Texas Observer reader, 

Thus, it ends as it began as it begins as it ended. Or something like that.

The state, and to some extent the nation, waits to see who prevails between John Cornyn and Ken Paxton in the May 26 runoffs. Trump could still endorse (and may indeed do so in the gap between press time for this magazine and when you read it), but he let pass the deadline for either candidate to formally drop out. The third GOP hopeful, Wesley Hunt, turned out to be nothing more than a marginal spoiler ensuring said runoff. 

On the blue side, the front-runner from last fall, James Talarico, indeed secured the Senate nomination after all—leaving his truncated tiff with Jasmine Crockett as one of those feverish episodes short-lived enough to feel more like a vexatious dream than history. 

We, meanwhile, soldier on through the inexplicably long gap between our early-March primary and late-May secondary primary (a new name to suit the absurdity). Only two other states are unwell enough to hold their midterm primaries as early as we do, and neither waits so long as Texas to then finish the job. For that matter, most states don’t have primary runoffs at all; instead, they presumably just enjoy the springtime like normal humans.

Yet, here we are, with just a few long weeks and the consciences of a tiny group of hardcore Republicans between us and a likely railroad commissioner who believes that every single Muslim in America should be deported. Godspeed to us all.

And here we are as well (flawless transition), with the Observer’s third issue of the year. 

I’ve been thinking, in the two years now that I’ve been editor, about what our covers should be for. It’s a tricky call. I want them to genuinely catch your interest, so I don’t want you to feel like you’ve basically already read the stories they advertise. At the same time, they can’t be so obscure that you’re perplexed. Sometimes, I think they should be a reprieve from an ambient heaviness; other times, they should be a call to skip brunch and take to the streets. And sometimes, perhaps just one time, they should be a rattlesnake.

May/June 2026 cover (Adrià Voltà/Texas Observer)

This issue’s cover, I hope, will serve as a planted flag. A statement of principle in the face of political headwinds blowing from both sides of the aisle. Something small to hold onto as some Democrats—in this election season without end—subject civil rights to political expediency.

Solidarity,

Note: To be the first to get all the stories in our bimonthly issues, become a Texas Observer member here.

The post Editor’s Letter: Introducing Our May/June 2026 Issue appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Last week the City of Kyle, a fast-growing Austin suburb, interrupted a string of recent victories won by local activists to thwart the further expansion of police surveillance technology across Central Texas. 

On April 21, council members overwhelmingly voted 6-1 to authorize the Kyle Police Department to apply for another state grant—worth up to $381,200—to continue funding at least 38 preexisting Flock Safety automated license plate readers (ALPRs).

Most of the local residents in attendance who spoke on the issue opposed the city’s move to obtain further funding for the artificial intelligence-powered network of surveillance cameras. “There’s one cell-phone tower within a mile of my house, and there’s four Flock cameras. You need a warrant to check my cell site records, but you have more granular data from the cameras than you do from [the cell tower],” David Moss, a Kyle resident, told the city council at the meeting.  

Flock has sold nearly 92,000 such cameras to local police departments across the nation—including more than 10,000 in Texas, according to an open source map of the cameras compiled by DeFlock. The City of Kyle has had them since 2024. The cameras record the license plate numbers of trafficking motorists going about their daily routines and store immense logs of surveillance data that can be queried by participating law enforcement agencies across the nation. The records are stored for at least 30 days before being deleted, except in cases in which the data is pulled from the system for investigative purposes.

Downtown Kyle in 2020 (Shutterstock)

Flock has come under fire from privacy advocates as well as local activists concerned about surveillance technology for allowing law enforcement agencies to conduct unrestricted searches of its data—including for the purposes of immigration enforcement and, in at least one instance, an abortion investigation. 

Flock Media Relations Manager Evan White told the Texas Observer that while the company doesn’t work directly with U.S. Customs and Border Protection or Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), “Agencies choose with whom to share data and can change or revoke their sharing settings at any point.”

