Whipped Cream Difficulties

Have you ever heard of the Texas Highway Patrol Association?

Did you know they had a museum in San Antonio? I did not. I might have gone down to see the museum, had I known it was there. But in retrospect, I’m kind of glad I didn’t make the trip: here are some photos of the museum from the Texas DPS website.

As you might have guessed from that link and the associated commentary (which I personally think is very unusual for Texas DPS), the THPA was one of those charities that does telemarketing calls, collects your money, and does very little to benefit anyone but the company that makes the calls.

In particular, the organization apparently promised to pay a $10,000 “death benefit” to families of troopers killed in the line of duty. The organization never paid, the families sued, and…

As part of a 39-page agreement, property belonging to the Texas Highway Patrol Association in Austin and a museum it operates in San Antonio will be liquidated…

Interestingly, the museum was founded by a former state legislator from Waco, Lane Denton. (Waco is also the home of the Texas Rangers Museum, which is actually well worth the drive from Austin to visit.)

In 1995, Denton was found guilty of theft and misapplying money belonging to a different organization, the Texas Department of Public Safety Officers Association, and sentenced to six years of probation.

And:

The lawsuit said state investigators found that few survivors received any financial assistance and that money from a scholarship fund went to children of board members. The suit also said officials used up to $10,000 in donations a day to buy tickets to amusement parks and movie theaters and to pay for airfare across the United States.

(Subject line hattip. I loved that show when I was a kid. No, I’m not that old: one of the local UHF stations showed syndicated reruns.)

Edited to add: In case you were wondering, here’s a Google Maps street view of the THPA headquarters. Note that this isn’t the large building on North Lamar, across from Texas DPS and right next to Dan’s Hamburgers, but another building.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 29th, 2012 at 9:31 am and is filed under Clippings, Cops, Law, Museums. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.