Free Republic

The case of the missing 100 brains in Texas has been solved, officials said on Wednesday. And, no, this is not a joke.

New special at Pizza Hut and the Dallas Police Department: Rob a delivery man of a large pepperoni pizza and cash, get a felony aggravated robbery charge thrown in free. Police say Jorge Armando Flores Montenegro 19, admitted to police that he helped rob a pizza delivery man Wednesday night after he was foiled by Caller ID, according to an arrest warrant affidavit. Police tracked back the phone number used in the order for a “Jorge Flores.” And they found a previous address matched the delivery address.

U.S. Rep. Ralph Hall, 91, was hospitalized in stable condition after a car accident Saturday afternoon in Fannin County. Hall, the oldest member of Congress, was taken by helicopter to Medical Center of Plano with serious injuries, said Department of Public Safety Trooper Mark Tackett. A representative for the hospital said Hall was in stable condition. He was conscious and joking with paramedics while he was being taken to the hospital, according to a written statement from his Washington, D.C., office. “Congressman Hall suffered a hip injury and minor cuts and bruises but is expected to make a full recovery,”...

Aledo school district officials have cleared Coach Tim Buchanan of bullying allegations following the Bearcats 91-0 drubbing of Fort Worth Western Hills last week. “They found no evidence of bullying,” Buchanan replied in a text message Wednesday afternoon. Aledo, 7-0 and the state’s top-ranked Class 4A football team, has dominated its opponents this year, averaging 69.3 points per game while giving up 6.7. In District 7-4A play, the Bearcats have won their first four games by an average of 77 points. The latest victory became a point of national interest when a Western Hills parent filed a formal bullying complaint...

A former U.S. Marine who falsely claimed to have been injured on the battlefield to scam charities and others was sentenced Wednesday to four and a half years in federal prison. Michael Duye Campbell had claimed he suffered a combat-related brain injury in Iraq, but he never left the U.S. and was never injured. Federal authorities said it was part of a scheme to get money to pursue his dream of playing on the PGA Tour. Campbell, 30, had pleaded guilty earlier to mail fraud for defrauding charities out of at least $40,000. But the damage he did was far...

An ongoing legal battle between wrestler-turned-governor Jesse Ventura and American Sniper Chris Kyle over an incident in Kyle’s best-selling autobiography did not end with the Navy SEAL’s death in February. Now, the man formerly known as The Body wants to take on Kyle’s widow Taya, according to documents filed in federal court in Minnesota in recent weeks. Their attorneys were in federal court just yesterday, pleading their respective cases to a judge who will have to decide if Taya is now responsible for a tale told in American Sniper about a bar fight Chris had gotten into with a man...

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst blames his stunning loss to Ted Cruz in last year’s Senate race on his campaign team and delays in staging the Republican primary. “We had a hard time finding our voters,” Dewhurst said during a recording of Inside Texas Politics, which airs Sunday at 9:05 a.m. on WFAA (Channel 8). Dewhurst said he had a new campaign team that didn’t understand how to use him. “They didn’t get me,” Dewhurst said. Dewhurst had strong name recognition entering the 2012 campaign season and was expected by most analysts to easily beat Cruz and other contenders for the...

A Garland man was arrested on Monday night after he tried to run down his ex-boss with his pickup truck in a far northeast Dallas parking lot, according to police documents. As an officer drove Marco Alejandro Alatorre, 28, to the Lew Sterrett Justice Center, the man pleaded with them for a second chance for his “mistake,” police said. “Are you going to deport me?” Alatorre said, according to police. “I’ve already been deported once.” snip Alatorre told the officers he was initially looking for his wife because he believed she is cheating on him. Instead, he spotted his old...

Hours after a West paramedic was arrested for possessing a destructive device Friday, the Texas Rangers and McLennan County Sheriff’s office launched a criminal investigation into the fatal fertilizer plant explosion that killed 15 people, injured 200 others and damaged hundreds of homes. But authorities have yet to say whether the arrest of 31-year-old Bryce Reed was related to the April 17 explosion at West Fertilizer Co. Reed was being held by U.S. marshals on Friday after he was booked into the McLennan County Jail. As Reed was due in federal court in Waco on Friday, divergent portraits of the...

A suspected drug dealer remains in the Dallas County Jail today after being taken in for a strip search that revealed a cocaine rock hidden between his buttocks. That’s right, folks, the crack was stashed in his crack. Benjamin David McKinney, 27, faces possession charges, along with resisting arrest after police say he put up quite a fight — in the nude — during the search at Lew Sterrett Justice Center.

