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Criminal justice
October 23, 2009
Contraband plea for Tabler mom, sister
The mother and sister of death-row cell phone gabster Richard Lee Tabler, whose calls to a state senator sparked a shakedown of all state prisons a year ago, have pleaded guilty to felony contraband charges, officials said today.
Gina DeBottis, director of the Huntsville-based Special Prosecutions Unit that handles prison crimes, said Lorraine Tabler, 61, and Kristina Martinez, 36, pleaded guilty in a Polk County state court and received a sentence of 10 years deferred adjudication.
Under that sentence, both women will remain on probation for 10 years and will have their record cleared ofd the charges if they do not commit new crimes in the meantime, officials said.
The women were accused of buying minutes for the smuggled cell phone that Tabler used to make the calls.
Tabler, 31, pleaded guilty late last month to contraband charges in the case and received a 10-year prison sentence, the maximum possible term. The new sentence was stacked atop his death sentence for two Killeen slayings in 2004.
Richard Tabler also convicted of an intimidation charge for threatening state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, the chairman of the Senate’s prisons committee. In a letter sent to prison investigators, Tabler threatened to kill Whitmire and this reporter — who broke the story about Tabler’s calls — several weeks after he was busted in his cell with a phone.
The bust triggered a massive lockdown of Texas’ entire state prison system for several weeks, during which time guards searched all cells and recovered dozens of cell phones and related gear, along with drugs, tobacco, weapons and other prohibited items.
Additional security including searches and visitors and staff has since been added to try to stop the flow of contraband into state prisons, although a recent report showed that cell-phone confiscations have increased in the months since.
Two months ago, prison officials were shocked to learn that Tabler had smuggled out a second letter threatening Whitmire. They ordered 14 prisons — including the one where death row is located — locked down and searched for contraband in a new crackdown.
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October 22, 2009
Cartel bust details unfolding
An Austin press conference is scheduled this afternoon to announce area arrests in a nationwide roundup of more than 300 suspected gang members in what law enforcement authorities say is the largest crackdown against a Mexican drug cartel operating in the United States.
The only Austin info so far: Multiple search warrants and apprehensions have been carried out, a “significant amount” of cocaine and cash has been seized in the bust of the La Familia drug gang.
Officials so far are declining comment publicly, saying an afternoon announcement of the crackdown will provide further details.
In Washington, federal officials late this morning announced that 303 people in 19 states — including Texas — have been apprehended as part of the crackdown. More than 3,000 agents and officers made the arrests in a two-day sweep that netted 62 kilograms of cocaine, 729 pounds of methamphetamine, 967 pounds of marijuana, 144 weapons, 109 vehicles and two clandestine drug labs.
“Project Coronado, our massive assault on the La Familia Cartel, is part of our continued fight against all of the powerful Mexico-based drug cartels,” said Michele Leonhart, acting administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
“This organization, the newest of Mexican cartels, is directly responsible for a vast majority of the methamphetamine pouring into our country across our Southwest Border, and has had a hand in fueling the cycle of violence that is wracking Mexico today.”
Authorities said the massive bust is the product of a 44-month, multi-agency operation called “Project Coronado,” targeting illicit drug and crime operations of the cartel that has gained in strength since it split off from the Gulf cartel in 2006.
It was formed in the 1980s in the southwestern Mexican state of Michoacan and is involved in drug trafficking, bribery, contract killings, human smuggling, extortion, murders, torture and arms trafficking, according to several U.S. investigators who are familiar with the group.
According to federal officials, a New York grand jury has indicted alleged cartel leader and founder Servando Gomez-Martinez.
In July, after a dozen Mexican law enforcement officers were found murdered, officials say Gomez-Martinez publicly announced his membership in La Familia and said the cartel was locked in a battle with Mexican police, according to press reports at the time.
According to one federal indictment unsealed in New York, associates of La Familia based in the United States have acquired military-grade weapons, including assault weapons and ammunition, and have arranged for them to be smuggled back into Mexico for use by La Familia.
Officials said suspects indicted in the crackdown face charges ranging from conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana to trafficking in illicit drugs to money laundering; and other violations of federal law
In addition to Texas, states where arrests have been made or charges filed include California, Colorado, Georgia, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Washington state, according to federal officials.