Kyle City Council member Claudia Zapata was the lone vote against the grant application. “The fact that we have definitive proof that not only Texas DPS, but agencies across the nation, have tracked our system and used it in order to enforce immigration is, to me, disgusting,” she told the Observer, referring to the Department of Public Safety by its initials. “Some of [my colleagues], not all of them, vocally say that they care about immigrants, yet here is a tool that is being used to create a faster pipeline for their deportation, and they’re still for it.”

Council member Melisa Medina, who voted in favor of applying for a new Flock grant, said at a prior meeting that, “If something were to happen to [my daughter] I would definitely want that technology available, to be able to find that person.”

According to Zapata, Kyle’s internal ALPR policy does not mandate that an officer have reasonable suspicion or probable cause to conduct a search of the city’s Flock data.

Kyle Police Chief Jeff Barnett told council members that officers need only a “valid investigative reason” to conduct searches of the department’s ALPR data. The searches are “logged indefinitely, which allows for regular audits and to ensure our staff are using it in a proper manner,” he said. 

According to audit logs of the city’s Flock system reviewed by the Observer, the Kyle Police Department searched its own ALPR data at least 2,891 times from January through March of this year. The audit logs also show police from 18 other agencies across 10 states conducted at least 117 searches of Kyle’s Flock data that were related to immigration enforcement this year, with well over half of the searches flagged as “ICE.”

The Kyle audit logs also show that DPS conducted at least 10 immigration-related searches flagged as “civil and/or administrative,” which may involve warrants that aren’t signed by a judge. As reported by 404 Media, Texas law enforcement agencies conducted at least 180 searches of ALPR data in connection with immigration enforcement activity from January to May 2025. DPS did not respond to the Observer’s request for comment. 

At least 17 other searches of Kyle ALPR data flagged as civil and/or administrative were conducted by out-of-state police departments, mostly from Florida. The logs show hundreds of police agencies have access to the city’s Flock data. 

Another query, from January 5, by the local police department in Lebanon, Tennessee, listed “Obstructing Justice – Suspicious female filming traffic stop and making comments about ICE” as the reason for the department’s search of Kyle’s Flock data. Both filming police and speaking out against ICE are protected activities under the First Amendment.

Searches like these are why local municipalities have begun pushing back against the rapid adoption and expansion of such technologies, said Kabbas Azhar, a fellow with the Electronic Privacy Information Center. “In general, the use of Flock currently is completely unregulated,” he told the Observer. Even when cities and states do impose regulations, the Flock system is essentially run on the honor system, Azhar says.

Council member Zapata said she’s concerned about the possibility of the Hays County sheriff, who is a Republican, entering into a task force agreement with ICE (which wouldn’t require approval from the Democratic-controlled commissioners court) and using the city’s Flock data to carry out immigration enforcement.  

Under a state law passed during the last legislative session, all county sheriffs must request or enter into a 287(g) agreement with ICE, which deputizes state and local authorities to carry out certain immigration enforcement duties, by December 1. Last year, DPS entered into a task force agreement—the most expansive type of 287(g) arrangement—that effectively deputizes state troopers to act as federal immigration agents. DPS has been particularly aggressive in expanding its arsenal of AI-powered surveillance technology in recent years.  

Last year, DPS entered into a $26-million contract with Flock. (The state then also fined Flock earlier this year for operating without a license in violation of state law.) 

Additionally, anti-surveillance activists remain concerned about how the data is being used in abortion investigations in a state that has largely outlawed the procedure. Last May, for instance, 404 Media reported that the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office in North Texas had entered “had an abortion, search for female” as the reason for conducting a nationwide search of Flock cameras. Despite the local officers’ attempt to frame the search as a welfare check, an affidavit obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) confirmed deputies initiated the search as part of a “death investigation” of a “non-viable fetus.”   

