Pain & Profit Part 8, Lee Merritt acquitted, Heisman Trophy winner: Your weekend roundup

December 09, 2018 By Dom DiFurio and Nataly Keomoungkhoun Good morning! Here is a look at the top headlines of the weekend so far. 🌥️ Weather: Partly cloudy in the morning with some sun in the afternoon. High of 48. 🔎 Prefer the online view? It's [here](. Part 8 of Pain & Profit, a Dallas Morning News investigation into the way Texas treats fragile people who rely on Medicaid, the government insurance program for the poor and disabled. Pain & profit Abbott and lawmakers have the power to improve care for sick and disabled Texans. Will they use it? Texas spends $22 billion every year to buy health care for its most vulnerable residents. But taxpayers aren’t getting their money’s worth. As The Dallas Morning News [reported this year](, thousands of elderly and disabled Texans can’t get the medical care they need. Many chronically sick children have to fight for life-sustaining treatments. Countless [foster kids]( can’t get doctors’ appointments. Under a program called Medicaid managed care, health care companies promise to save taxpayer money and to help patients by hiring care coordinators to connect them with doctors and treatments. But Texas cannot prove it is saving money, and the state’s own [analysts found]( that most patients aren’t getting much — or any — care coordination. The good news is that Texas leaders can fix this mess. We interviewed more than a dozen experts, looked at what’s working in other states, and identified eight specific steps that could mend the state’s broken public health-care system and protect vulnerable Texans. Some require action from lawmakers, who convene in Austin in January. But most could be implemented by Gov. Greg Abbott’s administration now. [Read the full investigation of Pain & Profit Part 8.]( Explainer: [How does Medicaid work?]( The documents: [How we reported this special investigation.]( courts Botham Jean family's lawyer Lee Merritt acquitted on 16 counts of criminal contempt Civil rights attorney Lee Merritt said Friday [he is free to assist victims of police misconduct]( after a judge dismissed charges accusing him of practicing Texas law without a state license. Merritt, who is from Los Angeles, faced 16 counts of criminal contempt for practicing state law without a Texas law license. A judge concluded her dismissal of all 16 charges, including 14 that were dismissed outright before rebuttal. The Unauthorized Practice of Law Committee is considering appealing Thursday's ruling by Judge Cynthia Wheless, according to committee member Leland de la Garza. Commentary: Preston Center residents [are losing the battle against traffic](. And: Hundreds of animals living in 'layers upon layers' of filth [were seized from a Cleburne pet store](. dallas Sentencing delayed for the guilty in Dallas County Schools corruption case, including Dwaine Caraway Five men in the past year have pleaded guilty to federal corruption leading to the downfall of Dallas County Schools — [and all five will spend another Christmas at home](. Former Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway, for instance, faces up to seven years behind bars for accepting $450,000 in bribes and kickbacks from two figures in the scandal that brought down the agency once tasked with busing kids to school and helping them cross streets. Caraway pleaded guilty in August to two counts of federal corruption charges — tax evasion and wire fraud — and was originally scheduled to be sentenced next week. His new date is now four months away. Commentary: How a South Dallas neighborhood wrecked by a freeway [can become whole again](. And: Dallas County GOP released a statement [condemning a 'white nationalist' Republican from North Texas](. (Tom Fox/Staff Photographer) Photo of the WEEKEND Runner Martin Multon of Garland (right) congratulates Mark Hsu of Richardson after they both finished the BMW Dallas Marathon 5K race at City Hall in downtown Dallas on Saturday. [Despite cold and rainy weather,]( runners from all over the country showed up to run the 5K or the 10K. Around The Site - Heisman history: Kyler Murray, a former Allen high school football player, [becomes Oklahoma's second straight Heisman Trophy winner.]( - Crime: Three employees at a Sonic in Central Texas were arrested this week [after a family found drugs hidden in a kid's meal](. - The White House: Trump says chief of staff John Kelly [will leave the White House by the end of the year](. - The race for Mayor: High-profile philanthropist Lynn McBee says [she wants to be Dallas' next mayor](. - Entertainment: With the massive arrival of Venezuelans to North Texas, [entertainment options are growing](. - Cowboys: Did Jason Garrett's new shirt, Zeke and Dak's long sleeves and other superstitions [factor into the Cowboys' turnaround](? - No reports: The Air Force [failed 6 times to report Sutherland Springs church gunman](, a new report says. - Bomb scare: An angry customer who tried to use a bogus ID at a northeast Dallas bank [caused a short-lived bomb scare]( Saturday afternoon. Finally... Slow down the holidays by putting down the phone From contributor Catherine Price: As the whirlwind of the holidays descends, you may find yourself wishing that you could slow down time. Here's the thing: You can. [You just need to put down your cell phone](. I first discovered this myself a few years ago when, as an experiment, my husband and I took a 24-hour break from all our screens starting at sundown Friday. Saturday morning we accomplished more by 11 a.m. than we'd normally get done in an entire day. We cooked. We talked. We cleaned. We read. I practiced guitar. We played with our daughter. I felt like I'd unlocked a time-stretching superpower that I hadn't known I possessed. Since then, I've heard many similar reports from people who have taken up my suggestion to try a 24-hour phone fast — what I like to call a "phast." It turns out that this is the result of a real psychological phenomenon. 👋 That's all for this morning! 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