“This unprecedented, coordinated U.S. law enforcement action - the largest ever undertaken against a Mexican drug cartel - has dealt a significant blow to La Familia’s supply chain of illegal drugs, weapons, and cash flowing between Mexico and the United States,” said U.S. Attorney General Holder.
“We will not allow these cartels to operate unfettered in our country, and with the increases in cooperation between U.S. and Mexican authorities in recent years, we are taking the fight to our adversaries. We will continue to stand strong with our partners in Mexico as we work to disrupt and dismantle cartel operations on both sides of the border.”
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October 15, 2009
Prisons ban program founder for 'improper relationships'
The founder of the highly acclaimed Prison Entrepreneurship Program has abruptly resigned after she was banned from entering state prisons for having improper relationships with four ex-convict graduates of her program.
In a letter to supporters, Catherine Rohr, 32, who founded the Houston-based PEP five years ago, acknowledged that “mistakes in my personal life involved inappropriately close relationships with four free men who were also PEP graduates.”
Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, confirmed this morning that Rohr was banned last week from prisons and from working with parolees after investigators confirmed she had “engaged in inappropriate behavior.
“Our policies are clear: Volunteers cannot have personal or intimate relationships with with current or former offenders,” Lyons said.
Rohr had been widely credited with creating a statewide nonprofit that trained felons in how to start businesses and become successful in business once they left prison. Rohr recruited support from Fortune 500 companies and high-profile executives, and her successes had made headlines in The New York Times and other national publications.
To date, about 500 ex-cons had graduated from the five-month program. Most have been successful, according to PEP data.
Rohr could not immediately be reached for comment.
But in a letter she sent Wednesday to her supporters, Rohr attributed the lapse to “the darkest period in my life, resulting from my divorce in December 2008.” The letter reveals she took a leave of absence about that time, and had returned to her role as CEO last February.
“I found myself incapable of leading, and took a sabbatical from PEP,” she wrote in her letter. “I took emotional comfort in released graduates — the easiest people for me to relate to through my failures — which led to inappropriately close relationships.”
She said she revealed her mistakes only a month ago to the PEP board.
“I realize that I have destroyed much of the credibility that I worked so hard to earn with you,” she wrote. “I am so remorseful for my poor choices and the negative consequences of my actions. While serving PEP wholeheartedly as a consultant, I hope to have the opportunity to earn back your confidence.”
Asked whether Rohr could continue with the program as a consultant, Lyons said: “I don’t believe that will be an option.”
An internal investigation of the case is ongoing, other prison officials said.
Lyons said the investigation began about a month after the agency “received an anonymous letter … alleging that Rohr was involved in a relationship with a former offender who recently came off of parole supervision.
“Officials followed up on the allegation and contacted Rohr who confirmed that the allegation was true,” Lyons said, noting the agency then barred her from prison volunteering.
“The agency took this action because inappropriate relationships between volunteers and offenders compromise the safety of the volunteers, staff, and the overall security of the facility. Volunteers are trained extensively before entering units on what is considered appropriate conduct.”
In a separate letter top PEP supporters, PEP board chairman William Meyer, who is chief financial officer of San Jose, Calif.-based Bell Micro Inc., said the organization intends to continue on.
“We believe passionately in our mission,” he stated. “PEP is a strong and growing organization that is addressing one of the nation’s biggest problems and making a huge difference.”
According to PEP officials, Phi Tran, the group’s chief operating officer, has been named acting CEO while the board conducts a nationwide search to replace Rohr.
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October 8, 2009
Parole case verdict: Rights violated
After four hours’ deliberation, an Austin federal jury this afternoon found two top parole officials guilty of violating the constitutional rights of an ex-convict who was denied a required hearing for 576 days.
Jurors held Board of Pardon and Paroles Chairman Rissie Owens personally liable for some of the $21,250 in damages — plus attorneys fees that are expected to top $100,000 — that were sustained by Curtis Ray Graham, who sued after he was classified as a sex offender even though he was never convicted of a sex crime. He was arrested for aggravated rape in the 1980s.
The State of Texas would have to pay part of the verdict, which is expected to be appealed.
Graham testified he was never allowed to review evidence against him before the parole board made its decision in December 2007, despited several federal court orders requiring it.
State parole director Stuart Jenkins was not held personaly liable.
It is rare for ex-convicts to win such legal challenges in state of federal courts. It is almost unheard of for state parole officials to be held personally liable for official omissions.
