The Texas Youth Commission (TYC) is the state’s juvenile corrections agency. It provides care, custody, rehabilitation and reestablishment into society for Texas most chronically delinquent or serious juvenile offenders. A youth’s sentencing can begin at TYC and depending on the juvenile’s progress; the sentencing may be completed in an adult prison system.  The ages of youth at the facilities are between the ages of 10 and 17 years old.[1] 

Crisis and Conservatorship

During the 80^th Texas legislature reports of abuse and cover up by top officials were exposed by allegations from current and former youths at TYC facilities.  “An internal report, detailing how a sexual molestation scandal went undetected for more than a year in the Texas Youth Commission, was altered to delete references that top agency officials were alerted to the abuse but did nothing to stop it.”[2] Soon after the release of the reports several top officials resigned. The Legislature and Governor then imposed a force management takeover and put the agency in conservatorship status, which gives a single official concentrated power over an agency for an emergency.[3] The conservator’s duty is to properly assess each aspect of TYC, including facilities, treatment programs and educational services. The Legislature then created the office of independent ombudsman and appointed Will Harrell as the first head ombudsman. “The office of independent ombudsman is a state agency established for the purpose of investigating, evaluating, and securing the rights of the children committed to the commission, including a child released under supervision before final discharge.”[4]

TYC in 2008

TYC is currently working towards ending its conservatorship by late 2008. However, this legislative session TYC will be up for review by the Sunset Advisory Commission. In November 2008, the Sunset Committee will issue a report with recommendations for TYC. The Texas Legislature created the Sunset Advisory Commission to identify and eliminate waste, duplication, and inefficiency in government agencies. The commission reviews policies and programs of government agencies every 12 years. The commission questions the need for each agency, looks for potential duplication of other public services or programs, and considers new and innovative changes to improve each agency’s operations and activities.[5]

While TYC has made some substantial progress since TYC has been under conservatorship, there still is some work to be done.  This report lays out some possible recommendations for a juvenile correctional agency.

General Recommendations for a Juvenile Correctional Agency:

Education: A juvenile correctional facility should provide adequate education. The goal is for the student to gain educational skills while they are at the facility.[6] The curriculum should follow the Texas Administrative Code, Title 19, Part II Chapter 74. Even though correctional facilities such as TYC are exempted from specific requirements of State education policies, the correctional facility should nevertheless adopt the same policies as the State. The facilities should also offer a special education program.  There should be an assessment of where the student is at educationally when they arrive at the facility. After the assessment students should receive help from teachers in order to maximize their educational experience.  Each student should have the proper amount of time to learn the curriculum and teachers should be provided a sufficient amount of time to teach the curriculum.

Currently, TYC is attempting to update educational services at their facilities[7]. “40% of youth at TYC are eligible for federal special education programming; a significant portion of youth sent to TYC are school dropouts; and the median reading and math achievement levels of TYC youth are four and five years behind their peers, respectively.” [8]

The office of the independent ombudsman has put together a full report on TYC’s educational services and recommendations that should be made.[9]

Medical issues: A facility should have the proper medical staff and medicine available for youths at the facilities. Medicine is a necessity and not a privilege that can be taken away as a source of punishment for a person’s bad behavior. There should be an established baseline level of care required for the individual youths.  When the child first arrives at the facilities there should be an assessment of the children’s mental health needs. There also needs to be personnel to provide services for children with other medical needs such as chemical dependency and sexual health.

TYC currently lacks the personnel necessary to successfully provide these services. There are currently long waitlists for children who desperately need medical, mental and other services[10].

-          TYC needs to hire more licensed sex therapy and chemical dependency experts to administer treatment.

-           Children adjudicated as sex offenders may have deferred registration and require the successful completion of these treatments as part of their court ordered treatment. The long waitlists for these treatments should be reduced, if not eliminated; so that these children can quickly get the treatment they need to meet their court ordered obligations.

-          There also needs to be special emphasis placed on the needs of girls and the differences in which girls recover from chemical dependency.

