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Sheriff ’s devious way to stop migrants; Rice’s peeping webcam; don’t cry for Culley.

Give us your tired, your poor, your … set of wheels and large bills? That seems to be the philosophy down in Real County, about 100 miles northeast of Del Rio, where Sheriff Nathan Johnson is under criminal investigation for allegedly having his deputies illegally seize money and property from undocumented immigrants during traffic stops. According to the Texas Tribune, a Texas Rangers investigator says Johnson acknowledged regularly seizing money even from migrants who were not accused of any state crime before he handed them over to Border Patrol. Texas’ infamous civil asset forfeiture law is lenient enough to drive a stolen car through, but Sheriff Pickpocket apparently couldn’t be bothered to follow the simple legal procedure it requires. Instead, he’s accused of simply taking the loot — including cash and in one case, a truck — and classifying it as abandoned or as evidence for potential charges. Johnson defended his record of taking a “strong stand against human smuggling, drug smuggling, and illegal alien traffic.” He didn’t mention his record on highway robbery.

Rice University students who participate in the “Baker 13” tradition of regularly streaking through the campus’ Academic Quadrangle wearing little more than strategically sprayed shaving cream were apparently under the impression that they were doing so under a magical invisibility cloak, impervious to the prying eyes of passersby and omnipresent cellphone cameras. This week, the students cried foul — or fowl? — upon realizing that a new, live-streamed web cam intended to provide an “owl’s eye” view of the beautiful campus to meteorologists, TV news crews and others might offer more exposure than they bargained for. The streakers, in a sudden fit of modesty, complained that the camera, which is six stories high and doesn’t allow viewers to zoom in, might somehow leave them vulnerable to the nefarious surveillance of stalkers, predators and, God forbid, parents! To their credit, Rice officials promptly announced that every month during the nighttime nudist event, they would hit pause on the camera. That’s an ending nice enough for a bedtime story. Now just nestle safe inside that warm, fuzzy invisibility cloak, youngsters, and dream of a land long, long ago where youthful indiscretions lived on only in memories — not on social media — and there existed a marvelous thing called privacy.

David Culley, we hardly knew ye. Our woeful Texans are yet again searching for a new head coach after GM Nick Caserio decided to pull the plug on Culley’s tenure after just 351 days. Though his brief tenure included some baffling on-field errors, most notably accepting a penalty that all but ensured the New England Patriots a win, Culley is a kind and thoughtful coach whom his players respected and played hard for. And in Culley’s defense, he coached a roster devoid of top talent and name recognition (a common challenge on Twitter this season was “name any five *current* Texans players), the team had to start over at quarterback, and yet, the team won four games, one or two more than expected. Culley’s firing leaves the NFL with just one Black head coach. Don’t weep too hard for Culley, though. The Texans owe him the $17 million left on his contract, so he’ll make a total of $22 million for one year of coaching the league’s most anonymous team. If only unscrupulous attorneys general could be bought out the same way.

Allegations of bribery, fraud, an extramarital affair — the evidence of corruption just keeps on mounting in Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office. The latest revelation, though, is particularly shameful. We’d say it hits a new low if we hadn’t already reached the outer core of malfeasance. But this week, after investigating a complaint by the state’s largest newspapers, the Travis County district attorney found that Paxton violated the very open records law he is responsible for enforcing. Paxton has four days to turn over his communications from last January when he rallied in Washington with Trump supporters right before the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection. If he doesn’t, he’ll face a lawsuit. We can’t imagine why Paxton would try so hard to conceal public records. It’s almost like he’s got something to hide.

It was the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. who said that “darkness cannot drive out darkness. Only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.” The spirit of that message must have been with Cypress-Fairbanks ISD Superintendent Mark Henry on Thursday as he addressed a raucous meeting full of people outraged and hurting over comments an elected board member made Monday that quickly went viral and prompted resignation calls. The board member, Scott Henry, who ran on a platform opposing “critical race theory,” blasted a training session that discussed “white privilege” and seemed to dismiss the importance of diversity among CyFair’s teachers by comparing Houston ISD’s relatively high percentage of Black teachers with HISD’s dropout rate, which is higher than Cy-Fair’s. The superintendent, Mark Henry, denounced the comments and seemed to lift spirits by sharing his personal evolution from a small-town East Texas native to a proud grandfather of seven kids whose mixed ancestries run the gamut from Asian to Hispanic to African American. One, whom he calls his “prince,” belongs to Henry’s daughter, a member of the LGBTQ community. They’ve helped him, he said, understand the importance of kids having teachers who look like them or have similar backgrounds. He said the district is “more committed than ever” to recruiting teachers who reflect Cy-Fair ISD’s diversity.