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Wanted: Suspect responsible for Burglary of a Building
Houston man gets life without parole for sexually assaulting pre-teen and teenage girls, including those he knew from church
A Houston man, who was known at his church as “Uncle Al,” has been sentenced to life in prison without parole for molesting four girls, Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg announced Saturday.
“He groomed, molested, and raped these girls, and then he threatened their lives if they spoke out,” Ogg said. “He deserves to spend the rest of his life behind bars.”
Alfredo Lee Johnson, 43, went through a week-long trial before being convicted by a jury of continuous sexual assault of a child for repeatedly molesting a girl who was younger than 14.
The crime carries a minimum of 25 years in prison and a maximum of life in prison and on Friday, a judge sentenced him to the maximum.
Johnson’s behavior went from inappropriate touching to sexual assault from January 1, 2013, to August 5, 2016, according to testimony at the trial.
Jurors heard testimony that “Uncle Al,” who sometimes supervised the children of family friends and people from his church, groomed then raped a 15-year-old, molested a girl under the age of 14, and molested a 15-year-old in Louisiana.
Assistant District Attorney Mary Grace Bullard, who prosecuted the case with ADA Jana Oswald, both of the Crimes Against Children Division, thanked jurors and the judge and noted how important it is that children feel supported when they make an outcry.
“Without support, children are likely to recant in order to survive the situation they find themselves in,” Bullard said. “The first victim only felt safe to tell what happened to her after multiple other victims had outcries because she knew she’d be believed and felt supported by the person she told.”
Wanted: Suspect responsible for Aggravated Assault with a Deadly Weapon
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Ebrard dice que irá por candidatura presidencial en elecciones de 2024
Marcelo Ebrard, canciller mexicano, quiere ser uno de los aspirantes como sucesor al presidente Andrés Manuel López Obrador; es decir, buscará la candidatura presidencial en 2024 ya que, según dijo, para él es un compromiso de vida. ¿Cuál es su objetivo? ¿Sabe con qué partido político se lanzará como presidenciable? Te contamos lo que reveló el canciller mexicano.
Ebrard espera pronta aprobación de OMS a vacunas Sputnik V y CanSinoEU abrirá frontera a personas con vacunas anticovid aprobadas por la OMS: Ebrard En una entrevista radiofónica para Grupo Fórmula, con el periodista Joaquín López-Dóriga, Ebrard se dijo interesado en participar en la contienda, pero señaló que primero tiene que sacar adelante la responsabilidad que tiene en el actual gobierno mexicano como secretario de Relaciones Exteriores.
“Por supuesto, claro que me interesa, es algo que ha sido mi compromiso de vida y ni modo que ahora yo diga que no, pero ahora lo que tenemos que hacer es sacar adelante nuestra responsabilidad”, dijo Ebrard en la entrevista. “Y dentro de dos años o cuando se convoque a participar, ahí estaremos (…) no hay que distraerse porque si te distraes te caes”, añadió. “Pienso, definitivamente y esa es mi convicción, participar de acuerdo a las normas que se den en Morena (partido Movimiento Regeneración Nacional) en primer lugar, que es el proyecto político en el que estoy participando, y Morena ya determinará y nos dirán cómo va a ser el proceso y ahí vamos a estar”, expuso. Las declaraciones de Ebrard ocurrieron horas después de que la alcaldesa de Ciudad de México, Claudia Sheinbaum, también aspirante a suceder a López Obrador en 2024, pidió que Morena elija a su candidato mediante una encuesta a la militancia.
“Es lo que establecen los estatutos del partido al que pertenecemos, es algo en lo que concuerdo y además el presidente siempre lo ha mantenido”, afirmó la jefa de Gobierno capitalina al ser cuestionada en rueda de prensa. Sheinbaum consideró que elegir al candidato mediante una encuesta interna, método utilizado para definir los aspirantes a gobernadores estatales, es “el más democrático” y “una representación de lo que opina el pueblo”. La alcaldesa parte como favorita para ser la candidata presencial del izquierdista Morena en 2024 junto con el canciller Ebrard.
López Obrador cumplió la semana pasada una gira por varios puntos de la capital junto a Sheinbaum, pero el martes descartó en su rueda de prensa matutina que sea su favorita. “No tengo ningún preferido, a ninguna preferida”, recalcó el mandatario, quien defendió que Morena haga una encuesta para definir a su candidato presidencial. En cambio, el líder de Morena en el Senado, Ricardo Monreal, quien también quiere postularse a la presidencia, apostó el martes por convocar elecciones primarias y así “seguir democratizando” el partido. El mecanismo de la encuesta ha sido criticado dentro del partido por quienes consideran que se trata de una metodología poco transparente y que favorece a candidatos afines a la dirección.
