AM Show Hr 2 | WWI Veteran Murdered During A Car Jacking

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
It's that time. Time, time, time, luck and load. The
Michael Verie Show is on the air.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Holly rights are I feel the dispute, the subject line,
Disney dispute, the direct TV. I feel the dispute at
this time. It's not just a coincidence. No Disney, no ESPN,
and more importantly, no ABC affiliates. The presidential debate is
tomorrow night on ABC. It's not tomorrow night, it's a
week from tonight. I could be wrong, but this just

(00:51):
seems like all part of the plan to hide Kamala.
Over eleven million people cannot watch the debate, and I
am one of them. I love your thoughts, and I
feel like people should be talking about this.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
One of the.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
One of the most common refrains I get from people
is I feel like people should be talking about this.
When would they talk about the three hundred things that
are all going crazy right now? I'm not sure how
to cut through because there are so many things.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
I literally have.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
Over one hundred clips of audio I want to get
to from just the last few days, and every single
one of them is noteworthy.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
So I understand the frustration. I do.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
I think this is going to be the end of
Direct TV, which had begun a slow and steady constant decline.
I think I read they were down forty percent in subscribers.
And my guess is this is probably the It's not
the beginning of the end, it's the end of the
beginning of the end, and it just goes downhill from

(02:11):
there because you can take away people's programming, but you
cannot take away their sports programming. You just you cannot
do that. Let's go to Ducky, Ducky, you're on the
Michael Berry Show. Ramon passed me a note that says
that you just got out of prison after thirty six years.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
Yeah, in twelve days. Let's not forget that. With thirty
six years and twelve days.

Speaker 1 (02:40):
Which prison were you in?

Speaker 3 (02:42):
Can you hear me?

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (02:43):
I was at first, I was it well, I don't know.
I was at the United States Penitentiary in Beaumont. Then
I prolled out of the medium. I'm under the pro law.
I'm the pro I seen the United States pro Commissioner
and they give me a pro date. They let me out.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
All right, let's back track and establish some facts. What
was the original crime you committed that got you incarcerated?

Speaker 3 (03:09):
Okay, conspiracy to manufacturer imfeted me And.

Speaker 2 (03:16):
Okay, and you were so you pled out from something else.
That's a lesser charge than you originally were charged with.

Speaker 3 (03:25):
No, I went to a ten week jury trial.

Speaker 1 (03:29):
And what year were you convicted? Eighty eight.

Speaker 3 (03:33):
I got arrested August seventh, August seventeenth, nineteen eighty eight.
And I got convicted April eleventh, nineteen eighty nine.

Speaker 2 (03:42):
April eleventh, nineteen eighty nine, all right, And then you
were sent to the Styles unit in Beaumont.

Speaker 3 (03:51):
No. I was sent to first off, I was given
eighty years. By the end, this is a federal prison term.
And I was given eighty years. And they sent me
to Alreno, Oklahoma, at what's called the SCI Federal Correctional Institution.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
And how long were you there?

Speaker 3 (04:10):
I was there from nineteen eighty nine till nineteen ninety.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
Seven, all right, and then where.

Speaker 3 (04:17):
And then they sent me on an administrary transfer to
the United States Penitentiary at Levemore.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
Kansas, from ninety seven to win till ninety nine, okay,
and then from there.

Speaker 3 (04:31):
From there I went from USP Elevenmore to the United
States Penitentiary of Beaumont. They had just opened it.

Speaker 1 (04:37):
Up, and that was ninety nine to what.

Speaker 3 (04:42):
To two thousand and eight?

Speaker 1 (04:44):
All right? And then where.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
From two thousand and eight to two thousand and nine,
I was at FCI Medium Beaumont, all right? Then, and
then I went to a place called Yazoo, Mississippi.

Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yes, yeah, yes, the medium you're Drew Clarafan.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
And I was there from nineteen I mean, I was
there from two thousand and nine to twenty and fourteen.

Speaker 1 (05:13):
All right?

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Next, can I get the year first and then the location,
because the way I've made my chart here?

Speaker 3 (05:19):
Okay, okay? The next place was in two thousand and fifteen,
I was at Three Rivers FCI in South Texas.

Speaker 1 (05:29):
And then from there hold on till when.