And at a time when several similar lawsuits are pending against state parole officials, attorneys have argued that a win by Graham could force new hearings in perhaps thousands of parole cases where offenders were classified as sex offenders — with more stringent limitations on their freedom — without proper hearings.
“This should send a message to the parole board that their arrogance not to change their policy won’t work any longer, that constitutional rights matter in how they do their business,” said William Habern, a noted parole-law attorney from Riverside who represents Graham.
Owens left the courtroom after the verdict without comment. Jenkins declined comment, as did his attorneys.
“I feel that I have been vindicated,” said Graham, a minister who operates an auto detailing business in Athens, in East Texas. He has been on parole since 2003, after serving prison time on charges of attempted murder.
Richard Gladden, one of his attorneys,said the verdict is significant “because it puts parole authorities in this state on notice that their procedure used in many other cases, perhaps thousands, is unconstitutional.
“My guess is the court clerk’s office is going to be flooded now with other parolees filing suits on how their cases were handled,” he said. “But the state has no one to blame but itself. They have been on notice for some time that this denial of due process was unconstitutional.”
Defense attorneys insisted that Owens and Jenkins had followed procedures in effect at the time that they believes were constitutional because they had been reviewed by agency attorneys. Neither of them should be held liable for doing what they thought was right, their attorneys argued — even though Sparks himself had twice ordered that Graham receive a due-process hearing on his case.
The trial had started with a bang on Monday, with U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks repeatedly warning Jenkins’ attorney, Assistant Attorney General Kim Coogan, to limit her remarks about Graham’s past criminal history.
Sparks cited her for contempt for remarks at an August hearing and had declared a mistrial last month after he vented his disgust with defense lawyers several times.
At one point, with the jury ushered out for the upteenth time by an increasingly irritated Sparks, he pointedly warned the defense attorneys they were irritating the jury.
“A sixth-grader whose not doing well in school, whose a C student, can look at these undisputed facts and make a determination that due process was not followed,” the judge said at another point in the trial, chewing again on attorneys with the jury out of the courtroom. “The only thing we know in this case is there were no (required) hearings and that for over a year and two-thirds that nothing was done. Ten minutes. That’s all it would have taken to hold a hearing.”
On Monday afternoon, after Coogan noted while questioning a witness that an evaluation of Graham had diagnosed him as “a psychopath,” Sparks fined her $500 for “deliberately and intentionally injected prejudicial” information into testimony, despite his repeated earlier warnings.
She later paid the fine with a check from the Attorney General’s Office.
Then, in a bizarre twist, Owens’ attorney, Assistant Attorney General Bruce Garcia, asked Sparks to declare a mistrial based on Coogan’s comments.
“Are you trying to get a mistrial?” Sparks asked Coogan. “Your conduct today has prejudiced them (Owens and Jenkins) in the eyes of the jury.”
Even so, he denied the mistrial request.
In closing arguments this morning, Coogan set Sparks off again, reportedly suggesting that jurors should disregard the “mumbo jumbo” jury instructions that Sparks was giving the jury.
Sparks exploded, hinting that he had only one other remedy: jail. But after the verdict, eh took no action against her, opting instead for a hearing in coming days when he will address the issue.
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October 7, 2009
Uniforms for everyone
Not that anyone ever suggested that Texas prison guards were fashion plates.
But this morning, when the state prison system’s governing board met at Austin’s Omni South Park Hotel, the official uniform shirt was the order of the day.
All board members, all executive staff, even support staff members sported the blue polo-style tops, an almost surreal sea of navy blue in the ballroom — monogrammed last names on the front, an American flag on one sleeve and the Correctional Institutions Division patch on the other.
“My 17-year-old son asked me if I had a job change,” human resources director Carol Blair Johnson told the board during a presentation.
Brad Livingston, the state prisons chief, explained it this way: “It’s an effort to show our support for the correctional officers who are in difficult and dangerous situations every day … a small but potent show of solidarity.”
But a little strange, to some. Instead of a public board meeting, the show of solidarity made the meeting take on an appearance of a staff meeting — at a prison.
In fact, two hotel workers said they thought it was a meeting of cops.
For those wondering: Livingston said the uniform shirts were paid for by the employees who were wearing them, not taxpayers.
“We issue enough shirts to correctional officers already,” he said.
