Dallas Criminal Defense Lawyer Blog

August 31, 2013

Top Ten Reasons Texas Should Legalize Marijuana

Eric Holder has given a tentative green light for State recreational marijuana programs to go forward. Given how the last medical marijuana memo has been largely ignored, I’m still a little pessimistic the DOJ will really leave these States alone. Regardless, here are ten reasons Texas should take this opportunity to reform our State’s marijuana laws. As a reminder, possession of any usable amount of marihuana is a 180-days-in-county-jail misdemeanor in Texas. I know, we are insane about weed in the Lone Star State, but it doesn’t have to be this way. On to the list.

1. Willie Nelson. Are we really going to keep arresting Willie? Really? What kind of asshole arrests Willie Nelson for pot. If this was my only reason, it would be enough.

2. It’s safer than booze. Texans drink a lot. Booze kills people. Weed can’t kill you.

August 31, 2013

“No-Refusal” Labor Day Weekend In Fort Worth

by Robert Guest

It’s another No-Refusal weekend across the Metroplex. That means cops are going to seek blood warrant, and hold you down and take your blood vampire style. Murica!

First, let’s remember how we got here. The legislator passed laws limiting the ability of officer’s to hold you down and steal your blood.That wasn’t good enough for our convict-at-all-costs prosecutors, who got activist judges to effecitvely destroy the protections that were in place.

So now officers will fax their fill-in-the-blank warrants to friendly Judge Rubberstamp to take your blood, because the system needs arrests so we can justify more government employees and higher budgets fora agencies.

August 28, 2013

Kaufman County DPS Racial Profiling Statistics

by Robert Guest

As part of the my ongoing open records work I requested the racial profiling data for our local DPS office. I received a breakdown of stops, citations, and searches by race/ethnicity for all stops in Kaufman county for the first 6 months of the year. Texas law requires the recording of this data, which anyone can ask for. Check out my open records 101 guide for a how to.

Let’s look at the data shall we. 13-2328 (13-06-25) letter to requestor.pdf

In the first 6 months of 2013 there were 7,312 total traffic stops by DPS in Kaufman County. 4,744 of those stops had white drivers, 1,685 had black drivers, and 439 had hispanic drivers. Asian, Indian, and “Other” are the remaining choices. I’m assuming Indian means Native American, but who knows.

August 28, 2013

Rockwall Criminal Defense Lawyers- Guest and Gray

by Robert Guest

Pardon the generic title, but I need the internet to know that the Guest and Gray Rockwall Criminal Defense office is for business. Our firm been taking cases in Rockwall for years and we decided it would better serve our clients to open an office there.

If you are searching for a Rockwall criminal defense lawyer let me take this moment to introduce myself. I’m Robert Guest, Chief of the Criminal Defense Division. I’ve been blogging about criminal defense for a few years now. There is some great information available on the left, sorted by category. I’m a true believer member of the NORML legal committee. I think it’s insane and immoral that we arrest pot smokers, sellers, retailers, dealers etc. So if you are charged with a drug crime and want a lawyer who won’t judge you and thinks the drug war is a crime against humanity, consider our firm (and check out my War on Drugs posts).

I’ve been working criminal cases for a decade now. I prosecuted for 2 years, and my former blog was called “I Was The State”, which morphed into this blog. Being a former prosecutor has some advantages, but really it’s overrated. Clients like to know that you use to prosecute, but prosecuting doesn’t teach you anything about defending a case at trial, or investigating a case. It does offer some insight into criminal law, law enforcement, and it gives you a chance to watch some good defense lawyers try cases. Looking back on it, prosecuting was the easiest job I ever had as an attorney.

August 26, 2013

Uber vs. The Dallas Taxi Cartel, with some DWI angles thrown in

by Robert Guest

DMN reports on the ongoing battle of Uber vs. the local taxi cartel. Uber is an app that lets you quickly connect to a taxi cab. It’s easy to use and has quickly gained a following in major cities across the US. Unfortunately for Uber their program is a threat to the Dallas taxi cartel. Instead of learning to compete with Uber and offer a better service, the Dallas Taxi Cartel is seeking to cash in on their influence and make Uber illegal. That’s right, of all the problems we have in Dallas the City Council is wasting time trying to make a taxi app illegal.

Why would the powers that be entertain such an idea. Easy? The Taxi Cartel makes profits by limiting competition. The cab companies uses these profits to “influence” council members and lobby for more anti-competitive regulations. For example, Dallas has an artificial limit on the number of taxis, this means the market can’t respond to demand and the consumer pays more.

So how much influence does the Taxi Cartel have in Dallas? DPD sent the vice out to arrest cab drivers who offered rides through Uber. Read that again, arrest cab drivers for the “crime” of giving rides to people who use an app. Fortunately for Dallas citizens the Vice Squad enforces mostly consensual crimes like prostitution, so their absence isn’t much of a threat to public safety.

August 24, 2013

Tom Pauken Wants To Help Veterans, By Arresting Them For Medical Marijuana

by Robert Guest

Tom Pauken is running for Governor of Texas. He’s nearly identical to Greg Abbott in every way, except Greg Abbott has a lot more money. Tom’s trying to differentiate himself so he recently took to Facebook to tout himself as a supporter of veterans.

Tom was asked if he would support allowing veterans to use medical marijuana, or if he wanted to continue to have them arrested. At first Tom just deleted the comments. (He banned me from his page and removed all my comments).

Finally Tom’s inability to answer this question became really embarrassing so he let loose fired off the answer below. Now remember what the question was; Tom Pauken, who allegedly really loves veterans, was asked if should we arrest veterans who use medical marijuana. Tom’s answer-

August 21, 2013

SWAT Warrior Cops vs. Warrior Cop Author

by Robert Guest

Radley Balko is the leading author on the militarization of our local police forces and wrote “Rise of the Warrior Cop”, which I haven’t read yet but need to. Mr. Balko moved his blog to the Huffington Post, but The Agitator was a great read while it lasted.

Recently, some apologists for military home invasions SWAT raids have sprung up and Mr. Balko is meeting their argument head on. Here’s the link if you are interested.

Remember kids, police officers are government, and the government never wants to give up power, even the power to break up poker games and kill innocent Americans in wrong-house raids. Police departments around the country have gsome shiny new SWAT toys and piles of cash from the federal government, and they want to keep them.

August 21, 2013

Be skeptical about any DPS “Expert” or “Scientist”

by Robert Guest

When you ask potential jurors how they feel about defense experts you will usually hear some voices of distrust. They will think that defense experts are “hired guns” and are approached with some degree of skepticism. I’ve found that many jurors are less cynical when it comes to Department of Public Safety (DPS) experts.

Here is how broken our criminal justice system is. The Department of Public Safety is an agency of the State of Texas. The same State of Texas that is bringing a case against the Defendant. DPS has it’s own army of Troopers who arrests drivers for all sorts of offenses, but mostly make believe “crimes” (drugs) and opinion crimes (DWI).

So after a DPS trooper takes your blood in a DWI case, where do they have this evidence analyzed? At their very own DPS lab! Run by their DPS buddies! The lab will “analyze” this evidence and then show up in court to say…. guess what.. the State should win and the defendant is guilty! It’s like having as A-Rod as the homeplate umpire in the next Rangers-Yankees series.