By KERA News & Wire Services
Dallas, TX –
The independent ombudsman for the Texas Youth Commission resigned Monday after her felony indictment for allegedly smuggling a knife into a teenage lockup.
Newly appointed ombudsman Catherine Evans said in a statement that she submitted her resignation. Gov. Rick Perry's office says he has accepted the resignation and said he would appoint a replacement. Perry appointed Evans to be the TYC ombudsman in September.
In the Houston County indictment unsealed in Crockett on Monday, Evans is accused of carrying a knife into an East Texas correctional facility. If convicted, the former Dallas state district judge could face two to 10 years in prison.
Evans says it was "a regrettable mistake" that she forgot a Swiss Army knife was in her handbag.
Texas inmate pulls gun on guards, takes off
A convicted sex offender serving a life sentence pulled a gun on two guards during a prison transfer today.
State prison officials say 49-year-old Arcade Joseph Comeaux Jr. held the guards hostage briefly before fleeing on foot in one of the guard's uniforms.
Officials say that at the time of the escape, the inmate was in a wheelchair that he claimed he needed to help move him around. Prison system spokesman Michelle Lyons says the guards were transferring Comeaux from a prison in Huntsville, north of Houston, to one in Beaumont, in southeast Texas, when he made his bid for freedom.
Comeaux took the officers' weapons and handcuffed them together in the back of the vehicle before fleeing on foot. The officers were later found unharmed about an hour later.
Lyons said Comeaux was wearing one of the officer's gray uniforms and black boots and took the guards' weapons, a shotgun and two semiautomatic pistols. He left his own weapon behind.
The Texas Department of Public Safety says several unconfirmed sightings of Comeaux were reported in the Baytown area. The escape triggered a lockdown at Lee College and three campuses in the Goose Creek school district, in and around Baytown.
Engineered edible cottonseed could feed millions
A Texas researcher has found a way to reduce the toxins in cottonseed to make it edible not just for cattle, but also pigs, chickens, fish and humans. Researchers have worked for decades to neutralize gossypol, the poison found in cottonseed that only bovines' multiple stomachs can digest.
Keerti S. Rathore, a Texas A&M University researcher, says he has discovered how to shut off gossypol production in the seeds but leave it in stems, leaves, flowers and tissue where the toxin is needed for protection from insects and disease.
Researchers say the amount of cotton grown worldwide contains enough protein to feed 500 million people per year.
Snow brings traffic woes to parts of El Paso
A short-lived snowfall today covered parts of El Paso, stalling traffic and forcing officials to close a heavily traveled mountain pass.
The early part of the storm that hit around midday today prompted highway officials to close parts of Trans-Mountain Highway, a state road also known as Loop 375 that connects El Paso's far west side to the northeast and parts of Fort Bliss. The snow fell in large clumps just before midday, covering car windows and pilling up on trees and rooftops before being washed away by a steady rain.
The National Weather Service says the mix of snow and rain was expected to continue as a storm front moved east across southern New Mexico from southern Arizona. Winter storm warnings were issued for large swaths of southern and eastern New Mexico and West Texas east and north of El Paso into Tuesday.
Forecasters say parts of the area from southern New Mexico to Hudspeth County, just east of El Paso, could see between three and eight inches of snow in 24 hours. The weather service predicted snow and a wintry mix of snow, sleet and rain were expected to move into the South Plains, Concho Valley and Edwards Plateau on Tuesday.