Balch Springs Police Department Fires Officer Who Killed Fifteen-Year-Old: Your Texas Roundup

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“The reason I applied to so many schools is that I didn’t think I would get accepted to any of them.”

—Amina Mabizari to the Houston Chronicle. The Alief ISD high schooler applied to all eight Ivy League schools, apparently thinking she wouldn’t make the cut. She was wrong. Seven out of eight schools accepted her. The eighth school, Harvard, put her on a waiting list, but she ended up choosing Yale anyway. Congrats, Amina!

BIG NEWS

Officer Involved
The Balch Springs Police Department fired the officer who shot and killed fifteen-year-old Jordan Edwards Saturday night. Officer Roy Oliver fatally shot Edwards when he fired at a car full of teens as they attempted to leave a party. So far, we know police were called to the area in response to reports of underage drinking, and when they arrived they heard gun shots nearby. An attorney representing Edwards’s family said the teen and his friends heard the shots, and they were trying to safely leave a party when Oliver shot Edwards. None of the other teens in the car are facing any charges. Although Balch Springs PD originally claimed the car had been driving “aggressively,” Police Chief Jonathan Haber retracted that statement on Monday after viewing body camera footage from the incident. On Tuesday, Haber announced that Oliver, who is white, had been fired. “From our policies, which I went by, there were violations,” Haber said, according to the Dallas Morning News. “I acted on them.” In a statement through their attorney, family members of Edwards said they were “grateful” for Haber’s decision to terminate Oliver, and said the police chief had made “commendable strides toward justice” in the days since Edwards’s death. But the family also called for the department to take action against a second officer involved in the incident, who has not yet been publicly identified, for his actions following the shooting. In the statement, Edwards’s family said that the teen’s two brothers and two other friends were “manhandled, intimidated and arrested while their brother lay dying in the front seat,” adding that “the officers who extended this nightmare for those children ought to be properly reprimanded as well.”

MEANWHILE, IN TEXAS

UT Stabbing
As the University of Texas at Austin community continues to grieve following Monday’s fatal stabbing attack, more details are slowly coming out about the suspect. Law enforcement officials said on Tuesday that the suspect, Kendrex White, was suffering from mental illness before the incident, but they fell short of identifying a possible motive, according to the Austin American-Statesman. University of Texas Police Chief David Carter said White, a 21-year-old junior biology major, had been “involuntarily committed” recently in Bell County. That’s all we know about White’s commitment at this time. White was arrested by UT police on April 4 for driving while intoxicated. According to an arrest affidavit from that incident, White told an officer that he took “happy pills,” and a report filed by UT police said White told officers he was only supposed to take one 35-milligram pill of Zoloft, but that he had taken two of them at around 4 p.m. the day before. Carter also dismissed rumors that White was targeting fraternity or sorority members. “This was not a conspiracy,” Carter said. “This was not a person that had a vendetta against any particular group. We have solid grounds and reason to believe that the individual was suffering from mental health issues.”

Special Relationship
Governor Greg Abbott signed a bill into law on Tuesday that prevents the state from doing business with any companies who boycott Israel. “You can always count on Texas,” Abbott said at a public ceremony at the Jewish Community Center in Austin, according to the Houston Chronicle. “Any anti-Israel policy is an anti-Texas policy. Texas is not going to do business with any company that boycotts Israel.” The bill had bipartisan support in the Texas Lege, and Abbott has always been a huge Israel fan. According to the Chronicle, Abbott praised Israel on Tuesday for its cultural and economic connections to Texas, and referred to it as an “essential international ally.” According to the Jewish Daily Forward, Texas is the seventeenth state to implement such a law. The signing ceremony just happened to come on Israel’s Independence Day too.

Public Enemies
Summer might be around the corner, but Texas’s pro sports rivalries are already scorching hot. A San Antonian pretty much blacklisted himself in the Alamo City by posting a picture on Facebook of a Tim Duncan jersey engulfed in flames. According to the San Antonio Express-News, David Sheffield-Scott posted the photo with the following poetic caption: “F—k the spurs y’all bout to lose 4-0 to the rockets y’all have absolutely no chance in this series f—k the players and the coaches.” The Rockets surprised pretty much everyone with a blowout victory over the Spurs in game one of the Western Conference Semifinals, so it’s not like the Spurs needed any more motivation before taking the floor in game two tonight. Meanwhile, tempers flared in Monday’s matchup between the Houston Astros and the Texas Rangers, their first series of the season, when an Astros pitcher threw behind a Rangers player and the benches cleared, leading to some pushing and shoving. The Astros stole the first two games of the series and will look to complete a three-game sweep tonight. Whoever you root for, it’s a good time to be a sports fan in Texas.