Treatment: Girls and boys should be in separate facilities than one another. Female youths have different needs than males and those needs should be addressed properly. The facilities need to provide appropriate treatment and programming for girls.

As of now there is only one facility for female offenders, the Ron Jackson Unit.  At TYC there are substantial differences in the programming and services offered to male and female youth.

 Currently there are no licensed sex offender treatment providers who are employed at the Ron Jackson female unit. TYC was recently sued by the ACLU in June, 2008 for allegations concerning strip searches conducted at the Ron Jackson unit. The OIO made a site visit to Ron Jackson that revealed that in the security unit, girls were not allowed to wear undergarments even while on behavior management program and were reportedly transported to the infirmary and recreation by male staff while wearing no garments. The girls were provided diapers to wear while menstruating if they were in the security unit. These issues were reported to the Superintendent and within a week of the report these concerns were met to the satisfaction of the OIO.[11]

Some female offenders with a priority one need (high need) for sex offender treatment or capital treatments are not available because they are not offered at the Ron Jackson facility. Since they are not available female offenders are missing out on the chance to get help.[12]

Disciplinary: A correctional facility should have the proper protocol to deal with disciplinary issues by youths at the facilities and for staff members who over step their power of authority. There should be a policy enacted to help establish accountability for youth and staff member’s actions.   Medical necessities should not be withheld as punishment for behavior issues by the youths at the facilities. Overall a youth’s penalty for a bad action should not outweigh the action that the youth did.

At TYC there has been countless number of youth disciplinary problems. Some of the following disciplinary issues have occurred at TYC facilities[13]:

-          Withholding medication. There has been a past problem of youth in TYC facilities having their medication withheld as punishment because of their own behavior problems or due to other youth’s behavior problem. There was also the disciplinary denial of medication for youth caught “cheeking” medication.

-          OC Pepper Spray Incidents. There has been a substantial decline of OC pepper spray incidents but there still are concerns. Many officers in TYC facilities are still using OC spray on the youth inmates. OC (Oleoresin Capsicum) is concentrated oil obtained from extraction of “hot” peppers.  Inhalation of the spray or contact with the skin and eyes can cause serious irritation[14].

-          Isolation punishment. Isolation punishment is putting incorrigible youths in solitary cells for extended periods of time. It has been argued that this kind of punishment may violate the youth’s right since they have not been convicted of the act that led them to isolation[15]. Isolation punishment has had a substantial decline since the beginning of the year. However, there still are reported incidents of isolation being used as a punishment. 

-          Participants of sex offender treatment programs. Some youths at the TYC facilities have a waiver for sex offender registration if they successfully complete sex offender treatment prior to release. Some students felt intimidated by staff members handing out consequences so quickly because if they are kicked out they might have to register as a sex offender.

Security: A juvenile facility should have a major focus on safety. This means there needs to be a close ratio of officers to children and security cameras in areas that an officer can’t be at.  There needs to be specifications in the type of training the officers have such as addressing the use of restraints and pepper spray, supervising units including sex offenders, working with juvenile female offenders, preventing and investigating staff sexual misconduct with youth in custody, monitoring and delivery of medical and mental health services, and preventing bullying and coercion among youth in the facility.

Currently Senate Bill 103 establishes that at TYC facilities Juvenile Correction Officers have 300 hours of training and that the commission must maintain a ration of not less than one guard for every 12 persons committed to the facility.[16]

Regionalization: Regionalization of youth correctional facilities helps the youths in custody maintain a connection with the community. Some of the advantages of regionalization are that the youths are:

1.      Closer to family and community

2.      Closer to mental health resources

3.      Easier access to educational resources

4.      Easier access to medical care

5.      A larger and more qualified job applicant pool

6.      Lower costs over time due to lower recidivism rates

Currently there are eleven TYC institutions and nine halfway houses located in Texas. Many youths located at TYC facilities are away from their families and the community.

