Alanis, who had only been employed by Dallas ISD for a few months, sent a series of emails from his school account to the principal and other administrators, police said. According to an arrest warrant affidavit, he demanded that he and another teacher be paid the district’s Master Teacher Salary and be given back pay dating to the previous August. If they didn’t comply, the message warned, they wouldn’t want to “burn alive.” A follow-up email stated that anyone who failed to meet his demands would be “put down immediately by Dallas PD,” and attached an image of armed officers.

The threats, sent around the start of the spring semester, triggered an immediate law enforcement response. Dallas ISD police added extra officers to the campus while they searched for Alanis, who had gone missing for nearly a week. The sight of heightened security on an otherwise ordinary school day left students on edge and parents demanding answers, though officials released little information at the time.

Police documents later revealed the full scope of the messages. When Alanis finally resurfaced at his home on a Saturday, officers made contact. In a voluntary interview, he admitted multiple times to sending the emails. He told investigators he was standing up to the administration to force change on teacher pay, something he felt was necessary.

But to his family, the man who sent those threats was not the brother they knew.

“You know, there’s a back story to that,” his sister, Arlene, said at the time. “As far as we’re concerned, he’s not mentally stable at this point. He had some sort of mental breakdown. My grandpa passed away recently, so that might have triggered that.”

The family had spent a frantic week not knowing where he was. When Arlene saw him after he was located, she barely recognized him.

“He was very unlike himself when I saw him,” she said. “I was just like, ‘that’s not my brother.’ … We’re getting our brother the help he needs. He’s not a terrorist. There’s no need for anyone to be afraid of him.”

Alanis was arrested and charged with making a terroristic threat. He was placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation and booked into jail before being released on a $1,500 bond. Shortly after, his sister said he remained hospitalized for a psychiatric evaluation.

In the years since, the incident has lingered as a sobering reminder of the pressures that can simmer unseen behind classroom doors. The extra security has long since lifted, but the memory of that week—the tense emails, the added officers, the missing teacher—remains a chapter the Seagoville community won’t soon forget.

For a neighborhood where school pride runs deep and tradition binds families together, the teacher’s threat rattled far more than just an administration building. It shook a fundamental sense of trust, leaving many to wonder how such a cry for help turned into something so menacing, and how a classroom once dedicated to world history became the starting point for a story that felt too close to home.

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Seagoville Flashback is a recurring feature revisiting notable moments from Seagoville’s past, drawn from official city and police records.

This week’s Seagoville Flashback looks back to January 2020, when a robbery at a local Family Dollar store set off a foot chase and a multi agency search that ended with the suspect located from the air.

According to a news release from the City of Seagoville, dated January 21, 2020, the Seagoville Police Department received a call on Sunday, January 19, 2020, around 8:50 PM, reporting a robbery in progress at the Family Dollar store located in the 100 block of Hall Road. Police said information was received that a male dressed in all black and wearing a mask was in the act of committing a robbery of the business while displaying a handgun to employees.

Witnesses reported the lone suspect fled the business after obtaining money from the store and ran behind the strip shopping center.

Responding officers encountered the described suspect and engaged in a brief foot chase. According to the release, the suspect evaded officers into a residential area, where a perimeter was quickly established to contain him. Assistance in locating and containing the suspect was provided by the Crandall Police Department, the Kaufman County Sheriff’s Department, the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department K9 unit, and the Texas Department of Public Safety Aircraft Division.

With assistance from TXDPS Air Support, the suspect was located hiding in the yard of a residence in the 1000 block of N Kaufman St. Officers were directed to the suspect’s location and he was apprehended without further incident.

Police said the mask, the currency stashed in a Family Dollar shopping bag, and the weapon used in the crime were recovered in proximity to where the suspect was found. It was later determined that the weapon used in the robbery was a replica toy pistol. The suspect’s vehicle was later discovered parked on a residential side street.

Roderick Wayne Nelson Jr, 35, of Glenn Heights, was jailed and charged with Aggravated Robbery, Evading Detention, and Failure to Identify as a Fugitive. According to the release, Nelson was being held in the Dallas County Jail at the time.

Looking back, this case illustrates the level of coordination between local and regional agencies that can come together in response to a serious incident, with air support ultimately proving key to bringing the search to a safe conclusion.

Source: City of Seagoville News Release, dated January 21, 2020. Contact listed: Captain S. Davis, Seagoville Police Department, (972) 287-6815.

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Some stories from Seagoville’s past are hard to revisit, but they are part of our shared history, and they deserve to be remembered with care and respect. This Seagoville Flashback looks back at one of the most painful moments in recent community memory: the murder of Brii Jackson, a Seagoville High School freshman, in October 2017.