While Kyle has moved to maintain its surveillance infrastructure, other jurisdictions in the region have cut off Flock Safety and other similar tech—thanks in part to organizing led by a “No ALPRs” community coalition featuring over 30 state and local organizations. 

In June, San Marcos and Austin voted against the rapid uptake of ALPRs. While San Marcos voted to block a further expansion of its Flock camera network, Austin completely did away with more than 540 Axon and Flock ALPR cameras after the coalition pressured the city to hit the brakes. In October, Lockhart voted against a proposal to enter into a contract with Flock for seven new ALPRs after similar community pushback. Hays County, where Kyle is located, quickly followed suit, becoming the first county in the state to end its contract, which was for at least six Flock cameras.

In February, however, DPS began essentially overriding the local decisions of Austin and others by installing several Flock cameras within state rights-of-way along the highway after receiving authorization from the Texas Department of Transportation. An investigation by KUT also found that the Austin Police Department has continued to search Flock ALPR data stored by neighboring police departments in Round Rock and Sunset Valley.

Nationally, at least 61 cities have rejected the use of ALPRs, by either terminating contracts or halting further expansions of the technology, according to DeFlock. 

Mackenzie Rhine, a digital rights attorney and EFF board member, told the Observer that the Austin anti-ALPRs coalition is targeting other types of surveillance in the city and elsewhere—like AI-powered security cameras in parks—while also looking at taking the anti-surveillance fight to the state legislature next session.

The coalition is working to develop model state policy based off of Austin’s Transparent and Responsible Use of Surveillance Technology (TRUST) Act, which establishes a framework for how city departments adopt surveillance technologies and guides internal transparency and accountability measures, including restrictions on data retention and sharing and requirements to audit and report how such technologies are being used. 

Last session, state lawmakers took steps toward regulation of AI-powered surveillance technology in passing the Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act, which established the AI Advisory Council to review state agencies’ use of such tech. There were also bills filed to reign in police’s use of ALPRs, but none gained any traction. 

The coalition is now trying to expand its reach by partnering with new members who might be better positioned to communicate privacy concerns to the Republican-dominated legislature. That includes Travis County Libertarian Party Chair Austin Whaley, who, with the coalition, is considering pushing a state constitutional amendment with TRUST Act-like provisions that would require companies like Flock to consider privacy protections in their contracts, including addressing data-sharing agreements with third parties.

Despite the Kyle City Council’s vote to fund Flock cameras last week, Zapata said she’ll continue to work with like-minded representatives in other cities to combat the expansion of surveillance tech. But she also thinks that there ultimately needs to be a statewide legislative response.

“There is so much information that is collected off of these [ALPRs] that is just being funneled into big, expanding surveillance networks,” Zapata said. “It’s something that definitely has to be fought at the state level.”

The post As License Plate Readers Expand in Texas, Privacy Advocates Are Fighting Back  appeared first on The Texas Observer.

In 1999, a Dallas County jury sentenced Charles Flores to death for capital murder after a burglary turned deadly in Farmers Branch. He had been placed at the scene of the crime by an eyewitness who identified him in court—but this was after an officer from the Farmers Branch Police Department hypnotized that witness during the investigation. (The Texas Observer recently released a six-part podcast about the case—The Unforgotten: “Riding Shotgun”—in partnership with Free Range Productions.)

As of 2023, evidence based on hypnosis is no longer admissible in Texas criminal courts. For decades before, though, law enforcement agencies, including the statewide Department of Public Safety, used hypnosis as an investigative tool in thousands of cases. 

Based on changing attitudes about hypnosis and a growing understanding of its flaws as a memory retrieval technique, Flores has attempted to use a 2013 law—Article 11.073 of the state’s Code of Criminal Procedure, often referred to as the “junk science law”—that offers an appeals avenue for people convicted because of faulty or outdated science. Three times, he’s asked the Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) to take another look at his case in this context, to determine whether he should get a new trial.