Speaker 3 (05:32):
I was just there eight months. I was only made
it there eight months. And then from two thousand and
fifteen till twenty eighteen, I was at the United States
Penitentiary in that water, California.

Speaker 2 (05:45):
Duckie, Can we just assume they're all US penitentiary so
we don't have to say that each time?

Speaker 1 (05:50):
All right?

Speaker 3 (05:51):
Yes, okay we can. I mean I got out from
the medium the last time.

Speaker 1 (05:54):
Though, age eighteen till what's the next.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
Okay, eighteen to twenty, I was at Beaumont USP Beaumont, Well.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Hold on, I had you at USP Bowmont from O
eight to O nine is at the same facility, so
that was medium.

Speaker 3 (06:12):
Uh huh, Yeah, I went back there. I got them
to send me from California. I asked me for I
want to go, and I said, you send me back
to the pen in Texas because it's.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
Home, all right? So until twenty you and Beaumont, then what?

Speaker 3 (06:24):
And then I went to the medium across the street
until twenty four and then I got out.

Speaker 1 (06:32):
How long you been out.

Speaker 3 (06:35):
Since the twenty eighth to August?

Speaker 1 (06:38):
Oh? You really did?

Speaker 3 (06:39):
About five days? I email. I texted you the first
day I got out. You said you read all everybody's emails.
So I sent you an eight to this phone number,
and I sent you an email telling you I just
got out. But you got to understand, I'm still learning
how to work all this. I got an iPhone and
I don't know how to work it. You know, I'm
still learning.

Speaker 1 (06:58):
How'd you get an iPhone?

Speaker 3 (07:01):
Well, my best friend lives down there in Spring and
he had his wife show up at the bus station
and bring me one.

Speaker 1 (07:08):
How nice is that's a good friend.

Speaker 3 (07:09):
They will. Well, I've known him since nineteen sixty five,
you know, since I was five years old. He looked out.

Speaker 1 (07:18):
And so where is that where you're living?

Speaker 4 (07:21):
No?

Speaker 3 (07:21):
Right now, I'm in Hutchings, Texas at the Halfway House.
I'm sitting in the halfway House, in a room in
a halfway hell. Like I said, I've just been here.
I've been here five days.

Speaker 1 (07:30):
No, no, how long will you be there?

Speaker 3 (07:34):
August? I mean November nineteenth is the day the pro
Commission give me to make pro What they've done is
they give me a few months. Have they give me
eighty five days halfway House? After thirty six years, they
give me eighty five days. Readjustice Society.

Speaker 2 (07:47):
So doucky, I'm guessing if they gave you eighty years
originally for this manufacturer amphetamines.

Speaker 1 (07:55):
You were running.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
Yes, that's grazy, big drug house. It was the War
on Drugs era. But I'm guessing you had a pretty
impressive business operation going on.

Speaker 3 (08:07):
Well, I mean, you got to remember, Miss Barry. At
the time, these chemical houses was kind of like Walmart.
You could go in there about this, this, this and that.
So they couldn't compete down in Mexico because we could
get everything up prow to do it well. They started
controlling these chemicals and about the late eighties, I mean
the late eighties and early nineties, and so they turned
the regional problem into a national problem because the market.

(08:31):
They're going to find a market. They tried this in
Mexico years ago, and it didn't work. As soon as
they controlled all these chemicals where you couldn't get anymore.
It was a wrap. They sent it down there and
they got control of the whole thing.

Speaker 1 (08:43):
So you say the Mexican stole our drug making too.

Speaker 3 (08:47):
Well, yeah, of course, you know, well what it used
to be, you know.

Speaker 1 (08:51):
Hold on.

Speaker 5 (08:56):
Listening to Michael Berry's show.

Speaker 1 (09:06):
This He is Shirley Q. Look alive from the prison yard.

Speaker 6 (09:12):
I've been here all morning, supposed to get here for
six o'clock. I'm standing at these prison gates. Honey, they're
supposed to let Watu sit out to day. To me,
she's just not some of the inmate hunting. She is

(09:36):
also my good friend.

Speaker 3 (09:39):
She is.

