School pride

Here's how TCU stacks up in the latest rankings of top Texas schools

Horned Frogs have reason to be proud.

Just in time for fall break, personal finance website WalletHub has released 2019's Best College & University Rankings. While three Dallas-Fort Worth schools have punched into Texas' top 10, Texas Christian University ranks close behind, at No. 12.

Cross-town rival Southern Methodist University ranks at No. 5 in the Lone Star State. University of Dallas comes in at No. 7, and University of Texas at Dallas rounds out the top 10. (Between UTD and TCU sits University of Houston, at No. 11.)

In order to determine the rankings, WalletHub compared 951 colleges and universities across seven key dimensions: student selectivity, cost and financing, faculty resources, campus safety, campus experience, educational outcomes, and career outcome.

Houston's Rice University takes the No. 1 Texas spot and comes in at No. 9 overall in the U.S. The University of Texas at Austin follows as the No. 2 best school in Texas, and Trinity University comes in third.

Rice University has been dominating collegiate headlines as of late, with its game-changing tuition and scholarship program and highest paid graduates in the state. In the new rankings, Rice comes in first for the following individual metrics: admission rate, student-faculty ratio, graduation rate, and post-attendance median salary. The school places second for gender and racial diversity.

TCU (national rank: 189) scored well in student selectivity and educational outcomes, but faltered in campus safety, as well as cost and financing.

SMU (national rank: 119) did best in the categories of faculty resources, student selectivity, and career outcomes. University of Dallas (national rank: 138) also was applauded for student selectivity, while UTD (national rank: 168) earned a nod for cost and financing.

Rounding out the top Texas schools are Texas A&M University (No. 4), Southwestern University (No. 6), LeTourneau University (No. 8), and Baylor University (No. 9).

Rice is in rather prestigious company on the national list, coming in behind the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton University, Yale University, Harvard University, California Institute of Technology, Duke University, University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia University. Stanford is No. 10.

colleges university-texas reports rankings

Death Penalty

Tarrant County man gets death for murder of convenience store owner

Tarrant County Sheriff's Office

Christopher Turner

A man received the death penalty for his 2020 cold-blooded execution of a convenience store owner.

According to a release from the office of Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney Phil Sorrells, a Tarrant County jury sentenced Christopher Karon Turner, 48, to death on November 20 for executing convenience store owner Anwar Ali during a robbery. Tarrant County Assistant District Attorneys Charles Boulware and Allenna Bangs represented the state.

On March 27, 2020, at around 6:15 am, Turner, a convicted felon, wore a surgical mask and a glove and entered the Super Big Country Mart in an unincorporated area of Tarrant County south of Fort Worth. There, he held a gun to the back of Anwar Ali, the 62-year-old store owner, and walked him through the store.

Ali did everything Turner demanded, including opening the cash register to give him money. And yet Turner forced Ali into the bathroom and onto his knees, and shot him in the neck. Ali was discovered, dead in the bathroom, about an hour later.

Turner fled the store in Ali's Toyota minivan with the money from the register and Ali's wallet. In the van, he found more than $50,000 cash in a black bag. Over the next few days, Turner went on a shopping spree, buying cars, jewelry, drugs, clothes, and more. He and others used cash and a credit card that belonged to Ali.

Turner fled to Colorado where U.S. Marshals arrested him. On his body they found a firearm which was determined to be the murder weapon.

"This was a premeditated, cold-blooded murder," Boulware told the jury. "From the moment he was charged with this crime, he has tried to escape responsibility."

Bangs noted that before this trial began, Turner obtained the names of jurors and their telephone numbers, and gave them to an inmate charged with murder. At the trial on November 20, as Bangs addressed the jury, Turner tried to hold up a sign to the jury but was handcuffed by Sheriff's deputies who removed him from the courtroom, while he yelled out "she lied."

Ali came to the United States from Pakistan decades ago to pursue the American dream. Ali's son, Hussein, spoke in the courtroom after the death penalty was announced. "Thank you for giving us justice," Ali said. "I hope there are no more devils like this person."