Buried within a 26-page lawsuit, which I covered as a daily story, was one sentence about a Texas district attorney resigning because he was being investigated for official oppression. Curious, I asked the plaintiff’s lawyer if she knew why the prosecutor was under investigation.
The investigation report that she emailed me prompted me to start my own investigation, and report a series of four stories about how the DA was sexually harassing his first assistant, the drastic affect his behavior had on that female career-prosecutor.
In the midst of newsgathering, I also uncovered a judicial sanction against the district judge in their area for interfering in another court’s cases to benefit his own court coordinator. A deeper dive into appeals and court records from the same judge’s court revealed his propensity for making baseless allegations in angry emails and for calling lawyers and litigants liars, which could amount to judicial misconduct.
Here’s the series:
Report: Ex-Texas DA Jim Wheeler Was Under Investigation for Sexual Harassment When He Resigned
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Female Texas Prosecutor Speaks Out About Alleged Sexual Harassment by Ex-DA
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Sanction: Texas Judge Interfered in Cases to Help His Ex-Court Coordinator, Who’s Now District Clerk
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Texas Judge’s Hot Temper, Stern Tongue Revealed in Court Records
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