In less than a year, Mark Melton has received two memorable phone calls about his life’s work—one a dream fulfilled, the other a nightmare that could dismantle everything he’s built. The first came on a Saturday evening. That alone wasn’t unusual. Melton, a prominent corporate attorney and the head of the nonprofit Dallas Eviction Advocacy Center, doesn’t take weekends off, so his cell rarely stops ringing. Often the caller is desperate—a single mother, say, panicked about being put out on the street with her children. Melton started DEAC in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, and he was so inundated with pleas for help that it quickly took over his life. But this time, someone was coming to Melton’s aid.Clay Jenkins, the longtime Dallas…