Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
Bruce Tomaso spent more than 30 years as a writer and editor at The Dallas Morning News. When asked what positions he held there, he usually says it’s easier to list those he didn’t.
As enterprise editor on The News’s breaking news desk in the summer of 2016, he played a key role in covering the downtown shooting spree that left five police officers dead. For its coverage, The News was a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News Reporting.
He spent most of 1997 in Denver covering the federal criminal trials of Oklahoma City bombers Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols. Four years later, he covered McVeigh’s execution.
His first major reporting assignment for The Texas Lawbook was a retrospective on the 20th anniversary of the $119.6 million verdict for 10 young men who’d been molested as children by Rudy Kos, a priest in the Catholic Diocese of Dallas. The stories earned Bruce and his Lawbook editor, Allen Pusey, the Dallas Bar Association’s 2018 Stephen Philbin Award for Feature Writing.
In 2019, he covered the seven-week medical fraud trial of nine physicians, healthcare executives and others associated with Forest Park Medical Center, a now-defunct Dallas surgical hospital.
He’s a member of the Alumni Hall of Fame at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. He and his wife, Dallas attorney Patricia A. Nolan, have one grown son, who is smarter than either of them.
He will drop everything, including preposterous sums of money, to see Lady Gaga, Notre Dame football, or the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team.
You can reach Bruce at bruce.tomaso@texaslawbook.net.
The power of incumbency, normally a potent advantage at the ballot box, may prove to be of diminished relevance in this year’s three races for seats on the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas. This article explains the dynamics and background of the three races in Dallas' Fifth Court of Appeals.
Vinson Woodlee, 68 was charged in the Northern District of Texas with four counts under the federal anti-kickback statute. If convicted on all counts, he could be sentenced to 35 years inprison.
Richard Toussaint, a co-founder of Forest Park Medical Center, is already serving time in federal prison for a different fraud. Bruce Tomaso reports.
Justice Paul Green, the second-longest sitting justice on the Supreme Court of Texas, announced Tuesday that he is retiring at the end of August. A third-generation lawyer, Justice Green has been a reliably conservative vote on a state supreme court loaded with conservatives. Justice Green was re-elected in 2016 and his term officially ends in December 2022. Gov. Greg Abbott will appoint his successor.
U.S. District Judge Jack Zouhary ruled Monday that requests by Forest Park Medical Center doctors and officials for a new trial are "meritless." The seven defendants were convicted last year of taking part in a massive insurance fraud scheme. The judge also criticized trial tactics employed by one of the prominent lawyers during the trial as "dirty and nasty" and a "cheap stunt." The Texas Lawbook has complete details.
Andrea Kay Smith, who kept the books for the bribes paid to surgeons at the now defunct Forest Park Medical Center, was sentenced Wednesday in a Dallas federal court. Smith testified about the scheme as part of a plea bargain with federal prosecutors. The Lawbook's Bruce Tomaso reports.
Four physicians convicted earlier this year in the Forest Park Medical Center bribery and kickback trial have been suspended by the Texas Medical Board. The suspensions are not final, but they are mandatory while the convictions are being appealed. Bruce Tomaso has the details.
The U.S. government is seeking more than $17 million in forfeitures from the seven defendants found guilty in April in the Forest Park medical fraud trial. Defrauded insurance companies could be demanding more. Bruce Tomaso has the latest in the Forest Park MC kickbacks case.
In separate pleadings filed last week, six of the defendants found guilty in the spring for their roles in a bribery and kickback scheme at the now-defunct Forest Park Medical Center are asking the U.S. District Court in Dallas for judgments of acquittal or, alternatively, new trials. Texas Lawbook correspondent Bruce Tomaso provides a summary of the arguments.
A prominent Dallas spinal surgeon convicted in the Forest Park Medical Center fraud case is seeking a new trial. The filing on Monday by David Gerger of Houston-based Gerger Khalil & Hennessy, claims a string of harmful errors by federal prosecutors and the trial judge requires that the conviction in April of Dr. Michael Rimlawi be vacated. Bruce Tomaso has the story.
© Copyright 2026 The Texas Lawbook
The content on this website is protected under federal Copyright laws. Any use without the consent of The Texas Lawbook is prohibited.