The Monitor from McAllen, Texas • 41

Friday, March 10, 1995 THE MONITOR, McAllen, Texas 5D HOUSTON AREA ROUNDUP Two clerks indicted in first Lone Star Card fraud case The Associated Press years with his two sons after bitter divorce is behind bars. a tenced to 7'z years in prison. The events began in September ternational Corporation. NASA expects to spend $24 million in 15 months of the concept phase. NASA Administrator" Daniel S.

Goldin touted their selection as an example of how his agency intends to conduct its business faster, better and cheaper. He noted that it had been only two months since the agency issued proposals. The fourth firm, Orbital Science Corporation of Dulles, will try to build a new booster rocket by the turn of the century for $79 million. The new rocket designs will be the first since the space shuttle was developed in the late 1960s and 1970s. Father who fled with sons begins serving sentence HOUSTON A father who fled the country for nearly eight Mexico, Scotland, England and Canada, Greece, Brazil and Switzerland.

0 While her ex-husband was on' the lam. Smith's attorneys sued his parents, saying they concealed their son's whereabouts and funded his flight. A jury awarded her $53 million but it hasn't been paid in full, though some of their property has been seized. Smith's parents have since declared bankruptcy. Chuck Smith, 36, quietly surrendered at the Harris County Jail on Wednesday to begin a prison sentence he received in 1992.

He had been free on an appeal bond. Smith was arrested in Mexico in January 1992 and brought back to Texas with the boys, now 16 and 14. He was later convicted of interfering with child custody and sen- HOUSTON Two store clerks have been indicted for what authorities say is the first case of welfare fraud using a Lone Star Card, and officials say to expect more indictments from other sting operations. Still, they say the indictments don't signify failure of the electronic debit card for welfare and food stamp recipients, which was 1984 when Smith picked up his children at his ex-wife's Houston home for a visit and didn't return. He justified his flight by claiming Carolyn Smith was an unfit mother addicted to prescription drugs.

His nearly eight-year flight from justice was funded by his father. Chick Smith, a once wealthy local car dealer. It included stops in ssmm Electronics Appliances Computers mm mt Packard Bell Id 4- As Low As $45 A Month 486DX266 Multimedia Computer Package Double-speed CD-ROM drive Telephone answering system 420MB hard drive 7 4MB RAM 1 16-bit sound card i Stejseo speakers 249600 taxmodem Plus 27 software titles, including: Microsoft Windows for Workgroups. New Groiier Encyclopedia. 3-D Dinosaur Adventure.

MS-DOS, Sports Illustrated 1994 Sports Almanac LEGEND20CD140PROJET II VfTTt i. i '0-1 No Interest No Payments For 90 Days All Products $99 Minimum Purchase 99 mi 4i 10-Qiannel Cordless Phone with Answering Machine SPPA250C Bubble Jet Color 24-Pin Color Dot nn Matrix rnnter 99 3finx3fif)rini nn hinh resn- ffcQQ "inter IMOU 360dpi color or 720dpi 'j) true black output, prints nn nlain nunor Qirennr 'J) lutiori, Command-Vue III As Low As $15 A Month print controls, gsxho 'As Low As $20 A Month ii'lHl uai7iia Mitaiw wnuii i i MMM, 9feS'J Wtf'. p-ft WAS'- introduced earlier this year to help curb fraud. Clerks Nhung Thi Cao, 44, and Tien Due Dinh, 34, were indicted Feb. 21 on charges of illegally redeeming food stamps, said Harris County prosecutor Carl Hobbs.

Earlier in the month, the pair were approached by an undercover officer seeking to sell benefits from the card for cash. Hobbs, who heads the district attorney's welfare fraud division, said there have been similar sting operations since artd expects more indictments. However, he said the Lone Star Card is not a failure. "We Tiave eliminated the street' dealers," he said, explaining those using the card have to use a scanner. The scanners are scattered among about 2,500 stores in the county.

About 200,000 Harris County households have the cards. But like any system, "someone who is crooked will always try to cheat the system," Hobbs said in Thursday's editions of the Houston Chronicle. "We just have to try and keep up with them," Animal lovers outraged over dog shooting GALVESTON Animal lovers "from across the country have 'written to prosecutors and a judge who is presiding over the case of two police officers charged with using a dog for target practice. About 30 letters have arrived at the office of County Court-At-Law Judge Mary! Nell Crapitto, who will hear a motion to dismiss the cruelty case against Bayou Vista officers Greg Trantham and John Overstreet on Monday. The two are accused of shooting off various body parts of a stray Lhasa Apso last June before killing' it.

The Class A misdemeanor carries a maximum punishment of 12 months in jail and a $3,000 fine. "Almost all of them are from people who are upset about the dog being shot," said Crapitto court coordinator, Nancy Arturo. Crapitto has not read the letters, but is keeping a file, Arturo said. Assistant District Attorney Thomas "Jay" Wooten, also has been deluged with mail. The chief of the district attorney's misdemeanor section has received more than 50 letters and a couple dozen faxes from as far away as Canada, California, New York and Idaho.

Many of the out-of-state letters refer to a posting on the Internet. Houston, agree to rate rollback HOUSTON The City Council has unanimously approved a proposed agreement with Houston Lighting Power Co. that could mean an average $227 savings this year in Houston household light bills. The agreement, hammered out among attorneys for Houston Lighting Power the city of Houston and 18 smaller area towns, would lower; the light company's rates by nearly $1.5 billion over three years. The city estimates an average household under the settlement would save $227 this year and $129 each year for two additional years.

The Public Utility Commission in Austin still has to authorize the deal. City officials are asking that the reductions go into effect prior to PUC's final approval, meaning that ratepayers could begin seeing savings as early as April. Houston Mayor Bob Lanier on Wednesday praised the settlement as "a good deal" for the city and the first electric rate reduction in 1 recent memory. i NASA begins search for new launch system ilk i LLiiiULU IT Color TV with XS Stereo Sound Remote Control Built-in speakers, auto programming, 3-jack AV moni- 1 'I I Remote Control Ml Multi-color on-screen dis nlavs FnnlishSnanish a cn tor panel, on-screen clock. As Low As $20 A Month nnl i As Low As $1 5 A Month graphics.

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