Livingston said the idea for wearing the shirts was suggested by Board Chairman Oliver Bell, and everyone wore the uniform shirts for the first time at a board meeting a few months ago.
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September 29, 2009
Report: Drug courts keep addicts from treatment
A new report alleges that drug courts, created two decades ago as a way to streamline the handling of drug-related cases that were clogging court systems in Texas and other states, are now creating obstacles that keep some addicted defendants from getting proper treatment.
The findings of the study commissioned by the nation’s largest association of defense attorneys show that in many areas, “access to treatment comes at the cost of a guilty plea for low-level drug offenses while hard cases are denied and offenders wind up in jail at great expense to taxpayers.”
The report by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers resulted from a two-year task force study of the drug courts nationwide, and promises to trigger additional debate over the effectiveness of the drug courts.
“Well-intended prosecutors and judges, generally with little input from the defense bar, often limit entry to treatment to offenders most likely to solve their own problems while insisting that “harder cases” go to jail, at considerable taxpayer expense,” the study found. “Minorities, immigrants and those with few financial resources are often under-represented in drug court programs.”
The first drug court opened in Miami in 1989. More than 2,100 such courts now operate in most states, and incarceration rates for drug offenders and the cost to taxpayers has skyrocketed. Backlogs are also reported again in drug cases.
In 2008, FBI statistics showed that 1.7 million arrests were made in drug-related incidents, one arrest every 18 seconds.
Major recommendations of the study:
Substance abuse should be treated as a public health issue, rather than a criminal justice issue.
A serious national discussion on decriminalizing low-level drug use should begin, as a way to more effectively identify and treat addicts.
Treatment should be made available to all who need, want and request it.
Greater transparency should exist in admission practices, and expert assessments should be relied upon in making those decisions, not merely the judgment of prosecutors, as is the case in many jurisdictions.
The practice of requiring guilty pleas before a defendant can be admitted to a treatment program should be prohibited.
Additional programs should be created to preserve the rights of the accused, to protect against growing questions of coercion.
Read the full report, “America’s Problem-Solving Courts; Criminal Cost of Treatment,” [here].
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Huntsville schools closed, few prison effects
The closure of public schools in Texas’ prison capital this morning due to rampant illness drew the question: Are the six state prisons there affected by staffing shortages, as parents call in sick or stay home to care for their youngsters?
No, says Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. “Some parents have called in sick, but it’s not causing us an operational problem,” she said.
Huntsville public school officials closed all classes and extracurricular activities at eight campuses until Thursday, after “a high rate of absences” among students and staff.
Concerns about swine flu and other illnesses have led to numerous absences at schools statewide.
Huntsville, which has a population of about 37,000, is about 60 miles north of Houston.
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September 28, 2009
Death row con gets 10 years in senator threat
Death row killer Richard Lee Tabler, whose cell phone calls to a state senator sparked a statewide shakedown of all state prisons nearly a year ago, pleaded guilty this morning to threatening the lawmaker and possessing contraband.
During a brief courtroom appearance in Livingston, in East Texas, Tabler got 10-year sentence stacked atop his death sentence.
“The message here is that we take these possession of contraband cases seriously — especially cell phones on death row — and that we will prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law,” said Gina DeBottis, chief prosecutor with the Special Prosecutions Unit that handles prison cases.
“(Tabler) got the maximum sentence possible.”
Both crimes of which Tabler was charged — retaliation and possession of contraband in a state prison — were third-degree felonies, punishable by 2-10 years in prison. He could have received 20 years under a special enhancement provision in state law, but because his death sentence is still on appeal that was not possible, DeBottis said.
In October 2008, Tabler phoned state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, and this reporter several times to complain about conditions on Texas’s death row. Whitmire, chairman of the Senate committee that oversees prisons, reported the calls to authorities — and Tabler got busted in his cell with a cell phone. His mother and sister were also arrested for allegedly assisting him by adding minutes to the phone.
After the arrests, Tabler threatened to kill Whitmire and this reporter in a letter to prison investigators. He was indicted and had earlier pleaded not guilty.
About a month ago, prison officials were shocked to learn that Tabler had smuggled out a second letter threatening Whitmire and ordered 14 prisons — including the one where death row is located — locked down and searched for contraband in a new crackdown.
Those letters were later posted online by an outside party, officials said. A prison chaplain was fire for smuggling the letter out, and the case remains under investigation.
