TEXAS DIGEST
State records show a Texas police chief failed to discipline a sergeant accused of sexual misconduct and helped the sergeant flush drugs down a toilet, potentially compromising criminal cases that relied on the drugs as evidence.
The Hearne City Council on Tuesday suspended police Chief Thomas Williams without pay for two weeks after reviewing an investigative report compiled by Texas Rangers. The council also disciplined three other police staff members.
Rangers determined that Sgt. Stephen Yohner, who resigned last year, had been accused of sexual harassment while working at other police departments and was accused by co-workers of sexual misconduct while with the Hearne police.
The report says Williams was present when Yohner flushed marijuana, cocaine and other drugs down the toilet on his last day of work.
Hearne is northwest of Bryan and College Station.
A suburban Fort Worth couple accused of enslaving a Guinean woman for 16 years has been indicted on federal charges that include forced labor.
A grand jury on Wednesday indicted Mohamed Toure and Denise Cros-Toure, who are the son and daughter-inlaw of a former president of the West African country of Guinea. An affidavit says they brought the victim, then at least 5 years old but perhaps as old as 13, from her rural village in 2000. They forced her to work without pay in their home for years. Authorities began investigating after the victim fled the couple’s home in 2016.
Defense attorney Scott Palmer has said the criminal complaint against his clients is “riddled with salacious allegations, fabrications and lies.”
A former Southeast Texas parole officer faces up to 20 years in federal prison for accepting payoffs in exchange for letting other people provide urine samples for some convicts.
Prosecutors say 33-yearold Ashley Haley of Beaumont pleaded guilty Wednesday to conspiracy to commit extortion under color of official duty. Haley was a Texas Department of Criminal Justice parole officer since 2010. TDCJ spokesman Robert Hurst said Thursday that Haley resigned July 31. She was indicted this month in what court documents indicate was a payoff scam since 2016.
Haley had confidential information on parolees banned from using illegal drugs and facing random urine testing. Prosecutors say she provided details to a parolee, plus let others submit urine samples for parolees, in exchange for cash and goods such as vehicle tires.