Category Archives: Houston

At least 400 rescued from flooding in Texas as waters continue rising

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A flood watch remains in effect through Sunday afternoon after forecasters predict additional rainfall in Harris county

High waters flooded neighborhoods around Houston on Saturday following heavy rains that resulted in crews rescuing more than 400 people from homes, rooftops and roads engulfed in murky water. Others prepared to evacuate their properties.

A flood watch remained in effect through Sunday afternoon after forecasters predicted additional rainfall Saturday night and the likelihood of major flooding in Harris county, the nation’s third-largest county which includes Houston, and nearby areas.

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Dennis Rodman sued by woman who claims he slammed door on her hand

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A woman who says the former NBA champion hired her to be a personal assistant and artist for his family has filed a lawsuit

Former NBA champion Dennis Rodman is facing a lawsuit for damages from a woman who accused him of slamming a door on her hand and badly injuring her during an incident at his Houston home, after hiring her to be a personal assistant and artist for his family.

A woman who answered a call to a phone number associated with Rodman’s address in the Texas city dismissed plaintiff Taylor A Banks’ allegations as “a money grab”.

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Boy injured in Osteen church shooting lost ‘portion of his frontal lobe’

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Samuel Moreno-Carranza’s grandmother posted about boy’s condition, who was injured when police killed the shooter – his mother

A boy who was shot in the head at celebrity Joel Osteen’s Houston megachurch on 11 February has lost “a portion of his frontal lobe” while recovering at the hospital, according to his grandmother.

In a Facebook post three days after the shooting, Walli Carranza said her seven-year-old grandson – Samuel Moreno-Carranza – “has lost a major part of what makes us who we are” after “half of his right skull [had] to be surgically removed during two surgeries done in less than 24 hours”. Samuel had endured “cardiac arrest multiple times, and no one can determine whether he has significant brain activity because his scalp tissue is too friable” to let doctors attach electroencephalogram wires to him, Carranza added in a post that doubled as a criticism of the US’s lack of meaningful gun control.

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Houston: suspect killed and two injured in shooting at Joel Osteen megachurch

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Police chief Troy Finner says unclear whether five-year-old boy wounded in incident was struck by officers who shot at attacker

A shooter with a rifle was killed by two off-duty police officers and a child was critically wounded at a Houston megachurch run by the prominent evangelical Christian pastor Joel Osteen, the city’s police chief said.

Troy Finner said it was not clear whether the boy, five, was struck by the officers who returned fire after the shooter, wearing a trenchcoat, entered Osteen’s Lakewood church with the boy shortly before 2pm and began shooting.

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‘It’s scratching, dude’: US Coast Guard inspectors rescue stowaway dog from shipping container

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During a routine day at the Port of Houston, four marine inspectors heard barking from amid 10,000 containers

It was just another routine day of inspecting shipping containers at the Port of Houston for US Coast Guard officer Ryan McMahon when he and his team thought they heard barking coming from inside one of the thousands of containers that surrounded them.

“Oh, it’s scratching, dude,” one of the inspectors said on a video they recorded Wednesday morning as the team looked up at the container, stacked about 25ft (8 metres) in the air.

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Facial recognition used after Sunglass Hut robbery led to man’s wrongful jailing, says suit

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Harvey Eugene Murphy Jr’s lawsuit claims he was misidentified as culprit of armed robbery and put in jail, where he says he was raped

A 61-year-old man is suing Macy’s and the parent company of Sunglass Hut over the stores’ alleged use of a facial recognition system that misidentified him as the culprit behind an armed robbery and led to his wrongful arrest. While in jail, he was beaten and raped, according to his suit.

Harvey Eugene Murphy Jr was accused and arrested on charges of robbing a Houston-area Sunglass Hut of thousands of dollars of merchandise in January 2022, though his attorneys say he was living in California at the time of the robbery. He was arrested on 20 October 2023, according to his lawyers.

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Beyoncé’s childhood home catches fire on Christmas morning

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Blaze reported about 2am but was quickly contained and family living at property escaped safely

Beyoncé’s childhood home in Houston caught fire early on Christmas morning, though the family living there escaped safely.

The fire was reported at about 2am on Monday. The local fire department arrived on the scene of the two-story brick house within three to five minutes, the Houston Chronicle reported.

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Houston Chronicle compares people crossing border to Mary and Joseph

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Editorial board publishes opinion piece in response to hard-right Republican governor’s latest immigration crackdown

A stinging Christmas opinion issued by the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle newspaper asks Texas’s hard-right Republican leader: “How would governor Greg Abbott treat Mary and Joseph at the border?”

The leading media outlet in the Democratic-voting city published an editorial article on Christmas Eve and posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Christmas Day protesting at the red state’s latest crackdown on people seeking refuge by crossing the US-Mexico border without authorization.

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Ex-NFL player and former college teammates killed in collision in Houston

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DJ Hayden, who played nine seasons with the Raiders, Lions, Jaguars and Commanders, was in SUV hit by speeding car

A former National Football League player was among six people who were killed in a collision that occurred when a speeding driver ran a red light in downtown Houston on Saturday.