At Al Price, this practice of taking food from weaker youths is known as “Deebo,” named after a character from the movie Friday.

 No longer is “Deebo” just a hated and feared fictional character in the movie Friday but now that character has become a reality figure at this facility.

Every Youth we spoke to believe that it is simply a fact of life at Al Price that you must “fight for what is yours.” Youth seem to accept that they have but two choices at Al Price; “fight for your food or go on Deebo.”

So what would you decide?

The youth who has other youths “on Bo” or “Deebo” is referred to as the “Bo Master.” Whenever the “Bo Master” wants something then the others have to give it to them or they risk the chance of getting ‘beat up’ by “Bo Master” or other youths in the facility.  If a youth decides that they do not want to be “on Deebo” then they have to fight or at least appear that they will fight back if someone tries to pick on them.  

Some youth who are capable of fighting for their food do not do so because it could result in an extension of their length of stay in TYC.  They might opt to give in rather than reporting the extortion to staff because if they do, they could be placed on protective custody. Youth on protective custody are stigmatized as being weak or worse, they are identified as “snitches” and therefore subject to retaliation.

To fight or not to fight that is the question.

These youths need some type of effective intervention. Do not think that this is a hidden practice from the administration. One youth mentioned that when he arrived at the dorm the staff member commented saying “Oh boy, they are gonna get his food.” People know what’s going on but it seems that they are either afraid to stop it or feel that they are helpless in stopping the problem.

 In the report, some youth did mention that some staff always tries to intervene but since “Deebo” is such a long established practice it does not stop the problem. One way that staffers have tried to rectify the problem is by separating the “Bo Master” from everyone else, but the problem is so entrenched that the youth just pass food underneath the table. In spite of their efforts, the staff members are still in a predicament.  

Who knew something as simple and such a necessity as food would be such a controlling factor in determining who is in charge at these facilities. In the end the question is who is in charge: the staff members or “Bo Master”?

To read more about food extortion at the Al Price Unit or the rest of the Ombudsman report go to: http://www.tyc.state.tx.us/ombudsman/rept_Third_Quarter08.html.

The conservator of the Texas Youth Commission has told Gov. Rick Perry that the embattled state juvenile prison system is almost done with changes needed to operate on its own again.

Richard Nedelkoff has recommended that the agency be removed from a conservatorship by July 31, almost 16 months after the TYC was put into forced management amid an inmate sex-abuse scandal and revelations of possible cover-ups.

TYC spokesman Jim Hurley said the recommendation to legislative leaders was “based on completing those things that need to be done” to ensure that the agency is repaired.

“If those are not completed (by July 31), then that pushes that date back,” Hurley told the Austin American-Statesman.

Perry spokeswoman Krista Piferrer said the governor had not made a decision.

“Obviously, the governor would like to end the conservatorship when the time is right, but that decision is one we’ll need to work out with the legislative leadership,” she said.

News of Nedelkoff’s recommendation drew silence from legislative leaders, some of whom said the agency was still lagging on several key initiatives.

Those include implementing new rehabilitation programs and a new classification system, ramping up the training of correctional officers, removing youths serving time for misdemeanor crimes and installing new security cameras at lockups.

Major efforts have been made to reform TYC. Below is a timeline of TYC events and an update on where TYC is today:
A Timeline

February 2005 – Texas Ranger sergeant began investigating allegations of sexual abuse at Pyote Facility involving Ray Brookins, former assistant superintendent, and John Paul Hernandez, former principal. (DMN 2/18/07)

February 2005 - Ray Brookins and John Paul Hernandez both resigned (DMN)

February 18, 2007 – News Media Reports about the sexual and physical abuses occurring at TYC (DMN)

March 2, 2007 – Allegations of sexual abuse at the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Facility in Brownwood are reported in the media indicating that this was not an isolated incident (DMN)

March 2007 – State Auditor’s Office report identifies several issues (state auditor report)(PDF)