Speaker 6 (09:40):
Bless her heart. She been in there serve in thirty
days for aggavated ignorance. The judge had found her extra
guilt there. Bless her heart, but she could still always

(10:01):
be my friend. Everybody need a friend. Uh, somebody wait
for you when you get out of prison. They say
she doesn't gain some weight and lost a man. You know,
I bet she love a cold mountain liquor.

Speaker 7 (10:16):
She sure would.

Speaker 6 (10:18):
I'll drive her to the nearest seven the laugh, get
her some new points cigarettes, Honey, anything for my best friend.
I love wat Tuesday.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
She stick with me.

Speaker 6 (10:33):
She said making license plates was hard, but not as
hard as working at burgershift. I know that's right, honey.
She looking pretty good, a little raggety. Come on, girl,
I'll tell you what. I'm just glad that you is
my friend. If I need a friend, Tony, come on,

(10:58):
it's get you some cold, cold, cold mout liquor.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
That'd be a good girl.

Speaker 6 (11:05):
Had some cigarettes from Nihilator, mister goodbart. I had a
slim gym mine some kool aid.

Speaker 1 (11:12):
That's your heart, Ducky.

Speaker 2 (11:15):
That's a real friend whose wife shows up at the
bus stop when you've been in prison for thirty six
years with an iPhone for you?

Speaker 3 (11:25):
Well, I mean, you know the hell.

Speaker 7 (11:28):
I mean.

Speaker 3 (11:28):
I've known him since I was five years old. It's
my oldest friend. He used to run yellow cab up
there in Houston, and he quit that he was over
the whole yellow cab, and he quit that. He's driving
a truck. Now he's doing FedEx. So the only reason
he didn't beat me up there is he was driving
to Tennessee to Greenville, Tennessee to deliver FedEx, and you know,
so he can get off, but he sent the old
lady up there to do it. We all went to

(11:51):
school together. We're all from Old East Allas and that's
where we're from. He just moved to Houston. I went
to Woodrow Wilson. I'm from Old East Allas.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
How did they arrest you?

Speaker 3 (12:03):
Uh, well, they had surveillance over a period of about
three years, and they were looking at us because we
were producing a lot of amphetamine. We were producing a
lot of drugs. You got to remember there wasn't no
cartel back then, so we were making it all and
so they just after a period of time, they how
they usually do. They'll catch a couple of the outfliers

(12:23):
and they'll get they'll squeezing real hard in their wink
and they'll tail and they tell them the higher ups
and then that's what happens. You know, And if you
won't play along with their game, and you won't write
on nobody whethern you get the max time. If you
decide to take it to jury trial, it's a rap.
They're gonna give you the max. So I mean, I
just told them, you know, they come with some ass

(12:44):
to nine offer, Hey, we'll give you thirty years and
you testify, and I sid want you boil it at
your ass what I told them, And so I said,
you go rack twelve and they did. And so I
went to a NK jury trial and they convicted me.
And what happened is in the fifth Circuit on a
direct appeal, I lost twenty years off the old So
it left me the two thirty years stacked terms and

(13:04):
I did my first one. I did like twenty five years,
eleven months and six days and discharged. Did it then
under the prolall you got to do at least ten
years to be eligible, and so I did ten years
in the first Parle commission, I send the pro commission
on zoom and he give me a date, you know,
And I got out of one hundred and ninety two
days early. Because of Donald Trump in the first step back,

(13:27):
he's the only ones who done anything for anybody in prison,
Donald Trump, everybody in prison knows that Joe Biden passed
all those laws. You wouldn't believe how much spoil old prisident.
Trump's got him in fed old prisons. Yeah, so they
know he'll actually look at the situation and do something. Now,
he'll do something about him. You know, people know that
they know he's just not talking.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
What was the drug gill we're making, which ampetamine?

Speaker 3 (13:53):
Okay, we were making what's called amphetamine hydrochloride.

Speaker 1 (13:58):
Tell me about that drug.

Speaker 3 (14:01):
Well, I mean it's in the old days. The way
it was manufactured. We use a process called P two P.
And the P two p's got like three different names.
It's either benzo methyl ketone, finol too, propen on or
fenyl acetone. And what it was is you take like
a pattern like a cake patters called feno, a cidic acid.