Before his death in Houston during his collegiate alma mater’s homecoming weekend, 33-year-old DJ Hayden had played nine seasons in the NFL after the Raiders selected him in the first round of the college draft in 2013.

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Houston teen who went missing in 2015 is found alive in city

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Rudy Farias was found lying on the ground in front of a church, with his whereabouts for the past eight years still unknown

A Texas man who went missing as a teenager in 2015 after last being seen walking his dogs in Houston has been found alive, his family and police said on Monday.

Police and firefighters found Rudolph “Rudy” Farias IV around 10pm on Thursday after getting a call about a person lying on the ground in front of a church in south-east Houston, a police spokesman, John Cannon, said.

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Houston rapper Big Pokey dies at age 48

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Pioneer of the ‘chopped-and-screwed’ approach to hip-hop, the musician was once a part of Houston’s Screwed Up Click

Legendary Houston rapper Big Pokey died overnight Sunday after collapsing at a bar in Beaumont, Texas, his publicist has confirmed. The rap star, best known as part of the Screwed Up Click collective, was 48 years old.

“It is with deep sadness that we share the news of the passing of our beloved Milton ‘Big Pokey’ Powell,” reads a statement from the rapper’s publicist on behalf of his family. “Big Pokey will forever be ‘The Hardest Pit in the Litter’.”

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Three-year-old girl accidentally shoots sister, 4, dead in Texas

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Girl killed sibling in family home with semi-automatic pistol but unclear if any of five adults present will face charges

In a case that starkly illustrates the deadly consequences that the US’s permissive gun culture has on the country’s youth, a three-year-old girl accidentally shot her four-year-old sister to death in their Texas home late on Sunday, according to authorities.

First responders found the slain girl while responding to an emergency call at 7.30pm about an injured minor at an apartment in suburban Houston, the local sheriff’s office said in a statement. She was there with five adults – including her mother and stepfather – when her older sister grabbed a loaded semi-automatic pistol and shot her, first responders learned.

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Suspect arrested in killing of rapper Takeoff, say Houston police

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Authorities announce that member of Migos, who was shot at a bowling alley last month, was ‘an innocent bystander’

A suspect has been arrested and charged with murder in the killing of Takeoff, the rapper and member of Migos, at a bowling alley in Houston last month.

Announcing the news on Friday, Houston police said Takeoff, who was 28 and whose birth name was Kirshnik Khari Ball, was “an innocent bystander”.

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Houston investigated for slow response to Black and Hispanic residents who call 311

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City allegedly addresses illegal dumping complaints by people of color more slowly than those from white residents

Houston’s city government is under federal investigation after accusations that it responds to calls from Black and Hispanic residents about illegal dumping more slowly than if the complaints are from white residents, US justice department officials announced Friday.

The investigation into whether the Texas metropolis’ so-called quality of life officials are illegally discriminating against residents based on their race or national origin was prompted by a complaint filed earlier this year by the nonprofit Lone Star Legal Aid clinic, authorities added.

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Astroworld: Travis Scott and Drake sued over deadly Texas concert crush

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Lawsuits brought by some of those injured, including 23-year-old Texas resident Kristian Paredes

The rappers Travis Scott and Drake have been sued for having “incited mayhem” after eight people were killed and dozens injured in a crush during a Texas concert, a law firm has confirmed.

Thomas J Henry Law tweeted a story published by the Daily Mail on the lawsuit, confirming on Sunday that it had filed “one of the first lawsuits in Travis Scott Astroworld festival tragedy”.

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Astroworld: questions over why Travis Scott played on as crush developed

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Two investigations launched after eight people killed at event in Houston on Friday night

Organisers of what turned out to be one of the deadliest live music events in US history are facing mounting questions about why the rapper Travis Scott continued performing when first responders were already dealing with a mass casualty event.

Eight people ranging in age from 14 to 27 were killed and dozens were injured at the Astroworld festival in Houston on Friday night, when fans were crushed against the stage.

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Domino’s to launch robotic pizza delivery service in Houston

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Delivery service will eventually expand to other locations as part of partnership between pizza company and startup Nuro

Domino’s Pizza and Nuro, a Silicon Valley startup, said on Monday they will launch a robotic pizza delivery service in Houston this week as they seek to satisfy increasing online orders during the pandemic.

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‘We have no water’: Texans struggle after deadly winter storm – video report

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Millions of Texans are facing water shortages after a winter storm caused pipes to burst and treatment plants to back up. Officials ordered 7 million people – a quarter of the population of the nation’s second largest state – to boil tap water before drinking it. The storms have also left millions without power for days

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China says US ordered abrupt closure of its Houston consulate

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Beijing condemns move that could mark dramatic escalation in diplomatic tensions

The closure of the Chinese consulate in Houston threatens to start a fresh diplomatic row between China and the US, with Beijing accusing the US of giving it 72 hours to shut the diplomatic mission in a move it described as “unprecedented” and an “outrageous” escalation.

China said the US told the consulate on 21 July to cease all operations and events, and that Beijing threatened retaliation if the decision was not withdrawn.

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