Texas

Lawyer Chastises Supreme Court for Allowing TX Execution

A lawyer for the inmate executed after a Texas judge would not keep the courthouse doors open for his emergency petition says many people share the blame “for this preventable travesty.” Those who looked the other way include the justices on the U.S. Supreme Court, writes University of Houston law…

Nov 1, 2007 1:29 PM CDT

TX Prosecutor Cites Execution Moratorium

In the latest example of an apparent death penalty moratorium being voluntarily imposed in states throughout the country, a Texas prosecutor in the county with the highest number of death sentences in the nation says she will not seek further executions until the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in an…

Oct 31, 2007 10:28 PM CDT

Wildfire Volunteer Lawyers Can Sue Gov’t, Even FEMA

Volunteer lawyers who help victims of the recent Southern California wildfires will no longer be restricted in the kinds of lawsuits they can bring on behalf of their clients. Now lawyers can sue local, state and federal agencies, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which sponsors the disaster legal aid…

Oct 29, 2007 8:15 PM CDT

Marketers Sued for Mailings to Bump Seniors from No-Call List

Several states are suing insurance marketers over their attempts to bypass a ban on phone solicitation by mailings to seniors. The marketers are sending mail to seniors asking them to return a so called “lead card” requesting more information about estate planning or other topics, the Wall Street Journal reports…

Oct 26, 2007 1:35 PM CDT

Owen Wilson Eats Lawyers’ Cookies and Runs

Actor Owen Wilson (Wedding Crashers, You, Me and Dupree, and the big-screen remake of Starsky & Hutch) had a hankering for a snack, and the American Bar Association was only too happy to help. The ABA’s Board of Governors met Oct. 19 at the Four Seasons Hotel in Austin, Texas,…

Oct 25, 2007 6:03 PM CDT

Bad Police Lab Work Is Good News for 19 TX Inmates

Nineteen Texas inmates have received an offer of a free lawyer to review whether they were wrongfully convicted because of shoddy blood analysis work. The offer is a result of a report issued by a special investigator who identified 180 cases that could be flawed because of bad blood work…

Oct 23, 2007 1:23 PM CDT

Texas PI Practice Opens LA Office

A 28-lawyer Texas personal injury firm is establishing an outpost in Los Angeles. The Lanier Firm, founded by W. Mark Lanier in 1990, will initially focus three lawyers on its new LA office. They are: Lanier himself, who will head the office while continuing to practice in Houston, counsel Shepard…

Oct 18, 2007 5:16 PM CDT

Judge Targeted for Refusing After-Hours Lethal Injection Appeal

Twenty lawyers have filed an ethics complaint against the presiding judge of Texas’ top criminal court contending she should have kept the court open past 5 p.m. to accept an emergency appeal on behalf of a death-row inmate scheduled to die later that day. The complaint against Presiding Judge Sharon…

Oct 11, 2007 4:42 PM CDT

Lawyer’s TV Ad Claims Rival is Nonlawyer

A Texas personal injury lawyer has paid for TV ads asserting that a partner in a Corpus Christi law group is not a lawyer. The lawyer in the ad, Thomas Henry, has also filed a complaint with an unauthorized practice of law committee, Texas Lawyer reports. Henry wants a determination…

Oct 10, 2007 1:52 PM CDT

TX Firm Cuts Billable Requirements

A Dallas-based law firm is cutting billable-hour requirements to give new associates more time for training. Strasburger & Price says associates need only work 1,600 hours the first year at the firm, down from a prior requirement of 1,920 hours, the National Law Journal reports. But the firm expects the…

Oct 9, 2007 12:24 PM CDT

TX Law Firm Dodges $1.4 M Emotional Distress Award

The Law Offices of Windle Turley saw the tables turned when an ex-client won a $1.4 million judgment for emotional distress after the firm sued him for legal fees. Now a Texas judge has set aside the verdict, Texas Lawyer reports. The law firm had sued ex-client Robert French to…

Oct 8, 2007 12:24 PM CDT

Arson Fire Destroyed Home of TX Justice, Marshal Says

A June fire that gutted the home of Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina was arson, the fire marshal has concluded. Investigators have subpoenaed cell phone records of the judge’s family members and friends, six of whom have been identified as “people of interest,” the Houston Chronicle reports. Family members…

Oct 4, 2007 3:21 PM CDT

Stubborn Juror Won’t Vote

“What do we do when a juror refuses to vote?” That was the handwritten note submitted yesterday to the federal judge overseeing the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing case, the Dallas Morning News reports. U.S. District Judge A. Joe Fish of Dallas sent the jurors back for more deliberations with…

Oct 4, 2007 2:22 PM CDT

This Defense Upheld: Client ‘a Dad-gum Mess’

A Texas appeals court has upheld a DWI conviction even though the defense lawyer called his client’s life “a dad-gum mess.” A dissent argued the defense lawyer “effectively became a second prosecutor in the case,” Texas Lawyer reports. The defendant, Archie Doyle Martin Jr., took the stand, allowing the prosecution…

Oct 3, 2007 12:13 PM CDT

Texas Halts Lethal Injection

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has halted the execution of a death-row inmate scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection today. The Texas court issued a stay late last night for Heliberto Chi after the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision a week ago to consider the constitutionality of…

Oct 3, 2007 10:57 AM CDT