(14:21):
You mix it with a sodium as tage. It's a
power and then a pattern. Then you take another chemical
called a seat again a hydrite so liquid, and you
put it into three net bowling flask and you let
it go for a while and it goes up in
these stacks just and it bonds to the stacks and
then you make what's called the P two P. Then
you have that. You just steal it and you have

(14:43):
your options. You can either make them amphetamine or meth amphetamine.
And then if you're making am fetamine, you got to
use another chemical called formic acid. You got to use
another one called forma mite and the P two P combining,
and then you cook it for a while and then
you set it back up and then you do a
distillation on it. After you get it off there, you
do a hydro cook with hydro core cassie. Now, if

(15:04):
you're doing a met reaction, you just take the P
two P and you took some lininum turrens and pure
chloride in it, and the monal methylady and forty ex
cent solution and water. You put it all in there
and you graped it. And it makes them met them
fit of me. And it keeps. And this newer stuff
they're making in Mexico don't keep. This other stuff keeps
for years, you know. And in the old days you

(15:25):
get ten thousand dollars a pound for it. You go
out here on the street owt here right now, you
pay about eighteen nineteen hundred dollars for a keto that
other craft, you know, and so it's you know, just
you get what you pay for.

Speaker 1 (15:37):
Were you getting high on your own supply?

Speaker 3 (15:39):
And no, I didn't like it?

Speaker 1 (15:43):
How'd you leave it up?

Speaker 3 (15:44):
And I just like to drink? How did I get
into it? When when I come I've always been kind
of you know, selling weed or hustling or sounding allays
say you're wade when I was a youngster, and uh,
they were just it was put in front of me.
It was put in front of me in nineteen eighty
and I'm sixty four now, and I didn't want to
have nothing to do with it because I had what
was called metha qua longs back then, met the kulutes,

(16:06):
and I was selling these qualutes and I didn't want
nothing to do with it. Well, when I come out
and the guy said, hey, look I've got this option.
You want to sell some of this? And so I did.
So they were having me fetched chemicals so I could
buy whatever they'd buy, and I stopped. Piled all this
stuff up to where I could learn, and I just
picked it up. They didn't have no computer or no internet.

(16:27):
You had to learn and you just had to teach yourself.
Through books and stuff, and so I just learned. Just America.
You got libraries, You've got all kinds of educational things here.
You got these phones. Now, there ain't no excuse the bees. Now,
I thought you sell them kids down there. It ain't
cool to be stupid y'all. Come on, man, how many

(16:48):
trying to learn? Well, I mean we make oh hell,
they just spends some weeks. We'd make more than others
to make make ten to fifteen pounds, and there's not
much compared now these cortails around one hundreds of pounds
crap up. But for the little area, it was good.
It was a good little lick.

Speaker 1 (17:04):
What was the street name of the drugill?

Speaker 3 (17:08):
Uh? Well they called it crystal crystal or h yeah,
crystal or let me see that's what they called it.
It's called speed or crystal.

Speaker 1 (17:19):
And how much money it wasn't nice?

Speaker 3 (17:23):
Well, I mean that's making ten thousand dollars a pound.

Speaker 4 (17:25):
You know.

Speaker 3 (17:26):
Hell, I had a pretty good lique of money at time.
But hell, it don't last no time. I call hell.
You go through it, ye out there having a good
time having fun, and you just go through it. But
you know it wasn't nothing. You know, you could it
costs about three hundred dollars to make ten thousand dollars
and that's about way.

Speaker 1 (17:43):
And that's who was running the distribution, or.

Speaker 3 (17:48):
Well, I just give him. I'd have guys that would
sell to me. I give him several pounds of it
at time, and some delaces that I'd given is like
a quarter pound, you know. And I let him sit
there and get that and to push that off on him.
You don't get him to him. And that's the way
it was working, you know. And it wasn't me. I mean,
it was all over the Metro, but it's all over Houston.

(18:08):
They still had a chemical house down there in Houston
Hall Industrial Scientific, and I mean for the longest time.
I mean it was all over and they closed it down.

Speaker 2 (18:20):
Well, you know what's sad about this, ducky is I
hate I hate a guy spending his entire life in
prison because I think is a little direction. You could
have done something with a great country, and you still can't.
Your ministry is powerful.

