White Grandfather arrest by Texas Police While Walking With Black Granddaughter

[Are_grits_groceries]

9. His blog, Grits For Breakfast, is very good!

GRITS FOR BREAKFAST
WELCOME TO TEXAS JUSTICE: YOU MIGHT BEAT THE RAP, BUT YOU WON'T BEAT THE RIDE.

One entry:
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012
Ugly allegations, OK sentencing reforms, and how to quickly fill up your jail
Here are a few, dispareate items that deserve Grits readers attention even if I don't have time to turn them each into individual posts:

Ugly allegations at juvie boot camp
Just in time for Valentines Day, here's a story of staff-inmate romance from a juvie boot camp in San Benito that got the adult staffer fired. The blog Hair Balls adds that the probation officer was found out when the boy bragged to a friend.

Because Texas county jails aren't quite full enough
An estimated 265 Texas law enforcement agencies will participate Feb. 25 in "The Great Warrant Roundup."

Local jail health provider sells out to national company
Randall and two other Panhandle counties contracted with a private company, Panhandle Correctional Care, but the local contractor was bought out by an out of state company from Maryland, reports the Amarillo Globe News. The new proprietors promise no change in the quality of care, but only time will tell. One of the problems with contracting for core services like inmate healthcare is that if the company you contract with sells out, all of a sudden you're stuck with a vendor from out of state who you never chose. One hopes it will work out, but it's a source of instability.

Dallas detective failed to investigate thousands of cases
In Dallas, a family violence detective allegedly failed to investigate thousands of cases, letting the file stack up in his garage. "More than 500 family violence victims were revictimized by the same person" after their cases were assigned to Det. Mickey East, reported Scott Goldstein at the Dallas Morning News (behind paywall). Remarkably, "East retired on Thursday after nearly 38 years on the force." Remarkably, "East had no prior disciplinary history," though he "was facing discipline that could have included termination." No one knows for sure how long this went on, but "Problems with East’s work were uncovered in September 2009, when a new supervisor found that East had entered into their tracking system just 16 cases in a four-year span. Detectives with similar caseloads had entered more than 1,500 during the same period." That speaks not only to Detective East's diligence, or lack thereof, but the supervisory structure that's supposed to oversee him, which is why it's notable that "Internal affairs cases are pending against one of East’s supervisors" related to the incident.
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http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/

His blog is very enlightening about what goes on in Texas.