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Tx Youth Commission's Superintendent Arrested

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Deborah:
March 23, 2007, 8:19PM
TYC official arrested, accused of lying about abuse
By R.G. RATCLIFFE
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle

AUSTIN - The superintendent of the Texas Youth Commission's intake facility in Marlin was arrested today, charged with falsely telling a Texas Ranger there were no sex abuse accusations at the unit.

Jerome Parsee is charged with making a false statement to a peace officer, a misdemeanor punishable by up to a $2,000 fine and 180 days in jail.

Also today, officials announced a panel of community activists, prosecutors and juvenile prison officials will review the records of nearly all youth inmates to make sure their sentences haven't been extended unfairly.

Advocates for TYC inmates and their families have complained that sentences are often extended for capricious reasons or in retaliation for filing grievances.

TYC special master Jay Kimbrough said the panel will review the documentation on each inmate's sentencing extension and discuss whether the decision was just and appropriate.

The panel will make a suggestion to a retired judge, who will decide whether the inmate should be immediately released.

"I have no confidence in the integrity of that entire system,'' Kimbrough said.

TYC incarcerates about 4,700 offenders ages 10 to 21 who are considered the most dangerous, incorrigible or chronic. Kimbrough said about nine in 10 of those offenders have had their sentences extended.

The Associated Press contributed to this report
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/chr ... 56316.html

http://www.kwtx.com/news/headlines/6672937.html
Friday?s announcement comes a week to the day after board members of the state's troubled youth prison system relinquished their power en masse.

The members of the Texas Youth Commission board acted after recommending a system-wide rehabilitation plan that calls for stricter inmate supervision and new procedures for reporting and investigating sex abuse allegations.

The TYC board turned over its power to acting executive director Ed Owens.

He was hired to overhaul an agency dogged by allegations that inmates were sexually and physically abused in facilities around the state.

Other TYC Facilitites

Institutions
Al Price State Juvenile Correctional Facility (Beaumont, Texas), moderate security, houses 312 inmates.
Corsicana Residential Treatment Center (Corsicana, Texas), high security, specialty facility, houses 170 inmates.
Crockett State School (Crockett, Texas), moderate security, houses 265 inmates.
Evins Regional Juvenile Center (Edinburg, Texas), high security, houses 240 inmates.
Gainesville State School (Gainesville, Texas), fenced, maximum-security, houses 316 inmates.
Giddings State School (Giddings, Texas), high security, houses 380 inmates.
Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex Units I & II (Brownwood, Texas), high security.
Sheffield Boot Camp (Sheffield, Texas), military-style security, houses 128 inmates.
Victory Field Correctional Academy (Vernon, Texas), military-style security, houses 336 inmates.
West Texas State School (Pyote, Texas), high security,houses 250 inmates.

Halfway Houses
Ayres House (San Antonio), moderate security, houses 24 males.
Beto House, moderate security (McAllen, Texas), houses 24 males.
Cottrell House (Dallas), community-based, serves, males 16 to 21.
McFadden Ranch (Roanoke, Texas), moderate security, houses 48 males.
Schaeffer House (El Paso, Texas), medium restriction security, houses 24 males.
Edna Tamayo House (Harlingen, Texas), moderate security, houses 24 males.
Turman House (Austin, Texas), community-based, serves males from 16 to 21.
Willoughby House (Fort Worth, Texas), community-based, serves females from 14 to 21.
York House (Corpus Christi, Texas), community-based, serves males from 16 to 21.

Deborah:
Complaints Flood Texas Youth Hot Line
By RALPH BLUMENTHAL
Published: March 26, 2007
AUSTIN, Tex., March 22 ? ?Investigations hot line,? said Brian Yasko, answering the phone at the Texas Youth Commission in a windowless command post that officers are calling ?the belly of the beast.?
 