Tabler’s mother and sister are awaiting trial in mid-October. Whitmire said prosecutors told him both are to receive probation in exchange for their agreement not to commit any additional crimes.
“I think they were used by him, and I think we’re all ready to put this incident behind us,” Whitmire said. “The point here is that Tabler needs to be secure on death row with no contact with the outside world where he can threaten me or any other Texan.
“I have been assured those are the conditions under which this plea was accepted from him this morning.”
Tabler, 30, was sentenced to death for the November 2004 slayings of two men in Bell County, outside Killeen. Tabler and a co-defendant drove up next to a vehicle driven by two men, and Tabler shot both men point blank with a .45 Ruger as his partner videotaped the last shot fired, authorities said.
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September 16, 2009
New prisons lockdown under way
More than 35,000 convicts at 14 of Texas’ toughest prisons have been placed on lockdown status in a new crackdown on contraband smuggling — the largest in months, officials just confirmed.
The shakedown involves cell-by-cell searches and is the most significant such action in Texas’ prison system in almost a year, since Gov. Rick Perry ordered a lockdown of all 112 state prisons in October 2008 after a death row inmate used a smuggled cell phone to call — and later threaten to kill — the state senator who heads a legislative prisons committee.
“We’re doing cell searches, and the units will remain locked down until we complete that,” said Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice that operates the state corrections system.
“The units we have locked down are the ones that have the most contraband seizures … from inmates and on visitors. The goal is to keep contraband out.”
Prison officials identified the prisons as the Polunsky Unit that houses death row outside Livingston, the Ferguson Unit in Midway, the Lewis Unit in Woodville, the Michael, Beto and Coffield units near Tennessee Colony, the Central Unit in Sugar Land, the Clemons Unit near Brazoria, the Scott Unit in Angleton, the Darrington Unit in Rosharon, the Stiles Unit in Beaumont, the McConnell Unit in Beeville, the Connally Unit in Kenedy and the Allred Unit outside Wichita Falls.
All are maximum-security prisons, Lyons said.
Today’s crackdown came after Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, blasted prison security earlier this month after discovering a threatening letter attributed to death-row inmate Richard Tabler posted on a Web site, blogginginmates.com.
In November 2008, Tabler threatened to kill Whitmire and this reporter in a letter mailed to prison investigators. Tabler had called Whitmire the month before and Whitmire had summoned authorities, who busted Tabler, his mother and sister for contraband.
The subsequent shakedown of all state prisons resulted in the seizure of dozens of cell phones and other contraband, including more than two dozen cell phones and cell gear from death row — arguably supposed to be the most secure part of the prison system.
In a lockdown, convicts are kept locked in their cells and routine operations and programs are suspended as special teams of correctional officers conduct a cell-by-cell search for contraband and other prohibited items. Such shakedowns can take several days to complete.
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September 11, 2009
Officials: Chaplain admits smuggling Tabler letters
A chaplain on Texas’ death row has admitted helping condemned Killeen killer Richard Tabler smuggle letters out of prison — perhaps including one that threatened a Houston state senator and his family.
Prison officials confirmed this morning that Richard Anderson, 51, a chaplain at the Polunsky Unit near Livingston, has been barred from the prison and recommended for termination.
“This chaplain has admitted he did take some letters from Tabler and mail them,” said Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice that operates Texas’ 112-prison system.
“We don’t know yet that the letters he mailed included the one threatening Sen. Whitmire, but that is being investigated. This is a very serious breach.”
Prison system rules forbid employees from mailing letters for convicts.
John Moriarty, the prison system’s inspector general who is overseeing the investigation, said investigators believe Anderson took letters out in June and July.
Anderson, a Methodist chaplain, was one of two chaplains at the Polunsky prison and ministered to more than just convicts on death row. The prison holds a total of about 2,900 convicts, including the 328 on death row.
In a May letter attributed to Tabler that was posted on the Internet, Whitmire was warned that Tabler could get to him even though he was on death row. Tabler earlier was charged with threatening Whitmire in a previous letter, after Whitmire reported cell phone calls from the inmate in October 2008.
Cell phones are prohibited inside Texas prisons, especially on death row that is supposed to be the most secure part of the state corrections system. In a statewide lockdown and search of all prisons that followed Whitmire’s tip, authorities found hundreds of cell phones and other contraband — including around two dozen cell phones and components on death row.
