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permission or official appointment from the court before filing the writs. She said, "There was no authority whatsoever for them to take those casesAnd this is the thing that kills me: They tried to double-talk their way out of it and pretend like there was some arrangement that gave them the authority. And they have still not come clean on it."
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Keel was unwilling to work with the public defenders after the dispute, and between 2014 and 2016 she appointed only one public defender in her court. On this issue she has said "They think 'oh we're doing all this great work, We're gonna be the hero They certainly wanted to take on all these easy
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crime lab, Jonathan
Salvador, had intentionally falsified lab results, calling into question the validity of nearly 5,000 drug cases. Four hundred of those cases were in Harris Country where Keel was serving as a State District Judge. The district attorney's office requested help from the Harris
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on behalf of the defendants in various courts, including Keel's. However, because public defenders are only appointed to represent defendants after a judge finds that the defendants are indigent, Keel's position was that the public defender had circumvented her judicial authority by not seeking
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in order to get out of jail because of backlogs in drug testing at the
Houston Police Department crime lab. Some of those drugs tests came back negative several months or years later. By the summer of 2016, it was estimated that nearly 300 people had been
192:, yeah, they got carried away—but not out of the goodness of their heart." The public defender's office has denied this saying "If you talk to anyone at the DA's office, they'll say they asked us to do this."
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She ran against incumbent Larry Meyers, who was expected to lose after he switched party allegiance to become a
Democrat. In the Republican primary, she ran against
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District Judges Chris Oldner and Ray
Wheless. Keel described Wheless as 'deceptive and inaccurate." When she ran she had 31 years of criminal legal experience.
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141:. She had previously served as assistant district attorney in Harris County. She received her undergraduate degree in English from the
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Keel is from a well-known Austin political family and has five brothers. She speaks
Spanish and is a volunteer interpreter for
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reports that the dispute was about "how, or even if, public defenders were allowed to help those 400 people get new trials."
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County Public
Defender's Office to retry hundreds of cases, but a dispute arose between Judge Keel and the
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In a second controversy it was discovered that hundreds of defendants had pleaded guilty to
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cases—it makes their stats look good. If they can get a bunch of these slam-dunk
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in 1985. Her husband, Jim
Hippard Jr., is an attorney. They have three children.
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since 2016. Between 1995 and 2016 she presided over the 232nd
District Court in
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320:"Judge Accuses Harris County Public Defenders of Flouting Rules"
290:"Fort Worth's Meyers: last Democrat standing statewide in Texas"
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263:"Candidates cite politics as key to criminal court race"
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204:. The public defender started filing writs of
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242:"TJB CCA About the Court Judge Mary Lou Keel"
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188:where almost everyone's going to be granted
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771:University of Houston Law Center alumni
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776:21st-century American women judges
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393:Statewide political officials of
167:found out that an analyst at the
165:Texas Department of Public Safety
761:People from Harris County, Texas
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151:University of Houston Law Center
261:McGaughy, Lauren (2016-02-01).
135:Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
35:Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
348:Dallas County Republican Party
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741:21st-century American judges
318:Flynn, Meagan (2016-10-27).
105:University of Texas, Austin
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145:in 1982. She received her
671:Court of Criminal Appeals
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502:Agriculture Commissioner
133:has been a Judge of the
746:American women lawyers
519:Railroad Commissioners
601:Trey Martinez Fischer
591:, Speaker pro tempore
550:President pro tempore
114:University of Houston
139:Harris County, Texas
456:Lieutenant Governor
223:translatingcuba.com
143:University of Texas
715:Michelle Slaughter
546:Charles Schwertner
465:Secretary of State
766:Texas Republicans
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681:, Presiding Judge
603:, Minority Leader
597:, Majority Leader
563:, Minority Leader
557:, Majority Leader
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267:Houston Chronicle
202:wrongly convicted
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700:Scott Walker
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620:Nathan Hecht
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163:In 2012 the
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147:Juris Doctor
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69:Larry Meyers
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695:Kevin Yeary
580:Dade Phelan
537:Dan Patrick
484:Comptroller
480:Glenn Hegar
467:(appointed)
461:Jane Nelson
452:Dan Patrick
443:Greg Abbott
411:John Cornyn
96:Jim Hippard
65:Preceded by
735:Categories
661:Evan Young
646:Jane Bland
515:Jim Wright
498:Sid Miller
471:Ken Paxton
353:2017-11-22
329:2017-11-22
299:2017-11-22
272:2017-11-22
247:2017-11-22
229:References
87:Republican
541:President
149:from the
101:Education
44:Incumbent
447:Governor
416:Ted Cruz
584:Speaker
169:Houston
529:Senate
190:relief
93:Spouse
572:House
395:Texas
186:writs
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221:on
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