The Department announced a simultaneous lawsuit and settlement with the state of Texas concerning the care given to residents of the state’s 13 facilities for persons with developmental disabilities. Along with the settlement agreement, the Department will file a complaint initiating a lawsuit against the state in federal court. An independent monitor will be appointed to oversee the state’s compliance with the settlement agreement and the court will retain ultimate jurisdiction.

The Department announced an agreement with Gregg County, Texas, to improve access for persons with disabilities to its programs, services, activities and facilities. The agreement was reached under the Department’s Project Civic Access initiative, which helps bring localities into full compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This agreement is the 163rd entered into under Project Civic Access.

Mark Edwin Cairnes, 51, of Jonestown, Texas, has been charged with advertising, receiving and possessing child pornography. A grand jury in the Western District of Texas returned the indictment against Cairnes on July 21, 2009, which was unsealed today after his arrest yesterday in Jonestown.

Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (ALKQN) member David Hellums, aka "CutThroat," pleaded guilty today to a superseding indictment charging him and 16 co-defendants with various offenses related to alleged narcotics and weapons trafficking, as well as violent activities throughout Texas.

A federal judge in Dallas has permanently barred Lennon Madzima from preparing federal tax returns for others. The court found Madzima repeatedly understated his customers’ income tax liabilities “by negligently and willfully claiming frivolous and meritless federal fuel tax credits that had no realistic possibility of being sustained on the merits” and “by negligently and willfully inflating or fabricating telephone excise tax refund credits.”

Eugene Morris, a former correctional officer with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, was sentenced today in federal court in Houston for providing a false statement related to a federal civil rights investigation. Morris was sentenced to two years in prison and two years of supervised release.

Patrick Cochran, 47, of Lake Jackson, Texas, was sentenced late on Monday in Phoenix to 76 months in prison for travel with intent to engage in sex with minors and possession of child pornography.

Mark Edwin Cairnes of Jonestown, Texas, pleaded guilty today to advertising and possessing child pornography.

Formosa Plastics Corp., Texas, and Formosa Plastics Corp., Louisiana, will spend more than $10 million on pollution controls to address air, water, and hazardous waste violations at two petrochemical plants in Point Comfort, Texas, and Baton Rouge, La.

A federal district court in Texas has permanently enjoined Ludivina Salinas of Mission, Texas, from preparing federal income tax returns for others.

A hospital group based in McAllen, Texas, has agreed to pay the United States $27.5 million to settle claims that it violated the False Claims Act, the Anti-Kickback Statute and the Stark Statute between 1999 and 2006, by paying illegal compensation to doctors in order to induce them to refer patients to hospitals within the group

Under the settlement, which must still be approved by the court, 11 defendants will pay all costs related to making the complexes for which they were responsible accessible to persons with disabilities.

Daniel Melgoza, a Bexar County, Texas, Corrections Officer, was charged today in a four-count federal indictment with violating the civil rights of two detainees and obstructing justice.

The former general manager of a Sugar Land, Texas-based business was arrested on Nov. 18, 2009, for his alleged role in a conspiracy to bribe Mexican government officials to secure contracts with the Comisión Federal de Electridad (CFE), a Mexican state-owned utility company.

A federal grand jury has indicted a Ft. Worth, Texas, husband and wife, Emmanuel and Ngozi Nnaji, on charges of engaging in a nine-year scheme to compel the labor of a Nigerian victim as their domestic servant.

Mark Edwin Cairnes, 51, was sentenced today to 292 months in prison and lifetime supervised release following his prison term for advertising and possessing child pornography.

Michael Sayklay, the former vice president of Economy Cash & Carry Inc., a Texas-based grocery wholesaler, pleaded guilty today in federal court in El Paso, Texas, to a criminal violation of the Plant Protection Act.

The jury returned guilty verdicts on all four counts of the indictment that charged Michael Anthony Higgins with violating federal law by willfully stealing money from motorists that he had stopped on the highway while working as a trooper.

The Department will monitor the Jan. 23, 2010, special municipal election in the city of Hondo, Texas, to ensure compliance with the anti-discrimination and minority language requirements of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Economy Cash & Carry Inc., pleaded guilty today in U.S. District Court in El Paso, Texas, to a criminal violation of the Plant Protection Act related to the falsification of a required certificate stamp.

Phillip Windom Offill Jr., 51, of Dallas, was indicted on March 12, 2009, and today was found guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit registration violations, securities fraud and nine counts of wire fraud.

“Today’s extradition brings a criminal to justice and paves the way forward in our law enforcement partnership with El Salvador,” said Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the Criminal Division.

Six alleged members or associates of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (ABT) have been indicted and arrested for their alleged roles in the 2007 murder of two people in Nacogdoches County, Texas.

