Polk County Enterprise (Livingston, Tex.), Vol. 128, No. 8, Ed. 1 Thursday, January 28, 2010 Page: 1 of 16
sixteen pages : ill. ; page 22 x 12 in. Digitized from 35 mm. microfilm.View a full description of this newspaper.
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••••:•••••:••. •
Local Weather
51/30
Sat
1/30
Mostly cloudy Highs In the low
50s and lows in the low 30s.
Sun
1/31
54/35 £j
-Jim*'
Abundant sunshine. Highs in the
mid 50s and lows in the mid 30s.
Mon
2/1
58/45
‘V'VN'X'A
Showers. Highs in the upper 50s
and lows in the mid 40s
Tue
2/2
69/42
Mostly cloudy Highs in the upper
60s and lows in the low 40s.
f 2009 American Profile Homotown Content
Service
Index
Bulletin Board........
......2B
Classified................
4B-6B
Crossword..............
......4B
Community Calendar,
........5 A
Obituaries...............
......6A
Official Records.....
......2A
Opinion...................
......4A
Living......................
1B-3B
Sports.....................
7B-8B
*0 4 8 7 9
/
1 9 7 8 7
PfiPTill
ENTERPRISE PHOTO BY CORDON LEBARRON 3Ct j V j t \CS.
Onalaska
man killed in
rollover crash
Twelve Livingston
firefighters work to
free an Onalaska man
from his Chevrolet
S-IO after it over-
turned on Hwy. 146
South at Bird Road at
2:15 p.m. Thursday.
John Burton Edwards,
58, of Onalaska was
pronounced dead at
the scene. The crash
is under investigation
by the Texas Depart-
ment of Public Safety.
Edwards and his
wife Rosa have been
active supporters of
the Onalaska Junior
ROTC and other youth
| Volume 128 Number 8
The Dominant News and Advertising Source in Polk County
Price: 50 cents |
.....R8*
ENTkurmiE
www.easttexasnews.com
Fri A
V" 48/32
1/29 v^\\;
Showers and thunderstorms
Highs in the upper 40s and lows in
the low 30s.
Registration 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Gourd Dance I p.m. to 6 p.m.
Grand Entry 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.
Contestants begin earning competition
points at 2 p.m. during the first grand entry.
An adult category has been added for this
year’s event — 1st, 2nd and 3rd places will be
presented in the Men’s Traditional Contest.
For details, call Delbert John Johnson at 936-
329-0771 or email ACchildren@yahoo.com.
UPS 437-340
Sports
All-District Offensive
Lineman Mark Reyn-
olds, shown with Coach
Walter Fortune, was
honored at the Fall ath-
letic banquet Jan. 21.
t
See Sports, Pg. 7B
Living
2009 Miss Polk Coun-
ty crowns her succes-
sor Saturday night at
LHS Auditorium.
----See Living, Pg.TH -
Quote for
the day
"The mind is
not a vessel to be
filled, but a fire to
be kindled
— Plutarch
(46-119)
Ancient Greek author
'Career criminal' gets 7 years for
stealing grease from restaurant
Misdemeanor thefts cause major environmental damage
ENTERPRISE FILE PHOTO
Dancers entered in the Tiny Tot division at last year’s Chi I
dren’s Pow Wow show off their regalia as they prepare to
compete. I his year's competition begins at 2 p.m. Saturday
at the Alabama-Coushatta Multi-Purpose Center.
Death row blog shows
cop killer using cell phone
LIVINGSTON — A condemned
San Antonio law enforcement kill
er sent a photo of himself out of
Texas’ death row two years ago
using a smuggled cell phone, offi-
cials told^i reporter for the Austin-
Ainerican Statesman Tuesday.
The case confirms what prison
officials have long suspected, that
convicts — even those on death
row, which is supposed to he the
most secure part of Texas’ mas-
sive prison system — have had
Internet access with smuggled
cell phones, according to reporter
Mike Ward in a story published on
the Statesmen's web site Tuesday.
“We’ve known if they had a
phone, they could have Internet
access, but this confirms it. if
there was any doubt,” said John
Moriarty, the inspector general for
the Texas Department of Criminal
Justice, which runs the state’s pris-
on system. “It underscores that we
need jammers for these phones to
ensure public safety.”
Authorities said the latest epi-
sode involving smuggled phones
in Texas prisons surfaced after a
photo of Joshua Maxwell, 24, sen-
tenced to death for gunning down
a Bexar County deputy sheriff in
2(XX), appeared on “an inmate cor-
respondence Web site” and was
reported to prison officials on
Monday by an anonymous caller.