Investigators at the Texas Youth Commission in Austin are reviewing files in more than 1,100 cases involving accusations of mistreatment.
Quickly, Mr. Yasko began scribbling down details of yet another complaint, this one from a mother who said her son at the San Saba State School, now called the John Shero State Juvenile Correctional Facility, had been threatened by a sexually deviant corrections officer.

Yes, said Mr. Yasko, an investigator for the inspector general of the state Department of Criminal Justice; she could remain anonymous. ?What I?ll do is send this out to the field and have investigators interview your son,? he promised.

Since a sexual abuse scandal at the Texas Youth Commission became public last month, prompting mass firings and resignations, more than 1,100 investigations have been opened into new accusations of rape and other mistreatment. At last count 282 cases had been closed without action.

Many of those complaints have been flooding into the makeshift situation room here staffed around the clock by employees of the inspector general?s office of the adult prison system and of the state attorney general?s office.

These officers, in turn, parcel out the cases to about 100 investigators from the two agencies and the Texas Rangers who are interviewing witnesses at 24 youth detention centers and scores of small contract facilities across Texas, where more than 4,000 youths ages 10 to 21 are serving sentences of at least nine months ? but almost always longer ? for criminal violations.

One of the centers is the West Texas State School in Pyote, where a Texas Ranger?s investigation in early 2005 substantiated accusations that two top supervisors had carried on sexual relationships with juveniles. Both later resigned but were never charged with a crime.

The case languished for almost two years in the Ward County district attorney?s office until news reports last month, and the resulting outcry prompted the part-time prosecutor, Randall Reynolds, who operates his own law business, to request assistance from the state attorney general. A grand jury has been hearing evidence.

?I imagine we have got their attention,? said John M. Moriarty, the inspector general for the prison system, who is running the hot line center and deploying investigators.

?Our thing is to get the police in there, enforce the law,? said Mr. Moriarty, a former police officer who grew up in the Bronx. ?There?s a new sheriff in town.?

Jay Kimbrough, named by Gov. Rick Perry as special master to overhaul the Youth Commission, also voiced determination in a separate interview. ?I?m sadder, and I?m madder than I was the day before,? said Mr. Kimbrough, a former deputy state attorney general.

In a commandeered office at the Youth Commission headquarters, eerily empty of senior staff members who were purged in the uproar, bulging cardboard files and intake boxes are marked ?New Cases,? ?Cases to Be Assigned,? ?For Review? and ?To Be Closed.?

Against the backdrop of a white board on which is scrawled a toll-free hot line number, and injunctions like ?Record Prank Calls on Log, Get Exact Time,? officers with holstered handguns fill the air with investigative crosstalk.

?When are you going to serve it??
?No, the Ranger has got to go.?
?We want to execute the warrant.?
?Tell him I want him to meet with the D.A. at 1, no matter what.?

Of the 1,100 complaints that have come in since March 6, an estimated 225 concern sexual abuse, said Capt. Bruce W. Toney of the inspector general?s office. Captain Toney described some others as trivial grievances, like complaints of ill-fitting shoes, ?I don?t agree with the teaching? and ?not letting me talk.? He said some accusations appeared to be fabricated, some were pranks. One complaint stemmed from 1981. In another case, he said, a mother claimed that her son had entered juvenile detention able to read and write, but came out illiterate.

In some cases, Mr. Moriarty said, criminal files are being opened on cases that the Youth Commission had disposed of with nothing more than administrative penalties. One such incident, he said, involved a corrections office at the Al Price State Juvenile Correctional Facility in Beaumont who used excessive force to get a child to release a mattress he was grabbing. The officer, Mr. Moriarity said, ?bit the child.?

A few Youth Commission employees, Mr. Moriarity said, were found to have histories as sex offenders. Job applicants now are subject to background checks with fingerprint searches, he said.

To sort out the complaints, the command center includes four polygraph experts. The inspector general?s office normally investigates complaints in the state?s 106 adult prisons. But a proposal to extend its jurisdiction to youth detention centers is among pending bills in the Texas Legislature that address the abuse of juvenile detainees ? now the leading issue of the session.