According to a report from FOX 7 Austin published on October 11, 2017, Brii was a 15 year old Seagoville High School freshman who was shot and killed in far southeast Dallas County. The Dallas County Sheriff’s Office arrested a 14 year old boy in connection with her death.

The loss hit especially hard because of its timing. Brii had celebrated her fifteenth birthday with family just the day before she was killed. Relatives told FOX 7 Austin that they had a great time celebrating that Friday, and less than 24 hours later, Brii was dying just feet from her front door.

Family members said the boy arrested in her death lived in the same mobile home park and that the two had known each other for years. According to FOX 7 Austin, Brii’s aunt, Tracie Addington, said, “They were friends at one point. They’ve known each other for 6 or 7 years. It’s heartbreaking, and I do not wish this on any other family.”

The outlet reported that the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office did not release the suspect’s identity because he was a juvenile, and it was unclear at the time where he obtained the firearm.

Family members told FOX 7 Austin that Brii had been walking with her 14 year old sister and a 10 year old cousin at the time of the shooting. Her sister held her as she lay bleeding in the street while they waited for help to arrive.

Those who knew Brii described her as smart and popular, a teenager with a bright future ahead of her. In the days after her death, classmates at Seagoville High School grieved together, and the community was left trying to make sense of how one child could take the life of another.

We were not able to locate publicly available information confirming the final legal outcome of this case, which is common in matters involving juvenile defendants, since those proceedings are often sealed under Texas law. If any readers have updated, verified information about how this case was resolved, we welcome you to reach out to our newsroom.

Nearly a decade later, Brii Jackson’s name still belongs to Seagoville. Moments like this remind us why community, connection, and looking out for one another’s children matter so much here at home.

*This Seagoville Flashback feature draws on original reporting by FOX 7 Austin, published October 11, 2017.*

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A look back at a 2018 Seagoville Police Department case that began with a traffic stop and ended with two wanted felons caught in the woods near Beckett Road.

It started as a routine traffic stop. It ended with a crashed pickup, two fugitives running through the woods, and a TXDPS helicopter circling overhead.

On the morning of February 15, 2018, a Seagoville Police officer tried to pull over a Chevrolet pickup for displaying the wrong license plates, according to a Seagoville Police Department news release. The driver did not stop. What followed was a pursuit that carried officers out of Seagoville, through Combine, and into unincorporated areas of Dallas County.

The chase finally ended when the driver left the roadway and crashed into a wooded area along South Beltline Road, near the intersection with Beckett Road, according to the Seagoville Police Department. Both occupants abandoned the truck and ran into the dense brush on foot.

Officers caught up with the passenger first. She was identified as Samantha Patrice Manseau, 28, of Balch Springs. After a continued search of the wooded area, officers located the driver as well, identified as Jacob Norman Holt, 25, also of Balch Springs, according to the Seagoville Police Department.

Both Manseau and Holt had active felony arrest warrants at the time of their arrest, the release stated. Manseau was charged with the misdemeanor offense of Evading Arrest or Detention. Holt faced two additional felony charges: Evading Arrest or Detention with a Vehicle, and Unauthorized Use of a Vehicle.

The Chevrolet pickup itself turned out to be stolen, reported through the Mesquite Police Department, according to the Seagoville Police Department.

No officers or bystanders were injured during the pursuit or the search that followed. The Seagoville Police Department credited the successful apprehension to outside support, including deputies with the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department and air support from a Texas Department of Public Safety helicopter, according to the release.

The case stands as a reminder of how quickly an ordinary traffic stop can turn into a coordinated, multi agency response, and of the cooperation between Seagoville Police and neighboring law enforcement that helped bring the pursuit to a safe end.

This Seagoville Flashback is based on a Seagoville Police Department news release dated February 16, 2018. For more information at the time, the release listed Captain Steve Davis as the department contact.

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Seagoville Flashback: The Mushroom Fueled Shooting That Took Three Years to Catch Up With Him

Some cases close quietly. Others take years and an entirely separate, unrelated incident to finally come full circle. The story of Russell Alan Ragsdale is the second kind.

A 911 Call in the Early Morning Hours

In the early hours of February 3, 2022, Ragsdale called 911 to report that he had shot his roommate inside their Seagoville residence. He told responding officers that his roommate had attacked him and that he fired in self defense, later stating he had “shot him many times.”

Officers recovered three firearms from the home, including a 10mm Glock and an AR 15 rifle, along with nearly two grams of hallucinogenic mushrooms. The roommate, 19 year old Timothy Patrick Morris, died from his injuries. A Dallas County grand jury indicted Ragsdale for murder, alleging he intentionally and knowingly killed Morris.

That murder case was later dismissed.

An Unrelated Incident at a Dallas Church

The Seagoville shooting might have remained a closed chapter if not for what happened more than two and a half years later, on November 2, 2024, at St. Augustine Catholic Church in southeast Dallas.

