Last month Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Elsa Alcala issued a dissenting opinion which accused the majority of failing to protect the constitutional right of a Hispanic defendant to have a translator present at his criminal trial. In her dissent, Judge Alcala, who was joined by Judge Cathy Cochran and Judge Cheryl Johnson says…

The crime rate is down, and fortunately, so is the number of people in Texas prisons. Texas is one of seventeen states that are in the early stages of a criminal justice reform program which takes the money that is being saved by reducing prison populations and invests it into programs designed to reduce first-time…