifying.

2. Gov. Rick Perry gave sheriffs $2 million to install Webcams on the Mexican border. But few arrests and drug busts have resulted, an El Paso Times investigation shows.

Do you have a tip about dogs or dog handlers? Drugs? Another subject? Send me an e-mail and let me know. Or join the conversation by commenting below.

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A reader called Problem Solver asking what should be done about a disagreement between her daughter and her daughter's landlord.

When her daughter moved out of her apartment the landlord claimed the place was "trashed." But the daughter had hired a cleaning crew to scour the place.

"Besides having lived there for two years, we had the carpets constantly cleaned, and [there were] some holes in the wall where we put pictures, it was clean," the daughter told my colleague Daphne Chen. "'Trashed' is the farthest thing from any truth at all."

Now, the landlord is threatening to take the tenant to small claims court.