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Dallas Crime Watch: Friday, May 29, 2009

The jury now has the case of Philippe Padieu, the remorseless villain who knowingly slept with at least six women when he was HIV positive. One now has full-blown AIDS and the others are now HIV positive. Prosecutors asked the jury to give him life.
More evidence of extensive drug use at Southern Methodist University emerged in the trial of James McDaniel.
The trial of Eric Ziegler, who prosecutors say dismembered Ibonne Zamudio after they smoked crack cocaine into the wee hours, continues with more disturbing testimony.
In Frisco, a man was charged in the death of a 15-month-old boy.
Things have been looking great in the overall Dallas crime numbers, but this week has been bloody. Tanya Eiserer notes there have been 10 slayings in six days this week.
A Dallas Independent School District hall monitor is accused of waving a gun and threatening a woman in a road-rage incident Thursday morning.
People are still atwitter over the story of a robber who used a sword to holdup a convenience store.
Five men guilty of conspiring to funnel money to Hamas terrorists through the Holy land Foundation are off to prison for sentences of between 15 and 65 years.
Prosecutors came out swinging in the closely watched federal trial of James McDaniel, who they say preyed on students at Southern Methodist University, selling them drugs and taking them on "roller coasters" of uppers then downers, cocaine then oxycodone.
Prosecutors told jurors how, high on crack cocaine and angered at having his sexual advances rebuffed, Eric Andrew Ziegler strangled Ibonne Zamudio last June inside a northeast Richardson home, then pulled out a 4-inch Buck knife and "gutted her like a fish."
A man who helped a killer dispose of the body of University of North Texas sophomore Melanie Goodwin was sentenced to eight years in prison Wednesday.
In the, "maybe, maybe not" a crime category, we learned that Dallas judge Jim Foster testified that the FBI questioned him about county commissioner John Wiley Price. Why? No one is saying. Yet.
Finally, some good news: Crime-fighting kids from the Pegasus School of Liberal Arts & Sciences rescued a woman being beaten at a downtown DART station. Thank you, young superheroes.

Arlington police credit public for helping to capture robbery suspects

Arlington police say the public -- including the media -- have helped them catch two robbery suspects recently, John Paul Dean and Marquis Turell Maxwell. Now they're asking for the public's help again to catch one more robbery suspect.

Officers are trying to find Demetrius Smith, the 22-year-old suspected of robbing a 7-Eleven store on May 6, 12, and 15. On each of these days the suspect entered the store in the 3400 block of South Collins Street early in the morning, threatened the clerk and displayed a handgun before taking cash from the business.

Dallas goes through bloody six days with 10 slayings

Just last week the Dallas' crime numbers had been looking really good. The number of murders was way down. While the numbers are still low, it's been a bloody six days in Dallas. From Friday though Thursday, 10 people were murdered. Most are unsolved. Most didn't have any particular rhyme or reason:

Man shot in an apparent robbery.
Man shot to death in argument with two men.
Man shot in possible drug house.
Man shot in apartment complex parking lot.
Man tries to intervene in a disturbance, gets beaten and shot in Dairy Queen parking lot.
Man fatally shot in suspected drug house.
Two convicted felons found bound and shot in a car in suspected drug-related slaying.
Man fatally shot in strip club parking lot. Man shot in apartment parking lot.

All were male. Six victims were black. Three were Latino. One was white. "They're random," said Lt. Craig Miller, commander of the homicide unit. "We just don't ever get those really cool CSI-type murders.... It's just somebody goes to a dope house and gets murdered. It's someone has been drinking, gets in a fight and gets murdered." In April, the city recorded 13 murders. Through Thursday, there had been 21 killings. Still, the city has had about 10 percent fewer murders than during the same period last year.