Tabler’s phone was seized in the shakedown.
Lyons said Tabler, in interviews with investigators after Whitmire reported last week finding the latest threatening letter posted online, revealed that Anderson had smuggled out and mailed letters for him.
Prison officials had earlier been trying to determine how the letter got out, since all of Tabler’s incoming and outgoing mail had been ordered inspected after the earlier threat.
Whitmire, D-Houston, said the disclosure raises troubling new questions about security.
“I would think death row would be the most guarded, scrutinized place in our prison system, but I guess not,” he said. “The question is: what else got out, what else is getting in, why can’t the contraband be stopped on death row?”
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September 9, 2009
Prisons chief: Slip-up in monitoring Tabler mail
Texas prisons chief Brad Livingston reveals in a letter that an apparent slip-up in prison security allowed a threatening letter from death row convict Richard Lee Tabler to reach a state senator.
“The agency was monitoring Offender Tabler’s correspondence because of prior threats made against you during his incarceration,” Livingston wrote in the Tuesday letter to state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston.
Nevertheless, his letter dated May 9, 2009 was mailed despite the threatening language, for which I apologize on behalf of the department.”
Livingston said in the letter that officials have suspended Tabler’s mail privileges “while we make arrangements for enhanced monitoring of his correspondence, with the exception for his attorneys of record.”
Livingston also revealed:
That enhanced monitoring of all mail leaving death row is planned, not just for condemned offenders “known to have abused correspondence privileges.” Logs of all outgoing mail will be will be kept, he said.
That investigators are trying to make a case against the person who posted Tabler’s May warning to Whitmire on the Web site www.blogginginmates.com. Once identified, that person “will be prohibited from corresponding with all death row offenders.”
That authorities plan to take action against the Web site and others that post threatening letters. Tabler’s missive was removed from the Web site last weekend.
An angry Whitmire demanded an explanation from prison officials last week after discovering the letter on the Web site. In one paragraph, the letter warned:
“Sometimes I wish that I could really show my hand and ask Senator Whitmire how ‘Rebecca’s health’ is. Maybe he’ll read this one. I wanna pass a message on to John through people reading this … John please understand that just because I’m on death row does not mean that you cannot be gotten to … or your family, so lets be friends again! LOL. Like I said I’m angry right now, and am not thinking clearly. I just want my family left alone.”
Tabler was busted with a cell phone on death row in October 2008 after Whitmire reported the convict had called him several times, telling him he knew where Whitmire lived and knew details about family members.
Tabler’s mother and sister were also arrested on contraband-related charges in the case, angering Tabler.
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Victim fund: 30 years, $1 billion in payments
Texas’ 30-year-old fund that compensates victims of violent crimes has surpassed the $1 billion mark in payments.
Marking what he called a “remarkable milestone,” Attorney General Greg Abbott said at a press conference late this morning that the fund — one of the nation’s two largest — has helped perhaps as many as 300,000 victims since it was established in 1979.
Since December 2002, more than $500 million has been paid from the fund to cover victim’s medical and out-of-pocket emergency expenses. And more than $300 million more has been made in grants to non-profit organizations and victim advocacy organizations that help crime victims recover.
Case in point: Austin resident Rhema Wambua, 28, who said she was a victim of domestic abuse a year ago struggling for someplace to turn.
“I felt hopeless … trapped,” she said tearfully, explaining how the fund helped her find a safe place to live for herself and her 2-year-old daughter, buy a car and start a new life.
“It gave me hope for the future.”
That’s exactly why the fund was created, Abbott said.
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September 3, 2009
Whitmire: New threat from death row con
The convicted double-murderer who threatened to kill a state senator after the lawmaker got him busted for having a cell phone on Texas’ death row appears to be at it again.
A rambling letter posted on the Internet and purported to be written by Richard Lee Tabler contains a new threat — and state Sen. John Whitmire is hopping mad with prison officials about continued lax security inside Texas lockups.
“My question to them is this: A year ago death row inmates in your securest prison had easy access to cell phones, and now your system is allowing them to send out threatening letters?” an angry Whitmire said today.
“What the hell is it going to take to stop this?”
Statesman.com could not verify the authenticity of the letters, or who posted them. But Whitmire said based on Tabler’s earlier threat and details in the postings, he is convinced they came from Tabler.