Among the bills are proposals by Representative Jerry Madden, a Republican from the Dallas area and chairman of the House corrections committee, to extend the attorney general?s jurisdiction and to give a special state criminal justice prosecutor concurrent jurisdiction with local district attorneys in cases of juvenile justice complaints. Currently, outside prosecutors are barred from entering a case unless invited in by the district attorney.

Apart from the investigations into the mistreatment of youths, many other proposals are under consideration. These include a plan for review panels to verify that juveniles are not being frivolously held beyond their minimum nine-month sentences.

Alternatives to incarceration are being explored, said Mr. Kimbrough, the special master. Meanwhile, at the command post, investigators who are reviewing old files forwarded another case for possible criminal prosecution, an accusation that a corrections officer at the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex in Brownwood had carried on a romance with an 18-year-old girl and arranged to meet her for a tryst upon her release.

In a letter intercepted by investigators and now part of the case, the accused guard wrote, ?She sets my sole on fire.?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/26/us/26 ... tml?ref=us


TYC abuse dates back to 1999
By Michelle West
Violence and corruption detailed in documented complaints against the now embattled Texas Youth Commission date back to at least 1999.

Documents obtained by The Daily Texan through the Public Information Act reveal reports and letters describing an agency woefully dysfunctional and dangerous for those living and working in its facilities. The request returned 150 pages of correspondence dating back to President George W. Bush's governorship. These records, mostly handled by the office's constituent services, are documented communication between the governor's office and the commission and parents, youths and employees pleading for the state to intervene.
More here: http://tinyurl.com/2quxxa

Deborah:
Embattled AG now accused in sex scandal 'cover-up'
Attorney General Gonzales among officials who allegedly ignored abuse of minor boys
Posted: March 25, 2007
9:49 p.m. Eastern
By Jerome R. Corsi
© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton, both already under siege for other matters, are now being accused of failing to prosecute officers of the Texas Youth Commission after a Texas Ranger investigation documented that guards and administrators were sexually abusing the institution's minor boy inmates.

Among the charges in the Texas Ranger report were that administrators would rouse boys from their sleep for the purpose of conducting all-night sex parties.

Ray Brookins, one of the officials named in the report, was a Texas prison guard before being hired at the youth commission school. As a prison guard, Brookins had a history of disciplinary and petty criminal records dating back 21 years. He retained his job despite charges of using pornography on the job, including viewing nude photos of men and women on state computers.

The Texas Youth Comission controversy traces back to a criminal investigation conducted in 2005 by Texas Ranger Brian Burzynski. The investigation revealed key employees at the West Texas State School in Pyote, Texas, were systematically abusing youth inmates in their custody.

Burzynski presented his findings to the attorney general in Texas, to the U.S. Attorney Sutton, and to the Department of Justice civil rights division. From all three, Burzynski received no interest in prosecuting the alleged sexual offenses.

"This case demonstrates that a partisan political agenda, with Karl Rove in an orchestrating role, has penetrated the Justice Department and subverted fair-minded administration of the law," Matt Angle, director of the Lone Star Project, told WND.

It's just the latest controversy for Sutton, Gonzales and the Bush administration's direction of the Justice Department. Earlier, Sutton's decisions to prosecute two Border Patrol agents and Deputy Sheriff Gil Hernandez were criticized as having been influenced by the intervention of the Mexican government.

Gonzales is under heavy congressional pressure in the controversy over the recent forced resignations of eight U.S. attorneys. At issue is whether the Bush administration is directing the Justice Department to pursue politically motivated prosecutions at the expense of fair or even-handed law enforcement.

In the Texas Youth Commission scandal, Texas Ranger official Burzynski received a July 28, 2005, letter from Bill Baumann, assistant U.S. attorney in Sutton's office, declining prosecution on the argument that under 18 U.S.C. Section 242, the government would have to demonstrate that the boys subjected to sexual abuse sustained "bodily injury."  :o Baumann wrote that, "As you know, our interviews of the victims revealed that none sustained 'bodily injury.'"

