{"id":435867,"date":"2026-09-14T19:54:25","date_gmt":"2026-09-14T19:54:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/435867\/"},"modified":"2026-09-14T19:54:25","modified_gmt":"2026-09-14T19:54:25","slug":"former-state-rep-lon-burnam-sues-judge-tim-ohare-nbc-5-dallas-fort-worth-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/435867\/","title":{"rendered":"Former state Rep. Lon Burnam sues Judge Tim O\u2019Hare \u2013 NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former state Rep. Lon Burnam is suing Tarrant County Judge Tim O\u2019Hare and Tarrant County over criminal trespass restrictions that prohibit Burnam from attending future Commissioners Court meetings.<\/p>\n

According to federal court documents filed Friday, Burnam is suing after he was removed from a Tarrant County Commissioners Court meeting<\/a> last month.<\/p>\n

The federal case names O\u2019Hare and Tarrant County as defendants and is classified as a civil rights lawsuit.<\/p>\n

In the lawsuit, Burnam alleges that O\u2019Hare and the county violated his First Amendment rights by cutting off his public comments, removing him from the meeting, and subsequently barring him from attending future meetings.<\/p>\n

He also argues Tarrant County is liable, saying its Rules of Decorum and the authority given to O\u2019Hare have led to a pattern of removing or restricting people who criticize county leaders.<\/p>\n

Burnam was carried out of the Aug. 4 meeting by his hands and feet after criticizing O\u2019Hare during public comment. The meeting included discussion about commissioners attempting to reduce the number of polling locations<\/a> for the midterm elections, which they tabled during that meeting but eventually passed the motion on Sept. 2.<\/p>\n

Burnam argues in his legal filing that he was punished not because he was disrupting the meeting, but because he was criticizing O\u2019Hare, opposing the proposal to reduce voting locations and showing support for another speaker, Base Mego, who had been removed.<\/p>\n

According to the complaint, Burnam was a registered speaker at the meeting and was still within his allotted speaking time when he lifted the microphone and turned toward the audience as a gesture of solidarity with Mego.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hare instructed Burnam to put the microphone down, and when Burnam continued speaking, O\u2019Hare ordered deputies to remove him, saying Burnam was \u201cdisrupting the meeting again.\u201d <\/p>\n

Burnam says he was not a threat and claims O\u2019Hare used \u201cdisruption\u201d as an excuse to silence his criticism. Burnam refused to leave voluntarily and went limp when authorities tried to remove him, which the lawsuit describes as “nonviolent resistance.” <\/p>\n

Four deputies then carried Burnam from the courtroom by his arms and legs, and he was arrested and booked on an alleged Class B misdemeanor.<\/p>\n

According to the complaint, Burnam received a letter from the Tarrant County Sheriff\u2019s Office six days later, imposing a criminal-trespass warning. The letter barred him from attending Commissioners Court meetings and from entering the county Administration Building while a meeting was taking place or scheduled.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hare has not commented on the civil rights lawsuit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former state Rep. Lon Burnam is suing Tarrant County Judge Tim O\u2019Hare and Tarrant County over criminal trespass…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":435868,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[116,118,117,122],"class_list":["post-435867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth-headlines","tag-fort-worth-news","tag-tarrant-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=435867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=435867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=435867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=435867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}