In a terse letter to prisons director Brad Livingston, Whitmire — who heads the Senate committee that oversees the state prison system and carries significant clout as the longest-serving senator — demanded that officials get control of Tabler.
“I specifically ask how an inmate on death row is allowed to openly send letters out to the public that are designed to intimidate, threaten and retaliate against an elected official or any other citizen of the state,” the senator said in a letter to Brad Livingston, the prison system’s executive director, and Oliver Bell, chairman of the prison system’s governing board.
“I am also appalled that no one within TDCJ has even contacted me regarding this issue.”
Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said authorities are investigating the information. “We can put restrictions on inmates’ mail, and threatening a state senator would be a good reason to do so,” she said.
John Moriarty, the prison system’s inspector general who earlier busted Tabler in the cell-phone case, said he intends to get to the bottom of Tabler’s latest missives.
“Prosecuting people on death row sometimes has little deterrent effect,” he said. “I guess this shows that … But people certainly shouldn’t have to put up with this, not a state senator, not anyone.”
Authorities said they were investigating whether a new crime may have been committed: intimidation of a witness, Whitmire.
Whitmire said he was alerted to the latest threat when a Google search by his office turned up letters on an Internet site, www.blogginginmates.com, purporting to have been written by Tabler.
In a series of letters posted between last spring and Sept. 1, Tabler complains about his treatment on death row and the prosecution of himself, his mother and his sister for possessing a cell phone.
A May 9 letter contains the following passage:
“So many thoughts are running through my head about these indictments against my family members. Sometimes I wish that I could really show my hand and ask Senator Whitmire how ‘Rebecca’s health’ is. Maybe he’ll read this one. I wanna pass a message on to John through people reading this … John please understand that just because I’m on death row does not mean that you cannot be gotten to … or your family, so lets be friends again! LOL. Like I said I’m angry right now, and am not thinking clearly. I just want my family left alone.
“I expected the death penalty because I’m guilty of my crime.”
The correspondence was posted by someone who identified his or her self as Fergie, with no other identification. “Fergie” also posted responses to several “Tabler” letters, including a May 22 letter that tells Tabler:
“My site is in the search engines and I will be doing a news blast next week,” the posting states. “This will bring lots of traffic and politicians as well as agencies to my site. I’ll keep you posted.”
Tabler was busted about 11 months ago after he phoned Whitmire and this reporter to complain about conditions on death row. Whitmire reported the calls to authorities, after Tabler said he knew details about the senator’s family members.
Gov. Rick Perry immediately ordered the entire 112-prison system locked down and searched. Dozens of cell phones were confiscated, and security measures were beefed up to thwart the flow of contraband.
In November 2008, Tabler wrote in a letter to Moriarty’s office: Let’s see you put the (expletive) Senator and Mike Ward in protective custody … I’ll have both those (expletive) executed in their (expletive) houses!!!”
Whitmire said the Internet-posted letter shows prison officials “clearly don’t have control of this situation.
“Is he sending messages out in code in those letters to some friends to come shoot someone?” Whitmire asked. “Tabler’s on death row for killing two people in cold blood. He threatens me once, and now again. And I read this first on the Internet?
“Clearly, someone’s not monitoring his mail as they should be.”
In addition to the new threat, Whitmire said is concerned about references to friendly relationships between death row inmates and prison guards. “There is something very wrong with how our prisons are being manipulated by inmates — still — after all these months and to the detriment of the public safety of the citizens of Texas” Whitmire said.
“I would hope this is an isolated incident — a second time, in my case — but my experience tells me it could be happening to other people, too,” Whitmire said.
“It’s not what I know about the prison system that scares me, it’s what I don’t know — and this is another example of that. What’s it going to take to get this problem fixed?”
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September 2, 2009
New Youth Commission board
Three and a half years after a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal shook the Texas Youth Commission and resulted in its governing board being fired, then abolished, the agency again has its own public board.
Gov. Rick Perry today announced the appointment of Euless pastor Scott Fisher as chair of the new commission, as he named five new members with terms to expire Sept. 1, 2011.
The commission held its first meeting in Austin yesterday, officials said.
According to an announcement by Perry’s office, Fisher — a member of the Youth Commission’s advisory board that has been serving in recent months until the new commission was created — is the senior pastor of Metroplex Chapel of Euless.