Baumann's letter continued, adding a definition of the phrase "bodily injury," as follows: "Federal courts have interpreted this phrase to include physical pain. None of the victims have claimed to have felt physical pain during the course of the sexual assaults which they described."  :o

Baumann's letter further suggested that insufficient evidence existed to prove the offenders in the Texas Youth Commission case had used force in their alleged acts of pedophilia: "A felony charge under 18 U.S.C. Section 242 can also be predicated on the commission of 'aggravated sexual abuse' or the attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse. The offense of aggravated sexual abuse is proven with evidence that the perpetrator knowingly caused his victim to engage in a sexual act (which can include contact between the mouth and penis) by using force against the victim or by threatening or placing the victim in fear that the victim (or any other person) will be subjected to death, serious bodily injury or kidnapping. I do not believe that sufficient evidence exists to support a charge that either Brookins or Hernandez used force to cause victims to engage in a sexual act."  :o

Baumann's letter went so far as to suggest that the victims may have willingly participated in, or even enjoyed, the acts of pedophilia involved: "As you know, consent is frequently an issue in sexual assault cases. Although none of the victims admit that they consented to the sexual contact, none resisted or voiced any objection to the conduct. Several of the victims suggested that they were simply 'getting off' on the school administrator."  :o Besides all the mumbo jumbo bullshit defenses, what happened to sex with a minor being illegal?

Baumann's letter also rejected Burzynski's charges that the administrators at the Texas Youth Commission facility in West Texas had used their position of authority to force the inmates to participate in the sexual acts or that the administrators had lengthened the sentences of the boys to retain willing participants or punish those reluctant to participate.

Baumann wrote: "In order for the government to be successful in a criminal prosecution, it would be essential for us to show that the victim was in fact victimized. Most of the victims were aware of the power that the school principal and assistant superintendent held over them, but none were able to describe retaliative acts committed by either the principal or assistant superintendent. Although it is apparent that many students were retained at West Texas State School long after their initial release date, it would be difficult to prove that either Mr. Brookins or Mr. Hernandez prevented their release."

On Sept. 27, 2005, the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division declined prosecution in a letter written to Lemuel Harrison, the Texas Youth Commission superintendent at the West Texas State School.

In that letter, Justice Department section chief Albert Moskowitz wrote that "evidence does not establish a prosecutable violation of the federal criminal civil rights statutes."

Angle maintains the decision not to prosecute was purely political.

"The U.S. attorney's office in Texas actually prepared indictments in this case," Angle told WND. "But when the word came from Washington, that's when Baumann wrote his letter declining prosecution. Sutton's office dropped the matter on the desk of the local district attorney, but nobody from Sutton's office said 'if you can?t go on this case, we'll help you out.'"

WND asked Angle to explain how politics drove the decisions not to prosecute.

"If you read the letters from Sutton's office or from DOJ, it's really amazing what abuse they describe and then downplay as not being serious," Angle explained. "They describe systematic and widespread abuse of juveniles who were held in these facilities by the people who were administering these facilities, and they acknowledge this fully, yet they determine that the evidence is not sufficient to warrant federal prosecution."  Just goes with the territory, huh? Part of their 'treatment' or punishment?

Angle explained to WND that he found both letters shocking.

"The letters justify not pursuing these cases because, number one, there is no evidence that any of these juveniles felt physical pain while they were being assaulted, and the letters use the word 'assaulted,'" he said. "And then also, they rejected prosecution because none of these juveniles stated in the investigations that they resisted and objected, which of course the facts of the report show to be the case. This case developed right in the middle of Governor Perry's 2006 re-election campaign. While Texas is a Republican state, and the Republicans expected to win, still at that time, Governor Perry was facing an election challenge from Carole Strayhorn, a third party candidate who was also a former Republican comptroller in Texas."