La carrera por la sucesión presidencial en México comenzó de manera temprana, a falta de tres años para las elecciones, cuando López Obrador mencionó recientemente a seis posibles sucesores. Además de Sheinbaum y Ebrard, los mejor situados, señaló al embajador mexicano ante la ONU, Juan Ramón de la Fuente; al embajador mexicano en Estados Unidos, Esteban Moctezuma; a la secretaria de Economía, Tatiana Clouthier; y a la secretaria de Energía, Rocío Nahle.
Source: www.milenio.com
Mexico City Replaces a Statue of Columbus With One of an Indigenous Woman
The replacement of a figure seen as a monument to colonialism touched a nerve as the country debates how it is shaped by race and sex.
Statues of Columbus are being toppled across the Americas, amid fierce debates over the region’s legacy of European conquest and colonialism.
Few have been more contentious than the replacement of a monument at the heart of Mexico’s capital, touching on some of the most intense disputes in the country’s current politics, including not just race and history, but also sex.
After prolonged debate, Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum announced Tuesday that the Columbus statue that once gazed down on Mexico City’s main boulevard will be replaced with a pre-colonial Indigenous figure — notably, a woman.
Announced ahead of Ms. Sheinbaum’s expected run for president in 2024, the new statue is widely seen as an attempt by the mayor, who is the first woman elected to lead North America’s largest city, to address — or exploit — the cultural tensions gripping the country, including the growing resistance by women to male-dominated culture.
The new statue “represents the fight of women, particularly the Indigenous ones, in Mexican history,” she said in a news conference announcing the decision on the anniversary of Columbus’s first arrival in the Americas. “It’s a history of classism, of racism that comes from the colony.”
Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has gone farther than his predecessors in denouncing the history of colonialism, celebrating Indigenous culture, and presenting himself as the defender of the poor against the country’s conservative opposition and mostly European-descended elite.
He staged elaborate commemorations this year to mark the 500 years since the fall of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan, located in today’s Mexico City, to Spanish invaders. He toured the country in recent months to apologize to Indigenous communities for colonial atrocities and has demanded similar atonement from the Spanish government.
But Mr. López Obrador has shown significantly less sensitivity to Mexico’s growing feminist movement.
In recent years, Mexican women have increasingly taken to the streets to demand government action against one of Latin America’s highest rates of domestic violence. At least 10 women and girls were murdered in Mexico on average every day last year, according to official government figures, and most of the crimes go unpunished.
Earlier this year, thousands of women turned out to protest in Mexico City, attacking ramparts outside the presidential residence with bats and blowtorches. Feminist protesters have also attacked colonial statues, seeing them as symbols of Mexico’s male hegemony.
Mr. López Obrador has minimized these protests, going so far as to call them an opposition ploy to destabilize his government. Last month, he claimed the feminist movement in Mexico was only created after he took office in 2018.
“They had become conservative feminists only to affect us, only for this purpose,” he said, applying to the feminists a word he often uses to deride his political opponents.
His disparaging remarks have presented a political challenge to his protégé and possible successor, Ms. Sheinbaum, who has tried to position herself as the leader of a more progressive, younger wing of the president’s left-leaning Morena party.
She has also drawn criticism from the feminist organizations by condemning violent attacks on public buildings in 2019.
“Violence is not fought with violence,” she said at the time.
The bronze statue of Columbus, erected in 1877 atop a pedestal in a traffic island, had been defaced by protesters in the past, and officials took it down last year, amid threats of further damage.
In its place will be a replica of a stone carving named “the Young Lady of Amajac,” which was discovered in January in the eastern state of Veracruz and dates to around the time of Columbus’s voyages, more than 550 years ago. The new figure will stand about 20 feet tall, three times the height of the original, now housed in the National Museum of Archaeology in Mexico City.
The choice of a statue of a woman to replace Columbus could appeal to feminists, while at the same time supporting the Indigenous rhetoric of Mr. López Obrador, said Valeria Moy, director of Center of Public Policy Research, a Mexican think tank.
“She is trying to satisfy everyone, especially her president,” said Ms. Moy. “From a political standpoint, the statue choice seems like a good decision.”
But not everyone was pleased, on either side of the cultural divide.
“They are focusing on the statue, without focusing on the rights of women who are alive,” said Fatima Gamboa, an activist with the Indigenous Lawyer Network, a Mexican advocacy group.
Ms. Gamboa, a member of the Maya Indigenous people, said a gesture celebrating Mexico’s Indigenous heritage does little to improve the precarious socio-economic conditions and discrimination still suffered by many Indigenous women.
A conservative former president of Mexico, Felipe Calderón, said the monument to Columbus was a valuable piece of Mexico’s artistic and historical heritage and disagreed with its substitution.
“To remove it, to mutilate it, is a crime,” he wrote on Twitter last month when Mexico City’s government first announced plans to replace it with an Indigenous symbol. “They are robbing it from Mexico City, its residents, and all Mexicans.”