BIG SANDY -- A Hawkins man is claiming his civil rights and religious freedom were violated earlier this year when a black man sacked his groceries and a Big Sandy grocery store owner banned the customer from the business. DeWitt R. Thomas filed a federal lawsuit in July against Keith Langston, owner of Two Rivers Grocery & Market. According to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Tyler, Thomas entered the market on March 5 to buy food. He stated in a nine-page, hand-written lawsuit that he told the grocery sacker, a black man, “Wait a minute, don’t touch...

A clerk at a 7-Eleven in Oak Cliff was assaulted by a beer thief Wednesday -- but ended up taking an eye for an eye. . . The suspect, identified as 38-year-old Willie Mayfield (right), allegedly lifted three 12-packs of Budweiser beer and tried to walk out. The clerk confronted him and was punched in the face. He reportedly pursued Mayfield outside and ended up knocking out the suspect's glass eye in the scuffle.

Kay Bailey Hutchison will not run for re-election to the U.S. Senate. In a letter to supporters, Hutchison said she enjoyed serving Texas.

Mario Miramontes figured during the traffic stop that he could conceal his arrest warrant by giving the police officer the name of his cousin – a 25-year-old husband and father who he believed had no scrapes with the law. After all, he had used the name before when in a legal bind. But Miramontes' plan backfired badly when it turned out the cousin also had a warrant – on charges that he had fondled an underage relative. Still, Miramontes, 22, of Dallas, felt that the error would be discovered when his fingerprints were run at the jail. His parole violation...

A Sachse man shot his alleged mugger to death in South Dallas early Friday morning, according to police records. Nicholas Lewis, 22, who lived on Cleveland Street, died in the hospital a few hours after he allegedly held up Jeffrey Hall, 43, in the 1800 block of Pennsylvania Avenue. Lewis pointed a semiautomatic pistol at Hall and demanded his wallet, according to a police report. Hall told police he handed his wallet to Lewis, who started to ride away on a bicycle. But Lewis then turned, according to police, and fired at Hall – missing him and striking his pickup....

Despite 30 years of practice, Nathan Wayne Pugh still hasn't quite gotten the whole crime thing down. His "robbery" of the Wells Fargo Bank in the 4200 block of Lemmon Avenue on July 26 is making the rounds among local police and federal agents. < snip > "This is not a bag of food," the note said, adding that the bag contained a "bom." The note further ordered her to "put money in an envelope and do not make any move till after I have left for ten minutes." The teller, who police said was a recent hire, remained calm....

FORT WORTH (CBS 11 / TXA 21) ― Fort Worth police Officer Wesley Lamb is accused of smoking marijuana while on duty and in uniform. Chief Jeff Halstead announced the arrest at a news conference Wednesday morning. 34-year-old Wesley Lamb was arrested Wednesday morning following a tip from a Fort Worth resident. He's accused of using and possessing marijuana while on duty. Halstead announced the arrest to a group of new police recruits Wednesday morning. He made it clear that this behavior will not be tolerated. Halstead also told the rookies that he has created a special team of investigators...

A handful of Saginaw High School cheerleaders have been disciplined for giving teammates sodas mixed with urine. District officials would not specify how many students were involved but said at least two girls were given in-school suspensions and others lesser punishments. The girls will not be allowed to participate in cheerleading events through the end of the school year but can participate next school year. A parent whose daughter drank the urine-tainted beverage said those involved should be permanently removed from the team. "They shouldn't be allowed to represent Saginaw," said the father, who did not want to be identified...

SURPRISE, Ariz. — Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington will tell his players today that he used cocaine last summer and has completed a baseball-mandated counseling program. A team meeting has been scheduled for 12:30 p.m. at which time the rest of the team will learn of what sources have described as a one-time weak moment by Washington in August. He told the Rangers’ front office — including team president Nolan Ryan and general manager Jon Daniels — and turned himself in to the commissioner’s office within days of the test. A source said that Washington offered to resign shortly after...

At the Dallas CityStore, customers can find affordable furniture, bikes, electronics and other merchandise from the police property room and other city departments. But a city employee was recently surprised to stumble upon a different product: 123 bags of illegal drugs mistakenly shipped over in a file cabinet by the Dallas Police Department Property Unit. "It was a terrible oversight," said Sgt. Warren Mitchell, a department spokesman. "We're going to see where we went wrong and try to fix that problem." The discovery last week came before the cabinet was moved from a back storage room of the store at...