Speaker 1 (19:12):
Testand away. Tragic story.

Speaker 2 (19:21):
Ninety year old World War Two veteran murdered during a
carjacking in southwest Houston outside the assisted living center that
he called home and to think the third who killed
him his life is useless, worthless, but he can take

(19:43):
the life of someone who brings joy and happiness to others.
You put the turds in prison, you leave the good
people to do good in society. KPRC TV with the.

Speaker 5 (19:57):
Story Sunday service at Southwest Church of Christ off to
a somber start.

Speaker 7 (20:03):
Our dear friends, our beloved brother, Nelson Becketts died yesterday afternoon.

Speaker 1 (20:08):
Killed by a person hijacking Nelson's car.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
Even saying that allowed now is hard to believe in
heard to fathom in the congregation.

Speaker 5 (20:16):
Beckett's friend of forty seven years, Steve Sandefer, I spoke
with him on the phone.

Speaker 8 (20:21):
I told his daughter, I said, you know, had she
called me that morning and said Dad didn't wake up
this morning, I would have said good. He's he's lived
his ninety years. He's been a champion of faith and
everything else. He's lived a great life. But to hear
that he had been murdered.

Speaker 4 (20:44):
That just.

Speaker 8 (20:46):
That was just beyond me.

Speaker 5 (20:48):
The dadly carjacking happening right outside Beckett's apartment building, his
car found ten minutes away at a different apartment complex.

Speaker 8 (20:56):
With total shock, I'd seen him on Wednesday. He was ninety,
but he was very mobile.

Speaker 5 (21:04):
Sanderfer says, the Navy veteran was a natural caretaker, driving
neighbors to doctor appointments, picking people up from halfway houses
to take them to church. Do you have a favorite
memory with Nelson, something that sticks out to you over
the past forty seven years that y'all have had together.

Speaker 8 (21:23):
Laughing, eating and laughing. Nelson was a comedian of sorts.
He always had a funny story, and so when he
started talking about well there was this man, you knew
it was a story, not a true thing, and you'd

(21:44):
get around the point eventually. But he was a very
loving man, a very caring man.

Speaker 3 (21:51):
He was just.

Speaker 8 (21:54):
A good faithful Christian man. He loved Jesus, he loved
his church.

Speaker 5 (22:01):
The shooter on the run, but Sandiford is confident whoever
killed his one of a kind friend will be caught.

Speaker 2 (22:12):
The story of Ducky a few minutes ago, guy who
was manufacturing amphetamines. To give him an eighty year sentence
means to take up a space in prison that could
and should be used for a violent criminal. I'm not
saying you encourage the manufacture of amphetamines. I'm not, but

(22:35):
I'm saying you should have proportionality in your sentencing. You've
got violent turds walk in the streets and quote unquote,
criminal justice reform makes them out to be the victim.
They'll find whoever killed this man, They'll find him. They

(22:58):
will absolutely find him. Nelson Beckett's murderer, and we'll find
out that he was wearing an ankle bracelet, an ankle monitor,
and he's committed other violent crimes before. Commissioner Tom Ramsey
is the only Republican on the Harris County Commissioner's Court.
We were talking earlier about the firing of Harris County

(23:18):
Public Health Director Barbie Robinson, who was involved in a
scheme for kickbacks with a group called DEMA out of California. Commissioner,
did you have a sense, because as you've pointed out,
this was the same group that did the COVID contract,
the eleven million dollar bid rigging scandal, did you have
a sense that this woman was up to no good?

Speaker 7 (23:40):
Well, I knew that there was a problem when and
thanks for having me, Michael, I knew there was a
problem when we want to hire a contractor out of
Northern California, Sonoma County. If you'd just done any kind
of research, there were issues in Sonoma County. And of
course this follows a really bad experience and this sort

(24:03):
of thing with Elevate, so you kind of put those
two things together. The new health director came out of
northern California, came out of Sonoma County, and she comes
down here and immediately begins to get contracts with Harris County.
It just clearly raises all kinds of warning signs. And

(24:26):
I never voted for anything on dema not to give
them a contract. I didn't even vote to pay them
over the last two and a half years. So it's
just beyond my understanding why this is what happens when
you start doing work with vendors that aren't from around here.
And by the way, they beat out Harris Center, which

(24:49):
is our premier mental health portion of Harris County. They
beat them out for this contract. So it sounds a
lot like University Texas in Alabite.