Investigators confirmed the
photo tvas of Maxwell in a pris-
on cell, but with facial hair and a
background color that was differ-
ent from the walls of his current
prison cell.
“We think we’ve tracked it
down,” Moriarty said. “We deter-
mined we had confiscated a cell
phone from (Maxwell) in 2()08.
We found him with it in his cell.
His appearance back then was
consistent with what he looked
like in the photo.”
Moriarty said the matter remains
under investigation. By Tuesday
afternoon, he said, the photo had
been removed from the Web site,
which officials declined to identify
because of the ongoing inquiry.
Moriarty said the revelation
that a death row prisoner had
Internet access underscores the
importance of getting technology
that will allow cell phone traffic
to be jammed in prisons in Texas
and other states. Such jamming is
prohibited under a Depression-era
law that has sparked controversy
for more than a year.
Prison officials in more than 30
states have endorsed the change.
Cell phone companies have cau-
See CELL PHONE. Page 2A
# e*
cOCkiNQ MU
WARNING
iiSo) 392-BVP
ENTERPRISE PHOTO BY LYNN BROWN
The grease containers behind virtually every fast food restau-
rant contain about $600 worth of biofuels ingredients. Thieves
can hit several containers in a single night and sell it t,o shady
wholesalers for about $2,000. ,
BY VALERIE REDDELL
Editor
polbie w.s @gmail. com
LIVINGSTON - A former
Texas Ranger and a retired Houston
homicide detective credited
Livingston Police and tenacious
prosecutor Beverly Armstrong for
finally sending a "career criminal”
to prison who they have been
pursuing for years.
Al Cuellar was a Texas Ranger
from 1978 to 1996 and now works
in corporate security for Griffin
Industries. He and F.P. Scoggins,
a retired detective for Houston
Police Department who spent
time in the homicide and narcotics
division, now do their sleuthing
for Griffin Industries, a biofuels
manufacturer.
Many of their investigations
follow thieves who raid containers
located outside most fast food
restaurants to collect spent cooking
oil. /
The restaurant grease sells for
about 26 cents a pound, and a full
container holds about 2,250 pounds
— with a value of $500 at less
reputable wholesalers.
“In Texas, the theft al each site is
a misdemeanor, hut each theft also
results in a spill and causes serious
environmental damage,” Cuellar
said. “In Austin, these cases arc
aggressively investigated by the
Texas Parks and Wildlife
See HOT GREASE, Page 2A
Children’s Pow Wow Saturday
Polk County CSI
gets state of the art
fingerprint ID system
BY VALERIE REDDELL
Editor
LIVINGSTON- Polk County
commissioners approved the pur-
chase of a fingerprinting system
with grant funds that will greatly
enhance the ability of the Polk
County Sheriff’s Office to identify
latent prints at crime scenes and
conlirm identities of people in-
volved in criminal investigations.
The court approved the purchase
of an A FIX Tracker System for
$70,000, using grant funds.
Deputy Scott Wright told com-
missioners A FIX is a sole source
vendor - making the purchase
exempt from competitive bidding
- and would give crime scene in-
vestigators the ability to match la-
tent prints with those entered in a
database maintained by the Texas
Department of Public Safety since
1993 as well as 50 other agencies
on the Tracker System.
“Will this work on fingerprints
off stolen road signs?” Pet. 4
Commissioner Tommy Overstreet
asked.
Wright said fingerprints could
be lifted from some recently re-
covered signs and see if they
matched prints in the system. The
AF1X system will live-scan prints
from an individual who refuses to
give his name or confirm identities
if officers believe the person gave
a fictitious name.
Commissioners also approved
three capital improvement proj-
ects that will be paid out of fund
balances and included on a year-
end reimbursement resolution.
Upgrades to the security system
at the courthouse and office an-
nex will convert panic buttons to a
wireless system to help eliminate
the number of false alarms.
Another upgrade at the Onalaska
sub-courthouse will eliminate the
need for multiple electric meters
and install a manual switch to al-
low the building to use generator
power in the event of a power out-
age.
Pet. 2 Commissioner Ronnie
Vincent said the electrical up-
grades will eliminate a current
expense created by multiple me
See COUNTY, Page 2A
■<
I
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Reddell, Valerie. Polk County Enterprise (Livingston, Tex.), Vol. 128, No. 8, Ed. 1 Thursday, January 28, 2010, newspaper, January 28, 2010; Livingston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth656351/m1/1/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Livingston Municipal Library.