Source: www.nytimes.com
RRC Commissioners Assess More Than $440,000 in Penalties
The Railroad Commission of Texas assessed $443,255 in fines involving 169 enforcement dockets against operators and businesses at the Commissioners’ Conference on Tuesday. The Commission has primary oversight and enforcement of the state’s oil and gas industry and intrastate pipeline safety.
Ten dockets involved $23,805 in penalties after operators failed to appear at Commission enforcement proceedings. Master Default Orders can be found on the RRC Hearings Division webpage.
Operators were ordered to come into compliance with Commission rules and assessed $12,250 for oil and gas, LP-Gas or pipeline safety rule violations. Pipeline operators and excavators were assessed $407,200 for violations of the Commission’s Pipeline Damage Prevention rules. Master Agreed Orders can be found on the RRC General Counsel webpage.
In the absence of timely motions for rehearing, decisions are final as stated in these final orders.
About the Railroad Commission:
Our mission is to serve Texas by our stewardship of natural resources and the environment, our concern for personal and community safety, and our support of enhanced development and economic vitality for the benefit of Texans. The Commission has a long and proud history of service to both Texas and to the nation, including almost 100 years regulating the oil and gas industry. The Commission also has jurisdiction over alternative fuels safety, natural gas utilities, surface mining and intrastate pipelines. Established in 1891, the Railroad Commission of Texas is the oldest regulatory agency in the state. To learn more, please visit http://www.rrc.texas.gov/about-us/.
Michele Wong Krause Elected Chair of DART Board of Directors
On Tuesday, October 12, the Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) Board of Directors elected Michele Wong Krause of Dallas as their chair for a two-year term.
Appointed to the DART Board in 2014 to represent the City of Dallas, Wong Krause recently served as vice chair. She also presently serves on the American Public Transportation Associations (APTA) Executive Committee.
“This is a transformative time for the agency,” said Wong Krause. “DART continues to adapt to our pandemic challenges and develop industry leading programs to serve the needs of our riders, while implementing improved customer experience initiatives that make traveling safer and easier. With the launch of the redesigned bus network next year, North Texas residents will have a transit system that provides greater frequency, longer service hours and improved access to their destinations.”
Wong Krause, a former City of Dallas Associate Municipal Judge, is currently in private law practice with the Wong Krause Law Firm in Dallas. She has previously served on the Board of Governors of the American Bar Association, the Board of Directors of the State Bar of Texas, and the Board of Directors of the Dallas Bar Association.
She graduated from the University of Texas at Arlington with a degree in Political Science before earning her law degree from Southern Methodist University.
Representing the cities of Richardson and University Park, and the towns of Addison and Highland Park, Gary Slagel was elected vice chair. He is the President and CEO of CapitalSoft and was appointed to the DART Board in 2011.
Dallas representative Rodney Schlosser was elected secretary. He is a Senior Vice President, Business Development and Strategic Partnerships at Asurion and was appointed to the DART Board in 2020.
Plano and Farmers Branch representative Robert Dye was elected assistant secretary. Dye is the mayor of the City of Farmers Branch and was appointed to the DART Board in 2020.
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Governor Abbott, TDHCA: Texas Rent Relief Program First In Nation To Provide $1 Billion In Assistance
“The Texas Rent Relief Program continues to provide an invaluable lifeline to Texans in need of assistance on their rent and utilities,” said Governor Abbott. “Texas is committed to helping households who have experienced significant financial strains as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and we are proud to be the first in the nation to achieve this billion-dollar milestone.”
“The Texas Rent Relief program has reached a major milestone, one that wouldn’t be possible without our partners, community, and team members working together to assist Texans in need,” said Bobby Wilkinson, TDHCA Executive Director. “Crossing the $1 billion mark shows we were able to address a great and pressing need that is still present here in our state, but it’s important we continue to work vigorously to get help out as quickly as possible.”
Texans can apply for the program by calling 1-833-9TX-RENT (1-833-989-7368) or submitting it online at TexasRentRelief.com. The call center is open Monday through Saturday, 8 a.m. – 6 p.m. To qualify, households must be at or below 80% of the area median income as well as meet other criteria. Landlords are encouraged to apply on behalf of tenants, who must co-sign the application.
By the numbers:
- More than $1 billion has been paid to more than 174,000 households.
- The program is reaching all corners of Texas, providing assistance to households in 241 out of 254 Texas counties – that’s a 95% reach of the vast Texas territory.
- More than 82% of the households served are either extremely low or low income, falling at or below 50% of their area median income.
- The program is prioritizing people at risk of eviction – more than 15,000 applicants have had their evictions stopped and removed from their credit records and have received more than $126 million in assistance.
- TDHCA provides a public dashboard to report on the program’s performance at TexasRentRelief.com.