But, like every other death-sentenced prisoner who has ever tried to use the law, Flores has been unsuccessful. 

The Unforgotten: “Riding Shotgun”

Texas legislators enacted the measure to address the evolution of forensics and the existing statutes’ inability to deal with changing science. But since then, no one on death row has been granted a new trial under the law, and many people who try to appeal based on it are shot down before a court even considers the facts or arguments.

In February, Flores’ attorney appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to address whether—in consistently denying claims like his, which are ostensibly what the 2013 law was meant to address—the Texas court system is following the state’s own laws, or potentially violating people’s federal right to due process. The Supreme Court has not yet decided whether to take up the case, but the decision could have massive implications for both Flores’ case and future appeals in Texas. If the highest court renders a decision in favor of Flores and other potentially wrongfully convicted people, it will likely force the CCA to relax its extremely strict handling of these junk science appeals. If not, relief based on the first law of its kind passed in the United States would remain a pipe dream for most who try to use it. 

More than a thousand people have been exonerated in the United States since 1989 after being convicted based on false or misleading forensic evidence, according to the National Registry of Exonerations. The Death Penalty Information Center reports that about a third of death row exonerations were in cases tainted by some type of junk science. 

Flores’ petition drew support from criminal justice experts, psychology leaders, and even renowned magicians Penn Jillette and Teller, who argue that, as experts in toying with perception, they see the hallmarks of manipulation in the case. 

This isn’t the first time the measure’s effectiveness has been scrutinized. A 2024 report by the Texas Defender Service (TDS) found that the junk science law “is not working to provide relief to innocent people convicted based on false or unreliable forensic evidence.” 

Estelle Hebron-Jones, director of special projects with TDS, told the Observer that when the bill was passed, “It was seen as having the potential to be such a strong tool for people who had claims that were difficult to present in the existing post-conviction landscape.” In reality, cases that seem perfect for the legal pathway are meeting significant roadblocks. 

Flores’ petition to the Supreme Court argues that “copious evidence” in the case—including “junk science, false testimony, official misconduct, and, most critically, actual innocence”—should have been enough to earn him a new trial. But, attorney Gretchen Sween writes, “Texas’s highest criminal court, the sole arbiter of post-conviction relief in death-penalty cases, has dismissed those claims without considering the merits, an act that cannot be squared with the state law.” 

The report by TDS indicates this is a trend. Researchers analyzed appeals filed in the 10 years after the law took effect. In that time, just 15 people received relief based on shoddy forensic evidence—about 20 percent of those who tried. The report’s authors found that the CCA was holding applicants to a much higher standard than the junk science measure dictated. Under the statute, someone has to show that the science used at the time of their trial is suspect, either because new or previously unavailable evidence or science contradicts it. Then, they have to show that the new science or evidence would be admissible and likely would’ve affected the jury’s decision. 

“Instead, [the CCA] usually only grants relief if a person can show evidence strong enough to eliminate any rational basis for their conviction, such as exonerating DNA evidence or an alternate perpetrator,” the report’s authors wrote. This is a nearly impossible bar to surpass, and poses a particular problem when someone doesn’t have an attorney, or there’s no DNA evidence in the case.

Flores is among many on death row who have tried unsuccessfully to argue for a new trial based on shoddy forensic evidence, but he’s one of only seven who have had their cases actually reviewed on the merits. 

Even the case that helped inspire the 2013 law nearly didn’t pass muster with the CCA.

In 1999, the same year of Flores’ conviction, Neal Hampton Robbins was convicted by a Montgomery County jury of capital murder in the case that would be cited as the inspiration for Texas’ junk science law. 