According to federal court documents, Ragsdale entered the church around 5:05 PM alongside roughly 100 parishioners attending Mass. He reportedly sat in the front row, then approached the priest a few minutes later, embraced him, and handed him a note reading “may peace be with you,” before leaving the building at 5:13 PM.

What happened next alarmed witnesses. Ragsdale allegedly retrieved a rifle from his vehicle while wearing a poncho, then closed three gates to the parking lot. At 5:35 PM, he reportedly attempted to re enter the church with the rifle, but parishioners had locked the doors. A parishioner kept Ragsdale talking outside the building for several minutes until police arrived. One witness later said he believed Ragsdale intended to shoot people inside.

Ragsdale was arrested shortly after on November 22, 2024, and has remained in federal custody since.

The Old Case Resurfaces

While investigating the church incident, federal agents uncovered Ragsdale’s 2022 arrest in Seagoville and the dismissed murder case tied to it. A forensic review of his phone showed a history of drug use dating back to November 2021, including evidence that he purchased and used hallucinogenic mushrooms on February 2, 2022, the day before the deadly shooting.

Rather than refile a state murder charge, federal prosecutors brought a different case entirely. On April 29, 2025, Ragsdale pled guilty to possession of a firearm by an unlawful user of a controlled substance, a federal charge tied directly to the fact that he was, in his own words, legally intoxicated from hallucinogenic mushrooms when he possessed the 10mm Glock used in the 2022 shooting.

Sentencing

On July 17, 2025, Senior U.S. District Judge Barbara M. G. Lynn sentenced the 25 year old to 66 months, five and a half years, in federal prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release.

At sentencing, Judge Lynn found that Ragsdale had not presented sufficient evidence to support his self defense claim from 2022. The court further noted that the death of his roommate was, in the judge’s words, of the defendant’s own making.

Acting United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Nancy E. Larson announced the sentence. Ragsdale remains in custody pending transfer to the Bureau of Prisons.

A Joint Investigation

The case was investigated by the FBI’s Dallas Field Office and the Dallas Police Department, with assistance from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ Dallas Field Division, the Seagoville Police Department, and the Texas Department of Public Safety, the latter of which had participated in the original 2022 murder investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jongwoo Chung prosecuted the case.

It is a case that began with a dismissed murder charge in a small Seagoville home and ended, years later, with federal prison time triggered by an unsettling moment at a Dallas church.

Sources: U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Texas; FOX 4 Dallas Fort Worth; WFAA; CBS Texas; Irving Weekly; The Dallas Express

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According to a City of Seagoville news release dated August 20, 2014, Officer Kenny Dickerson was named the Ray Ramon Texas Citizen Police Academy Alumni Association Officer of the Year. The announcement came during the Texas Citizen Police Academy Alumni Association’s annual training convention and awards ceremony, held in late July of 2014 in San Marcos Texas. Police officers and Citizen Police Academy Alumni Association volunteers from across the state attended the event.

The award carries special significance within Texas law enforcement circles. It is named in honor of a local police officer from Duncanville Texas who is credited as one of the first in the state to help bring about the concept of Citizen Police Academies, programs designed to give community members an inside look at the daily work of their local police departments.

Officer Dickerson’s nomination included a host of accolades recognizing his leadership and dedication to the

, the Seagoville Police Department, and the broader community he served.

Shop in Seagoville is proud to revisit this piece of local history as part of our ongoing Seagoville Flashback series, celebrating the people and moments that have shaped our community over the years.

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Seagoville Flashback is a recurring feature revisiting notable moments from Seagoville’s past, drawn from official city and police records.

This week’s Seagoville Flashback looks back to July 2019, when quick recognition of a suspect on surveillance video led Seagoville Police to an arrest just hours after a string of business burglaries.

According to a news release from the City of Seagoville, dated July 9, 2019, a Seagoville Police Officer discovered a shattered glass door at a convenience store in the 600 block of Hall Road during the early morning hours of July 5, 2019. Further investigation determined that a total of three businesses in the small strip shopping center showed signs of forced entry and had been burglarized.

Officers met with a representative of the convenience store who was summoned to the scene. According to the release, an officer was able to view the store’s surveillance video and quickly recognized the lone suspect as a known local offender.

Assisting officers searched for and located the suspect loitering around a business in the 200 block of N US Highway 175. He was carrying a backpack at the time of the encounter. Police said officers detained the suspect and found the backpack contained numerous items, including rolls of lottery tickets, packages of cigarettes, bottled drinks, rolled coins, and currency. All of these items were determined to have been stolen from the businesses during the burglaries.