He continued: "I would speculate that the political powers in Texas and Washington in the Republican Party were not interested in this sex scandal coming to light. Sutton and Gonzales let their political responsibilities outstrip their legal responsibilities, and as a result you had children who were in danger of sexual abuse and were left in that danger."

Angle says that while the U.S. Justice Department and Texas attorney general's office were not prosecuting in this case, they were actively pursuing minor voter fraud issues with only a handful of allegations to go on.

On March 2, 2007, Governor Rick Perry appointed Jay Kimbrough, his former staff chief and homeland security director, to serve as "special master" to lead an investigation into the Texas Youth Commission sex abuse scandal.  :roll: Shortly thereafter, the commission stopped a hiring practice that had allowed convicted felons to work as administrators in the system. The practice had involved a requirement that prior criminal records be destroyed for employees hired by the commission.  :o

On March 17, 2007, the entire Texas Youth Commission governing board resigned.

The Texas Youth Commission is the state's juvenile corrections agency, charged "with the care, custody, rehabilitation, and reestablishment in society of Texas' most chronically delinquent or serious juvenile offenders." Inmates are felony-level offenders between the age of 10 and 17 when they are committed. The commission can maintain jurisdiction over offenders until their 21st birthdays.

The Lone Star Project is organized as a political research and policy analysis project of the Lone Star Fund, a federal political action committee organized in Texas. The Lone Star Project has aggressively investigated alleged political abuses within the Texas Republican Party, including playing a leading role in investigating the activities of former Rep. Tom DeLay in the redistricting controversy in Texas.

Bill Baumann was the lead prosecutor in another controversial case. In a case eerily reminiscent of the controversial jailing of Border Patrol agents Jose Compean and Ignacio Ramos while the illegal-alien drug-smuggler they wounded went free, Texas Deputy Sheriff Gilmer Hernandez is imprisoned for a year for an altercation with illegal aliens. Baumann urged he get the maximum seven-year sentence.

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.a ... E_ID=54861

Deborah:
SUGGESTED CHANGES

Battles stalling bills to fix Texas Youth Commission
March 25, 2007, 11:09PM
By R.G. RATCLIFFE
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle Austin Bureau

AUSTIN ? The problems at the Texas Youth Commission are easy to recognize, problems such as isolated facilities and poorly trained guards ? and not enough of them.

But so far the legislative battle to overhaul the troubled juvenile corrections system has been almost as massive as the problems they're trying to fix.

"We need to get past small disagreements because this is a big problem and the solution needs to come very quickly, and unfortunately it seems to be dragging a bit," said state Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, the sponsor of one of the major TYC reform bills.

The first wide-ranging legislation meant to fix reported physical and sexual abuse problems at TYC is expected to emerge Tuesday from the Senate Criminal Justice Committee.

That bill, by Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen, has been more than a year in the making ? growing out of a 2004 riot at the Evins Regional Juvenile Center ? and had its progress delayed by the infighting that erupted with the latest scandal.

"We need to fix the problem, period," Hinojosa said. "The finger-pointing just slows down the process."

But while there is a general agreement that a quick solution is needed, the devilish details have sparked one skirmish after another.

Who will preside?
The Legislature and Gov. Rick Perry have fought over whether a special master or a conservator should preside over the short-term repairs at the agency.
The House argued for almost three hours last week over whether crimes in TYC should be handled by local prosecutors, a special prosecutor or the special prosecutions unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. In the end, the bill was sent back to the House Corrections Committee.

TYC acting Executive Director Ed Owens offered an agency rehabilitation plan, but Senate Criminal Justice Chairman John Whitmire said it lacks "the urgency factor."

Legislators are proposing TYC guard-to-youth ratios of 1-to-12. Special Master Jay Kimbrough wants the ratio to be half that. It's not uncommon for there to be one corrections officer for every 24 youths.