Robbins was found guilty of killing his girlfriend’s 17-month-old daughter after the child was found unresponsive in her crib, for which he was sentenced to life in prison. In the following years, the associate medical examiner who’d determined the toddler’s cause of death had reevaluated the case and changed the cause to “undetermined,” but Robbins remained in prison. The CCA considered Robbins’ case before the junk science law was enacted, and judges pointed out that existing laws lacked a remedy for a case like this, where new scientific knowledge called the evidence used in trial into question. 

Robbins filed another appeal just days after the law took effect, but some of the judges seemed to resent the new statute: Judge Larry Meyers reportedly referred to it as “a clear attempt at a power grab” by legislators. Robbins was ultimately granted a new trial and, rather than re-try the case, prosecutors dropped the charges for lack of evidence. He was released in 2016. 

In a more recent Texas case, Robert Roberson’s conviction and death sentence based on the largely discredited “shaken baby syndrome” diagnosis drew international and legislative attention. Scheduled to be executed in October 2024, Roberson was spared at the eleventh hour when a bipartisan group of legislators found an unprecedented loophole. Some members of the Texas House of Representatives subpoenaed Roberson to testify in front of a legislative committee about the application of the junk science law at a hearing set for after his execution date.

That fall, members of the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence held multiple hearings about the state’s junk science law and Roberson’s case. “Although our focus is Robert Roberson, we’re here because his case has shined a light on our new [junk] science writ law,” said Democratic state Representative Joe Moody at one hearing.

Kate Judson, executive director of the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences, said at the time that Roberson’s case is “one of the most egregious examples” of unreliable forensics being used to wrongly convict someone. Still, he faced another execution date in 2025, which was stopped when the CCA finally sent the case to a lower court to consider the arguments that the method used to determine shaken baby syndrome diagnoses has been debunked. The case is now pending in an Anderson County court.

A third Texas case that got further than most was that of Areli Escobar. Escobar, who was convicted of murdering his neighbor Bianca Maldonado Hernandez in 2011, maintained his innocence, and the forensics lab that conducted the testing in his case was so problematic that it was shut down in 2016—five years after he was sentenced to death. His lawyers argued the forensics from the case, including DNA findings and fingerprint analysis, were invalid. 

The CCA sent the case down to a trial court, and in a rare move, attorneys for the state actually agreed with the defense, saying Escobar deserved a new trial. Even with both sides’ support, his appeal was denied by the CCA. They said he hadn’t proved that the challenges to the DNA evidence would’ve changed the verdict.  

“When the law came into effect, people were hopeful,” said Daniel Woofter, one of Escobar’s attorneys. “It turned out to not actually provide relief to very meritorious cases like Areli’s. We’re still hopeful that … there may be fresh eyes taking a look at this law and the text of this law once more.”

Although today’s Supreme Court is somewhat unpredictable when it comes to matters of criminal justice reform, Flores’ attorney is hoping that the justices can provide their own fresh eyes on appeals that the Texas courts have barely bothered to justify denying.

There was a moment, nearly a decade ago, when it seemed like Flores might succeed in his appeal fight. After he argued that the prosecution’s reliance on a witness who’d been hypnotized had undermined the trial, the CCA agreed the matter was worth considering and sent the issue back to a lower court to further flesh out the evidence before the state’s top criminal court would rule. Remanding the case, Judge David Newell wrote that the CCA owed “a clear explanation for our decision to the citizens of Texas.” 

A Dallas district court held an evidentiary hearing in October of that year. Some of the key players from Flores’ 1999 trial again took the stand, including the witness who’d been hypnotized and the officer who conducted the session. Each side called scientific experts to opine on memory and hypnosis. Sween, Flores’ attorney, argued that the witness’ identification was so important to the state “because there had been so many inconsistencies among their other witnesses.” 

But after all of that, the CCA ultimately denied Flores a new trial without stating the reason—without the “clear explanation” Judge Newell promised. 

The post Texas’ Top Criminal Court Has Stymied the State’s ‘Junk Science’ Law. Will SCOTUS Intervene? appeared first on The Texas Observer.