End of Silence

I wrote last week about tomorrow being the 40th anniversary of the UT Tower Shooting. I’ve been updating that post periodically over the past week as new posts have cropped up. I’ve got a few more today:

• K-EYE reports on a retired APD officer who auctioned off one of Whitman’s bullets over the weekend and it sold for $250k. So, if I’ve got this right, an APD officer stole a piece of evidence and then decided to auction it off 40 years later to make himself $250k. Neither of the K-EYE stories mention what’ll happen to the proceeds, but if he’s keeping it all for himself, it seems a little slimy to me.
• Tomorrow has been designated Ramiro “Ray” Martinez Day by the Austin City Council.
• I’ve linked the six-part story on News8Austin in my original post, but here’s a summary page for all of their coverage.

Lastly, thanks to the Austinist for marking my original post as one of their Best of the Austin Blogs picks last week.

Check out Part 1 and Part 3.

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve found myself running into a blog written by Steve and Sylvia Crossland, who are local realtors.

They post everything from the status of the Austin rental market to why fourplexes are evil to why Steve’s against Green Mesquite showing Ultimate Fighting on their televisions (I happen to agree with him, btw. I’m a huge ultimate fighting fan, but I won’t allow my children to watch). Some of the posts are really specific to the real estate market, but there are enough things for a broad appeal, enough to get them added to my RSS reader.

A week from today marks the 40th anniversary of the infamous UT Tower shootings. On August 1, 1966, Charles Whitman climbed to the top of the UT tower and began firing at the people below. He ultimately killed 15 (including his wife and mother, whom he killed that morning before the shooting spree) and wounded 31.

Texas Monthly is running a feature which tells the story in the words of those who were there that day. It includes the stories of many of the victims and one of the men responsible for ending the ordeal, Ray Martinez. Until reading some of these accounts, I hadn’t realized that two men, Martinez and Houston McCoy, shot Whitman and that there was contention between the two about who actually killed him. McCoy brought a lawsuit filed a claim against the City of Austin in 2000 for PTSD from the incident and they counter-sued saying that he’d waited too long to file the claim. You can read more at this site run by John Moore who acted under power of attorney for McCoy.

The shootings were the catalyst for the formation of modern-day SWAT teams. At that time, Austin Police Department officers were only equipped with revolvers or shotguns, weapons that were useless at the distance needed to take down Whitman without storming the tower and getting to him at close range. EMT was also virtually non-existent.
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It’ll be a busy morning tomorrow around Southeast Austin.

Lloyd Doggett is hosting Neighborhood Office Hours at the Albertson’s at 1819 S. Pleasant Valley Rd. from 11am – 12:30pm. Lloyd has been in the news a bit more lately since the Supreme Court ruling on the districts created by the GOP several years ago. A new map must be selected based on that ruling. The City Council came out against the one proposed by the Texas Attorney General. Here’s a full analysis of the 12 proposed alternate maps.

Also in The ’41 this Saturday from noon to 5pm is Summer Skate Fest 2006 at the city skatepark at Mabel Davis. News8 has more.