March 15, 2007 – DOJ reports findings from an investigation of the Evins facility. Finds the conditions unconstitutional because of the harm the inmates are experiencing. (DOJ report)(PDF)

March 15, 2007 – Between January 2000 and March 15, 2007 there were 16,310 allegations of incidents involving juveniles at TYC. 4,454 of those allegations were confirmed by TYC. (DMN)

March 29, 2007 – Texas Senate confirmed Governor Rick Perry’s appointment of Jay Kimbrough as Conservator of TYC. (press release)

April 9, 2007 – Brookins and Hernandez are indicted and arrested for “charges that they “sexually abused teenage inmates at the state juvenile prison in Pyote.” (DMN)

June 8, 2007 – SB 103 and companion bill HB 2807 were signed into law. The bills provide for reform efforts at the agency. (SB 103)

June 8, 2007 – Governor Perry appoints Ed Owens to replace Jay Kimbrough as TYC conservator. (Governor’s Website)

June 2007 – Dimitria Pope appointed as acting executive Director after spending most of her career working at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (DMN)

August 2007 – TYC announces new Pepper Spray policy. The new policy permits guards to use pepper spray more often than in the past. (DMN)

October 2007 – TYC ends contract with GEO Inc. for the Coke County facility. The 197 male inmates are immediately moved to the TYC facility in Mart, TX. (DMN)

November 2007 – TYC reverses its pepper spray policy (Texas Appleseed/Chronicle) (PDF)

December 19, 2007 – Governor Perry appoints Richard Nedelkoff to replace Ed Owens as conservator. (Governor’s Website)

February 12, 2008 – Dimitria Pope, the TYC acting executive director, announces her resignation (DMN)

May 6, 2008 – 70 inmates at TYC’s facility in Giddings broke out of their cells and started running around the campus and climbing into trees and onto the rooftops of the facility. (DMN)

June 12, 2008 - ACLU sues TYC for mistreatment of girls at the Brownwood facility (Statesman)

An Update on Reform

The Texas Observer Blog has had several posts recently describing how those involved with TYC reforms are feeling about the progress the agency has made.

Rehabilitating TYC

Perhaps the agency has been so hard to rehabilitate because its problems extend beyond a handful of troubled facilities or a flawed approach to juvenile justice. Mental health advocates blame public officials’ failure to recognize the importance of early intervention programs within the mental health system statewide as a key culprit.

Mission Redefinition for TYC

There was much talk of transitioning from large, rural TYC detention centers to smaller, urban facilities, which would keep youth offenders closer to their families, increase community involvement and allow for specialized treatment.

Trickle Down Reform

Despite the ACLU’s TYC lawsuit, many juvenile justice advocates assert that, while it’s slow-moving, there is progress at TYC — trickling down from the top.

What are you’re thought? Is TYC headed in the right direction? What should be done next?

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit against the Texas Youth Commission on Thursday, accusing it of subjecting its female offenders to unwarranted solitary confinement, routine strip searches and brutal physical force.

According to the brief, incarcerated girls are “frequently subjected to punitive solitary confinement in oppressively cold, concrete and cinderblock cells containing nothing more than a metal slab intended for use as a bed, and in some cases, a metal toilet.”

The girls, many of whom suffered sexual abuse in the past, are also regularly strip-searched, the lawsuit alleges. Those who resist the searches are subjected to extreme force, including being pepper sprayed in the face or being bound in leather straps, the ACLU argued in its 19-page brief.

Constitutional rights

The ACLU filed its class-action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of the Western District of Texas on behalf of five girls currently incarcerated at the Ron Jackson State Juvenile facility in Brownwood.The ACLU accused the state’s correctional agency, which last year was rocked by a massive abuse scandal, of violating the constitutional rights of its minor clients, all of whom suffered sexual, physical or emotional abuse prior to incarceration.

Dismayed TYC officials charged the ACLU with failing to recognize the progressive reforms the agency’s new leadership has instituted as part of the shake up that followed last year’s scandal.