'It's an issue of trust'
On Friday, Kimbrough unveiled a plan along with the Texas office of the American Civil Liberties Union to review the sentences of youth offenders who had their sentences extended by TYC authorities. Kimbrough wants to find out if students have been kept in the system for purposes of retaliation or intimidation.
"This doesn't take legislation. This just takes people sitting down, recognizing there's a problem and working together," Kimbrough said.

Things have not been that simple in the Legislature, though.

Many members have been upset that a sex abuse scandal brewed at the West Texas State School and none of them knew about it until it was reported in the news last month. There is evidence that members of Perry's staff knew no prosecutions were coming out of the case as early as June 2005.

"It's an issue of trust," said Rep. Jim Dunnam, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus. "This thing just smells bad. In the way it is being handled (by Perry's staff.) They're trying to give the appearance that they're doing something, but the undercurrent is they're trying to cover themselves."

Bills in motion
Perry dismisses such talk.
"This 'When did you know? When did you know it? Do you think someone should have done more?' is missing the point of how are we making progress to getting these kids the protections that they need, and that's exactly what is happening," Perry said.

"I am absolutely satisfied with his progress and hope the Legislature will continue to work with us to put safeguards into place and not spend any more legislative time standing in a circle pointing to the left and saying, 'It's his fault,'" he said.

At present, the Senate Criminal Justice Committee and the House Corrections Committee are working on bills to overhaul TYC. And a special joint committee is investigating how the problems at the youth agency got so bad.

Sen. Chris Harris, R-Arlington, is on the special joint committee. He said the group is not doing enough and should be hearing from FBI agents who investigated allegations of sexual misconduct at the West Texas State School.

Harris said he wants to know what happened to child support payments that were collected by TYC. And he wants to know why the agency has not moved immediately to separate 11- and 12-year-old offenders from those 18 to 20 years old.

"I don't understand why we're not being aggressive, and I'm frustrated with it," Harris said. "I don't think we're digging hard enough for the truth."

Ideas for change

Major elements of Texas Youth Commission reform legislation:
?Inspector generals at TYC will be licensed law officers.
?Results of all investigations will be reported to state leaders.
?Create an ombudsman to review complaints by youths, staff or families.
?No child may be sent to TYC for a misdemeanor.
?Create a nine-member commission to study making TYC a regional system.
?Increase training of juvenile corrections officers from 80 hours to 300 hours before they begin working at a facility.
?Require staffing levels of one JCO for every 12 students. Currently it is one to 24.
?Require that JCOs be at least three years older than the youths they are supervising. Currently 18-year-old JCOs can guard 20-year-old incarcerated youths.
?Give advocacy and support groups access to the incarcerated youths.
?Parent's Bill of Rights on how to advocate for their child in the system.
?Give juvenile courts sole power to extend a youth's stay in TYC. The TYC staff currently decides when a youth may be released.
?Transfer all youth age 19 and older to the adult prison system. That transfer does not occur now until the youth is 21.
?Allow local district attorneys to request assistance from the special prosecutions unit of the adult prison system to try cases of crimes that occur in TYC.
?Give the Texas attorney general concurrent jurisdiction to investigate crimes against individuals in the custody of TYC.

Source: Senate Bill 103

Peggy Fikac contributed to this report.

r.g.ratcliffe@chron.com

hanzomon4:
AP - Texas girl has been in jail for more than a year for shoving teacher?s aide

"DALLAS - A teenager has been jailed for more than a year for shoving a teacher's aide at her high school, sparking anger and heightening racial tensions in rural East Texas.

Shaquandra Cotton, now 15, claims the teacher's aide pushed her first and would not let her enter school before the morning bell in 2005. A jury convicted her in March 2006 on a felony count of shoving a public servant, who was not seriously injured.

The girl is in the Ron Jackson Correctional Complex in Brownwood, about 300 miles from her home in Paris. The facility is part of an embattled juvenile system that is the subject of state and federal investigations into allegations that staff members physically and sexually abused inmates. - More

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