Officers arrested and charged Nicholas Troy Krause, 21, of Seagoville, with three counts of Burglary of Building. According to the release, he was being held in the Dallas County Jail on a $30,000 bond for the collective charges, and was also being held without bond on two probation violations stemming from previous theft convictions.

Looking back, this case stands out as an example of how quickly a coordinated response, combined with sharp recognition from an officer familiar with local offenders, can lead to a swift resolution in a multi business burglary investigation.

Source: City of Seagoville News Release, dated July 9, 2019. Contact listed: Captain S. Davis, Seagoville Police Department, (972) 287-6815.

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Seagoville Flashback

Nearly 11 months ago this week, a routine traffic stop on Seagoville Road turned into a fight for a Seagoville officer’s life. We look back at the case that shook our community.

It was just after 7 p.m. on Sunday, July 27, 2025, when a Seagoville police officer tried to pull over a Chevrolet pickup on Seagoville Road. The truck had been reported stolen. Within minutes, that stop would turn into one of the most dangerous nights of Sgt. Ethan Sinclair’s career, and a story that would dominate North Texas news for days.

A chase that went the wrong way, literally

According to the Seagoville Police Department, the driver, later identified as 36 year old Brandon Roy Boothe, fled when the officer attempted the stop. The pursuit ran from Seagoville Road onto IH 20, where Boothe entered the highway traveling the wrong way. The first officer broke off the chase for safety reasons, according to CBS Texas.

A second officer picked up the pursuit on the IH 20 service road near Beltline Road in southeast Dallas. Boothe tried to escape again, driving the stolen truck across a grassy area before colliding with another vehicle at low speed near the Beltline Road intersection, Seagoville PD said.

From foot chase to a fight for the patrol car

Boothe abandoned the truck and ran, with an officer chasing him on foot. Police said an attempt to use a Taser on Boothe failed. Then, in a moment that stunned investigators, Boothe doubled back and climbed into the officer’s own patrol vehicle, apparently trying to drive away in it.

Sgt. Sinclair, an eight year veteran of the department, later described the moment to NBC 5 Dallas Fort Worth. “Then he ends up doubling back, I see him grab the squad car door, and my mind just goes racing, and so the first thing I do is jump on top of him,” Sinclair told the station.

What followed was a violent, prolonged struggle inside the vehicle. Boothe briefly gained control of the patrol car and drove it forward into the stolen pickup, then put it in reverse and accelerated while Sinclair was still partly outside the vehicle, dragging him across the pavement, according to the Seagoville Police Department’s account.

Sinclair told NBC 5 that the fight felt far longer than its actual length. “They do three minute drills in the academy, and let me tell you, that’s a controlled environment. Out there, where it’s not a controlled environment, that felt like it was an hour,” he said.

The struggle stretched on for more than two minutes before a second Seagoville officer arrived and deployed a Taser, finally subduing Boothe, CBS Texas and FOX 4 both reported.

A career criminal, and an officer who walked away

Sinclair suffered a busted lip along with minor facial injuries and an injured ankle from being dragged outside the vehicle, according to NBC 5. He was treated at the scene and, by his own account to reporters, was far more focused on the outcome than his own injuries. “My adrenaline was so high, I couldn’t feel anything. I was just, I knew I had to get this guy out of that car,” he told NBC 5.

Boothe was taken to a hospital, medically cleared, and booked into the Dallas County jail. He faced multiple felony charges, including robbery, aggravated assault against a public servant, unauthorized use of a vehicle, evading arrest or detention with a vehicle, and two counts of unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon, after two handguns and ammunition were found inside the stolen pickup, Seagoville PD said.

Police described Boothe as a documented street gang member with an extensive criminal history dating back to 2006, and said he had an active warrant for a parole violation through the Texas Department of Corrections at the time of the incident. He had reportedly been out on parole since December of the previous year.

Seagoville Police Chief Ray Calverley did not hold back when speaking with CBS Texas after the arrest. “The actions of Sgt. Sinclair were exemplary,” Calverley said. “I couldn’t have asked for a better outcome. My outlook on Mr. Boothe is he’ll have his day in court.”

Calverley also raised pointed questions about the system that allowed Boothe back onto the streets. “I don’t understand why a person like this has ever left incarceration,” he told CBS Texas. “I ask those that are responsible for doing and prosecuting these offenses, where their heads are at.”

Looking back, one year later

A year on, the night remains one of the most harrowing on record for the Seagoville Police Department, and a reminder of the split second decisions our local officers face. Sgt. Sinclair’s composure under pressure, by every account from that night, kept a dangerous situation from becoming far worse.

This Seagoville Flashback is based on reporting from CBS Texas, NBC 5 Dallas Fort Worth, and FOX 4 Dallas Fort Worth from July 2025. Court proceedings in this case may be ongoing, and readers should consult the Dallas County District Clerk’s office for the most current case status.

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