Javier Peña, as a character, was popularized through the Netflix series 'Narcos.' But the story of the real Peña—who lives in San Antonio—and his quest to end the reign of Pablo Escobar is bigger than a screen.
Drugs
A case of carrots and the customs checkpoint in Pharr.
A report in today’s Austin American-Statesman shows the Texas Department of Public Safety was responsible for just 10 percent of all the drug seizures along the Texas border despite the state surge.
A Nigerian-born Louisiana man says he’s a chief and not a “witch doctor,” and his case recalls a far more horrible one from 26 years ago.
A Brazoria County task force executed a 21 Jump Street-style sting in area high schools over the past several months, culminating in the arrests of six students.
An old friend says Houston’s Benthall, the alleged administrator of online drug emporium Silk Road 2.0, is an even unlikelier drug lord than Austinite Ross Ulbricht, who is currently on trial for running Silk Road 1.0. Which is not say that she thinks Benthall is innocent...
For many military veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder, their only relief comes from a drug that is illegal in Texas: marijuana. Can a growing band of cannabis advocates persuade our legislators to change that?
Former Cowboys receiver Sam Hurd was arrested after attempting to set himself up as a Chicago drug lord—while he was drawing a veteran's salary from the Bears—and this week he revealed to Sports Illustrated how many of his former teammates in Dallas he sold "the loudest weed in California" to. How big of a problem are pot-smoking NFL players?
A dramatic increase in border security over the past six years has made the Sierra Blanca inspection station one of the nation’s toughest. And I oughta know.
Or so says the new Christmas song by singer-songwriter Kevin Fowler, who talks about his new holiday track, "Santa Got Busted by the Border Patrol."
Four police officers in the Rio Grande Valley, including the son of Hidalgo County sheriff Lupe Treviño, are accused of taking payoffs to protect cocaine shipments along the Mexican border.
Already running gunboats on the Rio Grande, the Texas Department of Public Safety has now purchased a manned spy plane to police the border.
UPDATE: The Hudspeth County Sheriff's department bites back at Fiona Apple's public comments about her Sierra Blanca bust.
A 22-year-old Waco man allegedly beat, choked, and ate parts of his family dog in a K-2-fueled rage.
The feds raided Jovitas, an old Austin establishment, and arrested fifteen people they say were involved in a heroin distribution ring.
According to a new e-book, "it became an open secret that he was using painkillers in sufficient dosages to keep him standing through the two-hour debates."
Walker, Texas Admiral, anyone? DPS will launch six gunboats on the Rio Grande to fight drug trafficking.
Photos of five Texas news stories that captured the nation's attention this month.
A county commissioner was accused of distributing 110 pounds of marijuana, a tenured UTEP professor violated university policies, a suburban mayor dined at Hooters with city money, and mayoral candidate got a lap dance in his campaign office.
Sheriff's deputies arrested 26-year-old Ricardo Luna, who allegedly tried to use crack cocaine as payment for a $10 lap dance at the XTC Cabaret strip club in Austin.
This time, Armie Hammer, who played the Winklevii twins in The Social Network, was (allegedly) busted with "special" sweets.
The cocaine goes north. The money goes south. And Mexican kingpins like Juan García Abrego laugh all the way to the bank—a Texas bank, that is.
A visit to San Antonio’s underground city, looking for kids with a can of paint and a nose for thrills.
Gilmer High School Principal released a statement to parents cautioning against use of digital drugs as a danger to East Texas teens.
The Texas Historical Commission's markers are now eligible for their own plaque, Ron Paul and Sheila Jackson Lee are the Hill's best talkers, and the TCU drug bust was a bit pitiful.
Plus, Josh Hamilton's first interview since his relapse, El Paso's Komen Race, and George H.W. Bush's hosiery.
Fifteen TCU students, including four members of Gary Patterson's Horned Frogs football team, were among eighteen people arrested on drug dealing charges.
After the Texas Rangers' outfielder publicly relapsed, fans and columnists alike had opinions about Josh Hamilton the Player. But what about Josh Hamilton the Recovering Addict?
The rapper takes a marijuana bust in the same place that tripped up his good friend Willie Nelson.
Two suspects arrested at a Whataburger outside of Houston find a unique way to kill time while being taken to the precinct.
Poodie Locke, longtime stage manager for Willie Nelson, died Wednesday at the age of 60.
The life of Roky Erickson—one of the most influential Texas rock and rollers of all time—has been one calamity after another. His family and friends have taken care of him with the best of intentions, but you know what they say about the road to hell.
Twenty-two years ago a Texas Ranger was shot and killed during a drug raid on the home of Greg Ott, a philosophy graduate student. Even today, no one really knows what happened on that tragic night.
With its optimistically broad streets and oversized cantilevered homes, Plano is the suburban ideal taken to its extreme, and its exaggerated scale often gives rise to exaggerated problems. Heroin addiction is only the latest.
Even by South Texas standards, the undoing of Starr County sheriff Eugenio Falcón, Jr., was one for the books.
Except for the time she spent as a police officer in Plano and Tyler—when she couldn’t get past the “emotional shutdown” required by the job—Kim Wozencraft has always been a writer. She kept a journal as a child, as a student at Richland College in Dallas, and later, during a…
In 1979, as an undercover cop in Tyler, I got hooked on drugs. Nearly two decades later I’m clean, but the consequences of my addiction haunt me still.
Now that Joe Chagra is dead, it’s time to clear his name in the 1979 assassination of San Antonio federal judge John Wood.
When the double life of pioneering record producer Huey Meaux was exposed, it was time to face the music: How well did I really know the legend I once called my friend?
Texas’ top drug lawyer helps dope dealers and cocaine kingpins beat their raps—and he’s proud of it.
Kim Wozencraft meant to spend her life putting drug pushers behind bars—until she became an addict. Now, more than a decade later, she’s fighting against the justice system she once embraced.
Bob Doherty was a Texas ranger who believed in the myth of the Old West; Greg Ott was a college dope dealer, a child of the sixties. When they met, it destroyed both their lives.
What is it like to miss the sexual revolution (and some others) by a mere handful of years?