Speaker 2 (25:01):
Doesn't It sounds a lot like the University of Texas
Health Science Center. It also sounds like the Russian judges
scoring our Olympians poorly so they could win gold it's
a joke. It's a joke without a good punchline, because,
as you know, the taxpayers of Harris County are getting
hit hard by this and are suffering by this. And

(25:24):
it's frustrating because and I said earlier before you were
on the air, if you weren't there, then none of
this would be exposed, none of this. Marissa Hanson is
doing her work, Holly over at the Texan is doing
her work. You've got a random story here and there.
But if we didn't have somebody on the inside asking

(25:46):
these questions, forcing this to be made more public, because
sunlight's the best disinfectant when it comes to this nonsense.
Commissioner Tom Ramsey, if you can hold with us, I
want folks to understand what's about to happen with this
eight percent property tax hike, how they got away with it,
because I think this is gonna give people in case

(26:08):
the red ass when they realize exactly what's going on.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
Commissioner Tom Ramsey's our guestimat let me see it right.
Listen for the dio tone.

Speaker 7 (26:19):
It sounds like this the Michael Berry Show chap tone
indicates everything is ready for your call.

Speaker 1 (26:38):
This centro takes too long to get to the good touch.

Speaker 2 (26:51):
I don't mind building to a crescendo, but I think
at some point I'm like, guys, I gotta go pee.
I'm not gonna make it till the end. Bring some
percussion in earlier, some keys in earlier. I'm going it

(27:17):
starts with popcorn, and it takes forever to get to
who did popcorn?

Speaker 7 (27:25):
Remember?

Speaker 5 (27:29):
So?

Speaker 7 (27:29):
Well?

Speaker 1 (27:30):
Uh huh, hot butter, that's it. Good call. Wow, that's impressive.

Speaker 2 (27:35):
Parris County Commissioner Tom Ramsey as our guest commissioner. The
eight percent property tax increase when revenues are already high,
values are already high, so that they can have more
money to spend on Rodney's pet projects without voters even
getting to approve it.

Speaker 1 (27:52):
Explain how that happened.

Speaker 7 (27:56):
Well, the site legislature allowed counties to increase taxes eight percent.
Normally they capped at at three and a half percent,
but they allowed it to go to eight percent because
we've had three disasters in Harrison County in the last
three months. So the interesting thing I find about this,

(28:18):
now we're going to use the eight percent window because
of the disaster is the problem is we're not spending
the money on disaster. If I could sit here and
tell you that, yeah, we were significantly impacted by the
May Day floods, the retro the barrels, farms, and here's
all the damage.

Speaker 4 (28:38):
We probably have a significant amount of damage.

Speaker 7 (28:41):
The problem is when I go in as Precinct three
and say my precinct has been impacted twenty five million
and I need money, and they tell me, oh, that's
too bad, you got four million, and then they take
eight percent increase, which is by the way, we talk
about percent, I like to talk numbers. That is two

(29:03):
hundred and sixty four million dollars more than we took
in last year.

Speaker 4 (29:10):
Apparently we paid all our bills last year.

Speaker 7 (29:13):
Had provided all our services.

Speaker 4 (29:14):
Last year, but this year we're going to increase.

Speaker 7 (29:17):
It two one hundred and sixty four million dollars to
go do things that to me don't make any sense.

Speaker 2 (29:26):
Barbie Robinson, the health director that it appears allegedly was
about ready to take some kickbacks, may have already from
this DEMA company out of California. Our executive producer, Chad Nakanishi,
had a deing go off in his head and reminded
me of a story The Press Democrat Atsnoma County, California,

(29:49):
found a company DEMA had bill more than eight hundred
thousand dollars for positions that a dozen former and then
current employees did not.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
Recall ever existed.

Speaker 2 (29:56):
The earlier part of that story was that the this
was a program that would send social workers instead of
shriffs deputies to.

Speaker 1 (30:05):
Nine to one one calls.