Source: gov.texas.gov
Governor Abbott Announces Over $36.4 Million In Funding For Operation Lone Star Initiatives In Texas
“Operation Lone Star is critical to our efforts to secure the border, and we will continue to invest in this operation in order to keep Texans safe,” said Governor Abbott. “The grant funding provided through House Bill 9 ensures that our local partners along the border have the resources and support they need to respond to the border crisis.”
The grants recently announced include, but are not limited to, funding for the following:
Border Prosecution: 31 awards totaling $22.3 million for projects that prosecute border crimes and provide prosecution resources for District and County Attorneys along the Texas-Mexico border and for counties that are significantly affected by border crime.
Operation Lone Star Frontline (Border Adjacent) Counties: 12 awards totaling $14 million to enhance interagency border security operations supporting OLS, including the facilitation of directed actions to deter and interdict criminal activity as well as detain and prosecute individuals arrested for state crimes related to the border crisis. This initial round of funding is directed to border adjacent counties that have issued local disaster declarations due to the imminent threat of disaster concerning border security.
• Brewster County: $926,771
• Culberson County: $424,518
• Dimmit County: $370,973
• Hudspeth County: $1,071,362
• Jeff Davis County: $235,280
• Kinney County: $3,185,272
• Maverick County: $1,578,743
• Presidio County: $822,721
• Terrell County: $339,851
• Val Verde County: $2,843,994
• Webb County: $1,676,618
• Zapata County: $523,894
Texas Border Sheriff Coalition: 1 award totaling $100 thousand to provide training, technical assistance, and coordination of multi-jurisdictional planning activities to border sheriffs in support of Operation Lone Star.
The Governor’s PSO is responsible for administering the OLS Grant Program. Local units of government that are interested in learning more about this program can view the funding announcement via https://egrants.gov.texas.gov/fundopp.aspx. Applicants can also contact PSO via egrants@gov.texas.gov or at 512-463-1919.
Governor Abbott has taken significant action to secure the border in the wake of the federal government’s inaction. Those actions include:
- Signing laws that provide $3 billion in funding for Texas’ border security efforts
- Launching Operation Lone Star and deploying thousands of National Guard soldiers and Department of Public Safety troopers
- Creating a system to arrest and jail illegal migrants trespassing or committing other state crimes in Texas
- Signing a budget authorization to build the border wall in Texas
- Signing a law to make it easier to prosecute smugglers bringing people into Texas
- Signing 9 laws cracking down on human trafficking in Texas
- Signing a law enhancing penalties for the manufacturing and distribution of fentanyl
- Issuing a disaster declaration for the border crisis
- Issuing an executive order preventing non-governmental entities from transporting illegal immigrants
- Taking legal action to enforce the Remain in Mexico and Title 42 policies in Texas
Source: gov.texas.gov
HHS celebra a los ombuds durante su día de concientización
Los ombuds de la agencia manejaron más de 90,000 casos durante el año pasado
En conmemoración del Día del Ombuds el 14 de octubre, Salud y Servicios Humanos (HHS) de Texas destaca el trabajo dedicado de los ombuds que fungen como defensores de las personas que usan los servicios del HHS y de los centros autorizados de atención a largo plazo, y sus familias.
“La Comisión de Salud y Servicios Humanos trabaja arduamente para brindar servicios imprescindibles que salvan y prolongan vidas a los texanos que los necesitan y nuestros ombuds colaboran para asegurar que estos servicios cumplan las expectativas de las personas que dependen de ellos. Es un privilegio servir en un puesto tan importante en un momento en el que los texanos necesitan más de nuestra ayuda”, dijo Joel Schwartz, ombudsman del HHS.
La Oficina del Ombudsman del HHS es un equipo de casi 100 personas que trabajan para resolver problemas entre los consumidores y centros de reposo, servicios de salud mental y de trastornos por el consumo de sustancias, asistencia de beneficios y de Medicaid, el sistema de acogida y otros programas del HHS. En el año 2021 los ombuds manejaron más de 90,000 quejas, preguntas y preocupaciones legislativas.
El Día del Ombuds se celebra el segundo jueves de cada octubre para concientizar sobre la ayuda que ofrecen los ombudsman. El tema de este año es “Ombuds: explorando opciones para resolver conflictos juntos”. Los Ombuds de todo el mundo recordarán el día conmemorando su trabajo en todos los niveles de gobierno, instituciones de educación superior y el sector privado.
En reconocimiento del Día del Ombuds, el gobernador Greg Abbott firmó una proclamación (en inglés)(link is external) para anunciar formalmente su apoyo al trabajo de los ombuds en Texas.
Las personas que necesiten ayuda con los servicios del HHS pueden visitar el sitio de La Oficina del Ombudsman del HHS o llamar al 877-787-8999.
Source: www.hhs.texas.gov