Disbarred Manvel lawyer no stranger to death

June 1, 2010 11:58 am Greg May wrote:

Shawn Roberts

The Texas Rangers and other authorities are investigating the deaths of four people close to disbarred Manvel attorney Shawn Roland Roberts.

Roberts, who was disbarred last year for professional misconduct related to drug use, was at the scene of each death, according to police.

He's being treated as a witness in the April 14 death of his wife, Amanda Linscomb, who police believe died of an overdose.

The Texas Rangers are assisting with the case and also probing the deaths of Tara Sganga, a girlfriend of Roberts whose body contained numerous drugs when she died in March 2007; Steven Blackshear, Roberts' roommate who died from acute toxicity in March 2009; and Roberts' mother, Sandra Roberts, who shot herself in August 2009.

Roberts is in the Harris County jail on several drug charges, including a charge of delivery of a controlled substance via injection related to Sganga's death.

A Brazoria County grand jury reviewed the deaths of Blackshear and the mother, but found no evidence of foul play.

Harris County prosecutors filed the delivery charge in August 2009, after a grand jury declined to indict Roberts on a murder charge.

Roberts' attorney, Mark Bennett, said that prosecutors have no evidence that Roberts injected Sganga with drugs.

“The (drug) charge is driven in part by a very upset family who wants Shawn held responsible for their daughter's death,” Bennett said.

As far as Roberts' involvement in the other deaths, Bennett said people involved in drugs will likely have people around them die. Asked if that meant Roberts was a drug user, he said, “I don't have an answer for that.”

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Texas Gulf Waits & Worries

LAPORTE -- Richard Arnhart spends much of his days monitoring wind trajectories, scientific bulletins and TV newscasts.

Parts of an oily blob three times the size of Rhode Island -- and growing -- are believed by many experts to be lumbering closer to the Texas Gulf, and Arnhart is part of the first line of defense.
As a regional director for the Oil Spill Prevention and Response Program in the Texas General Land Office, Arnhart is paid by the state to fight oil spills, and he's heavily involved in state and federal contingency planning for any possible impact on Texas from the massive oil spill lurking in the Gulf of Mexico.

Communities all along the Texas coast are making similar preparations as they join the rest of the world in tracking daily developments in one of the worst oil spill disasters in history.
No one knows for sure if remnants of the spill, which was about 160 miles east of the Lone Star State late last week, will reach Texas waters. The consensus seems to be that if there is an impact it will be in the form of tar balls or a frothy substance resembling chocolate mousse. Experts don't expect any residue to hit this far west for several weeks.

Beyond that, just what threat the spill poses for a region of the state whose economy and culture is tied to the gulf is difficult to gauge. Environmentalists warn of possibly irreversible damage to the state's fragile ecosystems and endangered wildlife. Others worry about potential losses to fishing and tourism, though local officials say they have yet to see any signs of an economic backlash.
"It's going to have an impact one way or another," said state Rep. Aaron Pena, D-Edinburg, chairman of the state House Select Committee on Emergency Preparedness, which has scheduled a Monday hearing in McAllen to examine Texas preparations for the spill. "We swim in that ocean. We eat the food that comes out of that ocean. It's part of our [committee's] charge to be prepared for emergencies, and this is certainly an emergency that Texas should be prepared for."
'No news is good news'

Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, whose office would be in charge of fighting residue from the spill and enforcing the cleanup, took steps late last week to calm fears about the oil slick.

"We're watching and waiting, but it's just not time to go to general quarters," said Patterson, who is scheduled to testify at Monday's hearing. "No news is good news."

Patterson sought to dispel TV reports that tar balls from the spill are already showing up on Texas beaches. Although tar balls occasionally wash ashore along the Texas Gulf, they may be decades old and could come from natural seepage or earlier spills, the land office said. An analysis on tar balls collected from Jamaica Beach on Galveston Island last week proved conclusively that the substance did not come from the oil slick in the gulf, said Cmdr. David Berliner of the Coast Guard.
Nevertheless, an out-of-control underwater gusher dumping more than thousands of barrels of oil into the gulf each day is impossible for Texans to ignore. Houston area residents watching TV last week, for example, might have seen ads aired by attorney Jim Adler offering his service to victims of the spill.

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Oil spill threatens already weakened wetlands

by Brad Woodard / 11 News
khou.com


Crews depart with giant box to help Gulf oil leak
With millions of gallons of oil already in the gulf and massive underwater plumes that could poison and suffocate sea life across the food chain, experts say the damage from the spill could endure for a decade or more. For Galveston, however, the picture isn't quite as bleak.

"There may be some kind of effect coming this way, some little tarballs, but we'd be talking about almost three weeks into the future, which gives it more time to break up. More time to sink," said Peter Davis, chief of the Island's Beach Patrol.

If Davis doesn't seem overly concerned, it's because he's seen it all before.

"I've worked here for almost 30 years, and before that I was on the beach all the time," says Davis. "I remember in the 80s when there was less regulation; there was tar around a lot more."

Long before the Deepwater Horizon explosion, in fact, long before offshore drilling, tarballs were washing up on Texas beaches. The state estimates as much as a million barrels of crude oil leaked into the gulf through natural seepage in just the last year.

Although the coast is clear in Galveston, at least for the moment, some business owners along the seawall worry all the news surrounding the spill with scare off tourists.

"They don't know if there is oil or no oil," says Izzy Wolraich, the owner of four businesses on the Island. "And we know there's no oil.

There're afraid about poisoned fish and dirty water, but there's not a panic yet."

And that's what he fears the most.

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Alvin Chamber Warns About Scam!

Alvin-Manvel residents warned about scam
May 6, 2010 3:58 pm Robert Stanton wrote:
Connie J. Elies, president of the Alvin-Manvel Area Chamber of Commerce, warns residents and business people to beware of an advertising scam that is using the chamber's name. Here is an e-mail she sent to chamber members and the media on Thursday:

Dear Members and Friends,

I have just become aware of a potential scam targeting area businesses.

Calls are being received across our area from a company who is claiming to represent the Alvin-Manvel Area Chamber of Commerce to solicit advertising on an "Alvin, Texas 2010 City Map."

To be clear, the chamber is not currently working on any type of map or other publication. In the future, when we offer advertising opportunities, chamber members will first be notified to bring awareness of the project and also given the name of the company that will be contacting you regarding advertising.

No one will ever call you without you first being notified of the project. Should you ever have questions regarding a company's affiliation with or representation of the Chamber, please don't hesitate to call our office immediately.

As a rule, never agree to advertising over the phone with a company that you aren't familiar with. There are plenty of reputable agencies in and around the Alvin-Manvel area that will contact you directly when there is a legitimate local publication in production.

Sincerely,

Connie J. Elies

connie@amacc.org


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