Speaker 2 (30:07):
Even though there were all sorts of red flags, and
we made quite a spoof of that at the time.
You said you voted against them the entire time. Why
what was your red flag with that organization.

Speaker 7 (30:20):
Well, one, as I said earlier, if they came out
of northern California and they beat out one of the
premier mental health facilities in the world, otherwise known as
Harris Center.

Speaker 3 (30:34):
So that's a flag.

Speaker 4 (30:35):
And clearly that was substantiated.

Speaker 1 (30:38):
Now two and a half.

Speaker 7 (30:39):
Years later when when clearly the services were not provided.
But let me tell you about this. It's called HEART
and it's a holistic response team to issues out there.
And my rule is anytime I hear somebody use the
word holistic, that's another flag that goes off. That's another

(31:02):
word for this is all made up and we don't
know what we're doing.

Speaker 4 (31:06):
Listen, Michael. There were five thousand, two.

Speaker 7 (31:09):
Hundred and sixty calls made under this program, and again
to send out mental health personnel rather than law enforcement.

Speaker 4 (31:20):
Well, the two thousand and six hundred of them.

Speaker 7 (31:24):
Related to weldness checks, another two thousand was related to
just checking on the neighborhood. Only two hundred were related
to any kind of mental health issues. So again, I
don't think they made those calls to be honest with you,
and no one seems to be interested in auditing that

(31:46):
I'm asking that.

Speaker 4 (31:47):
I'm going to ask the.

Speaker 7 (31:48):
County auditor again to go in and take a look
at these.

Speaker 4 (31:52):
So again, it's just an example of the hundreds.

Speaker 7 (31:56):
Of millions of dollars that were wasting at Harrison County
on issues like this.

Speaker 4 (32:01):
We've got a spending problem, not.

Speaker 7 (32:03):
A revenue problem in Harris County.

Speaker 2 (32:07):
When you look at Harris County expenditures, not just who's
getting the contracts and how they're going about it and
how poorly they're performing. What are a couple of things
that stick out that are a real burr under your
bonnet that you say taxpayers need to realize this is happening.

Speaker 7 (32:27):
Well at the top of the list Access Harris and
this is a program that, let's get on paper. It
allows people that that comes in looking for a particular
help in some area they can use this program that

(32:47):
goes across Harris County and looks at all.

Speaker 1 (32:50):
The different programs.

Speaker 7 (32:52):
Last year we spent three and a half million dollars
on this and I think a thousand people used it.
That doesn't even count to tens of millions of dollars
we spent with IBM setting this program up at the
Reproductive health Care Access Fund six million dollars. No problem there, right,

(33:15):
Reproductive health.

Speaker 4 (33:16):
Care Access Fund. Again, it's the it's.

Speaker 7 (33:19):
These programs that are politically named that are out there
maybe even doing things that are not legal creation of
the Elections Administrator. You know, we did that two and
a half years ago, three years ago, and now of
course we get out of that and turn it back

(33:40):
over to duly elected people. Michael, that costs US six million.

Speaker 1 (33:44):
Dollars a year. Commission go through that one minute. You've
just reminded me that I need to ask you about
one other thing.

Speaker 2 (33:51):
Attorney General Ken Paxton has declared to bear and Harris County,
the county where you're trying to put an end to
the nonsense about these voter registrate these.

Speaker 1 (34:02):
Ballots that they're mailing out. Have we managed to kill
that in Harris County.

Speaker 7 (34:08):
Yes, that was on the agenda last week and I
had pulled it to discuss it and and they looked
at it and said, uh no, we won't be sending.

Speaker 4 (34:19):
Out they were.

Speaker 7 (34:20):
What they were trying to do is encourage people to
register to vote by indiscriminately sending out letters to people
that were not registered.

Speaker 4 (34:28):
Well, there's a real good likelihood they would be sending
it to people that are not here legally, and.

Speaker 7 (34:34):
Then you're tempting them to break the law. You're breaking
law by sending it to them, and they're breaking the
law by trying to do that. Yes, that was killed
in Commissioner's Court, but we'll keep an eye beach your
old one.

Speaker 1 (34:46):
It doesn't come back in the commission. Tom Ramsey, well done, bravos.