Results tagged “drunkdriving”

Good morning, Houston. We've seen various incarnations of Google, but this one was new to us. Blackle is a search engine that is very similar to Google, but with a darker color scheme. And it's not just Google for the depressed - it's meant to save energy. A predominantly black screen requires less energy to display than Google's white background. One blog said that Blackle could save 750 megawatt-hours a year (or $75,000), if...

More on the deaths of Leon and Maurine Roberson, the couple who were killed Oct. 18 when a speeding wrecker driver broadsided their car: Assistant Harris County DA Warren Diepraam says the wrecker driver, Sergio Gonzalez, had cocaine in his system at the time of the crash. Gonzalez hit the Robersons' car as they left church in the 11800 block of Wallisville Road; according to reports, Gonzalez was going 20 or 25 mph above the...

HPD's plan to encourage police officers to work overtime to make up for a staffing shortage seems to be working — at least in terms of the overtime. The Chronicle reports today that the number of HPD officers earning more than $50,000 in overtime soared in 2006, totaling 70 — three times as many as earned that much in 2005. The four officers at the top of the list took home more than $100,000 in...

Today, KHOU takes a cursory look at the number of people arrested for drunk driving in Houston and finds that it has dropped significantly over the last couple of years — from 6,120 in 2004 to 4,737 last year to 3,709 so far in 2006. A drop of nearly 40 percent is good, right? Well, maybe not. Houston City Councilman Adrian Garcia says one of the reasons for the decline is there are fewer officers...

Everyone's favorite local investigator of things people often don't care about, Amy Davis, is at it again. According to a KPRC investigation, Rice students might be getting a pass on drunk driving from campus police. Here's our favorite part of the story (besides the video of the half-naked coeds trying to dance): "There's a beer keg in the bathroom and punch in the refrigerator. This is Rice University's annual night of decadence where scantily...

So if you ever find yourself on the tail end of a hard night of partying and wonder if you really had a good time, we have a suggestion: Look around and see if you're passed out in the middle of traffic. A 19-year-old found himself in that situation in southwest Houston this morning; unfortunately, we don't have a whole lot of details. Here's the report from KTRK:

The battle between the fuzz and drunks in public seems to never end, doesn't it? Earlier this year we saw the state step up its crackdown on drunks in bars, and now we hear HPD plans to increase its drunk driving enforcement. Can't be drunk in a bar, can't be drunk in a car — we guess we're just gonna have to stay home with our Mickey's from now on. The increased drunk-driving enforcement in...

John Hamilton Parker, a 15-year veteran of HPD, has been a hard worker this year. In January, he reported arresting a woman wanted on a drunk driving warrant and taking her to a county psychiatric center for a mental health evaluation. In February, he said he arrested a man wanted for the aggravated sexual assault of a child and transported him to the Harris County Jail. The problem: He apparently didn't actually do either of...

The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission has suspended its crackdown on drunks in bars while it investigates complaints from legislators and the public about how the program is run. The TABC stepped up arrests of intoxicated people in bars in September after the Legislature approved funding for 120 new TABC staff members, including 59 new agents, to help the agency decrease drunk driving. The idea was to keep people from being drunk in bars, which in...

Didn't Houstonist tell you that the state's crackdown on drunks in bars would change when it started affecting tourism? Ah, we were so right: The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission has announced it will conduct an internal investigation of the program and will start retraining officers. TABC spokeswoman Carolyn Beck said officers will continue to arrest exceedingly drunk people, but the commission is taking complaints — of which there have been many — seriously.

It looks like the Texas' stepped-up enforcement of the no-drunks-in-bars rule is starting to hit the state where it really hurts: in the pocketbook. Phillip Jones, president and CEO of the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau, said he's gotten calls from hundreds of people concerned about the crackdown. Two groups — one with almost 25,000 people and another of several thousand — have said they're not considering Dallas as a convention site because of the...

State lawmakers are planning to take another look at the crackdown on drunks in bars after public outcry over busts at 30 Dallas-area bars this month. And it does seem people are pretty ticked off about the whole thing:

Police are still investigating the stabbing death of a man in southeast Houston early this morning Mayor Bill White said he plans to testify in federal court Wednesday about how the city has changed the Safe Clear towing plan to comply with a judge's orders Prosecutors are asking a federal judge to give a life sentence to an accused Victoria smuggler who they say was responsible for the deaths of 19 illegal immigrants in 2003...