A federal jury has convicted an Arlington, Texas, husband and wife, Emmanuel and Ngozi Nnaji, of engaging in a nine-year scheme to compel the labor of a Nigerian victim as their domestic servant.

A federal judge in Beaumont, Texas, has permanently barred 12 people from promoting an alleged tax fraud scheme involving bogus income tax credits.

The leader of the Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (ALKQN) in Texas and one of his enforcers were found guilty this afternoon on multiple charges related to their participation in a large scale narcotics and firearms trafficking conspiracy.

The Department will monitor primary elections on March 2, 2010, in Fort Bend, Galveston, Gonzales, Williamson, and Wilson Counties in Texas, to ensure compliance with the minority language requirements of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and other federal voting rights statutes.

A Texas-based pipeline company has agreed to pay a $450,000 civil penalty to the United States to settle allegations that it failed to prepare and maintain proper facility response plans to deal with spills and environmental accidents at eight of its oil storage terminal facilities in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska.

The Department will monitor municipal elections on May 8, 2010, in Dallas and Galveston Counties, Texas, to ensure compliance with the requirements of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Two securities broker-dealers were charged in an indictment unsealed today for their alleged roles in a securities fraud scheme involving several publicly traded companies.

An Arlington, Texas, couple was sentenced today by U.S. District Court Judge John H. McBryde for forcing a Nigerian widow to perform domestic labor for them for more than eight years.

Ray M. White, 51, pleaded guilty today before U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul D. Stickney in Dallas to a criminal information charging him with one count of commodities fraud, announced Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney James T. Jacks of the Northern District of Texas.

The Department will monitor the municipal election on June 19, 2010, in Galveston, Texas, to ensure compliance with the requirements of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Steven Walter Cooke, 47, a reputed high ranking member of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (ABT) prison/street gang and a previously convicted felon, has been sentenced to prison for possessing firearms.

Three alleged members or associates of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (ABT) have been indicted for their alleged roles in a 2008 murder in Atascosa County, Texas.

Air Products LLC has agreed to pay $1.485 million in civil penalties to resolve hazardous waste mismanagement violations at its Pasadena, Texas, chemical manufacturing facility.

BP Products North America Inc. has agreed to pay a $15 million penalty to resolve federal Clean Air Act violations at its Texas City, Texas, petroleum refinery.

Eric M. Kurz, 46, of The Woodlands, Texas, pleaded guilty today to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and money laundering in conjunction with his actions as a wholesaler of investment products for A&O, a group of businesses that acquired and marketed life settlements to investors.

The Justice Department today announced a settlement agreement with the city of Kerrville, Texas, and Playhouse 2000 to bring the Cailloux Theater into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Todd Alan Cook, 24, of Wichita Falls, Texas, was sentenced today to 18 months in prison by U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis III for selling more than $1 million worth of pirated computer software through the Internet, in violation of criminal copyright infringement laws.

A federal court Tuesday issued a memorandum opinion and a preliminary injunction against Arthur Piner Grider, III; Asgard Avionics Corp. of Florida; and 14 other corporate defendants who operate as employee leasing companies, from violating the Internal Revenue Code.

The United States has settled two whistleblower lawsuits for $16.25 million alleging that Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) violated the competitive bidding rules of the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) E-Rate Program at the Dallas and Houston Independent School Districts in connection with technology services contracts with those school districts.

A federal court has permanently barred Maritza Villanueva of Irving, Texas, from preparing federal income tax returns for others.

A Harris County, Texas, commissioner and a Houston-based real estate developer have been charged with bribery conspiracy in an indictment returned yesterday by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Texas.

A Nacogdoches, Texas, man pleaded guilty today to charges related to a double homicide which took place in Nacogdoches in August 2007.

A Lufkin, Texas, man pleaded guilty today to charges related to a double homicide that took place in Nacogdoches, Texas, in August 2007.

The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas ordered that Juan Antonio Gaona must adhere to a 25-foot buffer zone around a Planned Parenthood Reproductive Health Services Clinic in San Antonio, Texas.

Eleven alleged members of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (ABT) have been indicted for their alleged roles in the 2008 beating of a gang prospect in Tomball, Texas.

Henry Clay Glaspell, of Arlington, Texas, pleaded guilty today to a hate crime charge stemming from the ethnically-motivated arson of a children’s playground at the Dar El-Eman Islamic Center in Arlington in July 2010.

Khalid Ali-M Aldawsari, 20, a citizen of Saudi Arabia and resident of Lubbock, Texas, was arrested late yesterday by FBI agents in Texas on a federal charge of attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction in connection with his alleged purchase of chemicals and equipment necessary to make an improvised explosive device (IED) and his research of potential U.S. targets.