“It would be nice to work with ACLU as partners,” said TYC spokesman Jim Hurley, noting TYC has made some dramatic changes in the last year. “TYC is not the same TYC it was a year ago.”

Certain conditions common

But Hurley acknowledged that notwithstanding certain reforms, many of the conditions cited in the brief could be found on any given day at TYC units throughout the state.”If kids are on a work detail in the cafeteria, before they go back to their dorm, I’m sure they’re (strip) searched, to make sure there is no contraband, no weapons,” Hurley said. “These are things that are done across the board.”

He said he believes the lawsuit could have been avoided with a simple phone call from ACLU attorneys. “It’s likely there are things in there that are already on the board ready to be revamped,” he added.

Hurley said addressing the special needs of the 150 or so female offenders had become one of the biggest priorities of the agency’s new conservator, Richard Nedelkoff. He indicated that the agency might take a hard look at the practice of strip-searching females.

An attorney for the ACLU said that while the agency had taken some important steps, patience is running low.

“In the interest of our clients, we just felt we couldn’t wait any longer,” said Lisa Graybill, legal director of the Texas ACLU.

The agency became the subject of national news reports last year amid allegations that top officials turned a blind eye to evidence that youth had been or were being sexually and or physically abused by staff at a number of facilities around the state.

Source: Sandberg, Lisa. ACLU Sues State Juvenile Prison System. Houston Chronicle, June 12, 2008.

A staffing shortage at a local Texas Youth Commission facility should be alleviated by the state’s decision to shut down a program that isolated violent youths.

Effective this week, the state discontinued a program known as aggression management, TYC spokesman Jim Hurley said. It targeted youths who assaulted staff or other inmates while incarcerated, isolating them in individual cells for extended periods of time, he said.

The program was housed at one of the two TYC units in Mart, with youths being sent there from juvenile prisons all over the state, Hurley said. It had the capacity for 24 youths and required 40 staff members.

As TYC has continued to examine its practices in light of an abuse scandal that rocked the agency last year, it has the agency last year, it has determined the program does not reflect national best practices in dealing with youth offenders, Hurley said. So the state decided to discontinue it.

To fill the gap, TYC is revamping its “behavior management program, which is conducted at all TYC facilities, Hurley said. It will be called Redirect and will revolve around a specialized treatment curriculum designed to manage aggressive youths.

The revamped program will focus on getting inmates to recognize what triggers their violent behavior so they can stop it, Hurley said. He added that it will operate on a privilege system, rather than a punitive one.

Each facility will continue to have so-called security cells where violent youths can be isolated if necessary, Hurley said. However, the cells will be used only for short periods of time.

“It won’t be sticking a kid in there for months on end,” he said.

The 40 staff members who worked for the discontinued program will be transferred to other areas of Unit I at Mart, Hurley said. Since the facility has a shortage of juvenile corrections officers, the shift should ease understaffing there, he said.

Unit I at the campus serves as an intake unit for all males who come into the TYC system. Once they are processed there, they are sent to different facilities throughout the state.

Unit II is a regular correctional facility, serving youths from this region.

Source: Culp, Cindy V., “TYC Violent Youths Program Scrapped” (June 6, 2008). Waco Tribune-Herald. Available at: http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2008/06/06/wactyc.html

As noted in the must-read blog Grits for Breakfast, Texas Monthly Magazine featured Will Harrell, ombudsman for the Texas Youth Commission, as one of 35 People Who Will Shape Our Future. Named as the first independent ombudsman for the Texas Youth Commission following a sexual abuse scandal that forced TYC into conservatorship, Harrell is largely defining the position as he goes - which judging from his record so far, he’s making the most of.
As Blakeslee notes, “In his first three months on the job, he made unannounced visits to all thirteen lockups and nine halfway houses across the state and presented his findings to TYC administrators and a special legislative oversight committee.”

Incidentally, Harrell is scheduled to participate in our upcoming Zealous Advocacy Conference 2008: Child & Adolescent Development & the Law