He is a member of Texas Hospital Trustees and Tarrant County Hospital District Board of Managers, and chairman of the Metroplex Chapel Academy Board of Trustees. He is also chaplain for the City of Euless Police Department and a past member of the Texas Ethics Commission.
A graduate of Nazarene Bible College, Fisher trained as a director of domestic violence program from Life Skills International, according to the statement from Perry’s office.
Also appointed to the new board: Joseph Brown, the criminal district attorney of Grayson County in Sherman; Larry Carroll, executive director of the Permian Basin Community Centers for Mental Health and Mental Retardation in Midland; Manson B. Johnson, pastor of Holman Street Baptist Church in Houston; Cameron County District Judge Rolando Olvera of Brownsville and Beaumont physician David Teuscher.
Brown, Carroll and Johnson were also members of the Youth Commission advisory board.
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August 10, 2009
Graham hearing held; no decision
A special review hearing ordered by a federal judge for parolee Ray Curtis Graham was held this afternoon, but no decision was rendered on whether Graham will be freed from sex-offender restrictions on his freedom — even though he has no sex-crime conviction on his record.
The case has attracted wide attention because, in a system known for its hidebound secrecy, the outcome of the case could force parole officials to rethink a long-standing and controversial policy. More than a dozen other lawsuits are pending on the issue.
Parole officials declined comment or did not return phone calls, but Bill Habern, one of Graham’s attorneys, confirmed that the hearing was held, as ordered by U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks of Austin, in a parole office in Palestine, in northeast Texas.
Habern said one member of the Board of Pardons and Paroles and two parole commissioners heard 20 minutes’ testimony, and a decision was promised by Friday.
Graham is seeking to have the restrictions removed because he has no sex-crime conviction, and Sparks on Thursday ordered the hearing after finding that parole officials illegally approved the restrictions in December 2007.
During a court hearing in Austin, Sparks issued a stern rebuke to state corrections officials for the way they classify some parolees as sex offenders even though the defendants have never been convicted of sex crimes.
Graham, who owns an auto detail shop in Athens and aspires to be a preacher, sued parole officials after they officially listed him as a sex offender without allowing him to see the results of a psychiatric evaluation they ordered to him to undergo. They also refused to allow him to appear with his attorneys at a hearing in which the decision was made.
Graham, who served time in prison for burglary and attempted murder, was never convicted of a sex crime. He was arrested for aggravated rape in 1982, but was never convicted, officials said.
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May 31, 2009
Youth corrections agencies reauthorized
After two years of controversy and criticism, the Texas House and the Senate have just approved a bill to continue the operations of the Texas Youth Commission and the Texas Juvenile Probation Commission — the agencies responsible for juvenile corrections in the state.
Both chambers’ votes were unanimous.
Both agencies will undergo sunset again in two years.
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DPS sunset bill gets final approval
House Bill 2730 — the bill that continues and modernizes operations at the embattled Texas Department of Public Safety — has just passed the Senate and the House.
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May 30, 2009
Final deal on TYC
Senate and House negotiators are reporting a deal on the two final sticking points on a bill to continue the operations of the Texas Youth Commission and Texas Juvenile Probation Commission.
Details: A new oversight board will include only one chief juvenile probation officer, not three, and both agencies will face a sunset review again in two years.
The Senate wanted three CPOs on the new board. The House wanted less.
The House wanted a 12-year extension on sunset review. The Senate wanted two.
The agreement now goes back to the Senate and House for final approval, probably tomorrow.
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May 28, 2009
Cockfighting bill, with additions
Amid a cacophony of crowing and clucking, a bill that would ramp up prosecution against cockfighting in Texas was approved early today by the Texas Senate.
When Sen, Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, moved for approval of House Bill 1320, after a brief, jocular debate, he did so with this phrase:
“Cock-a-doodle-doo.”
The measure makes it illegal for anyone to own or operate a cockfighting facility or equipment, to train cocks to fight or to attend a cockfight — or “rooster fighting,” as Ellis repeatedly called it.
Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, attached an amendment to the bill that would prevent “highway piracy” by corrupt law enforcement officers by tightening regulations on asset forfeiture and seizure of property from arrests.
That proposal earlier passed the Senate as Senate Bill 1529.
The vote was 31-0, with several senators making crowing sounds to signal their vote.
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May 27, 2009
DPS sunset bill gets okay
The Texas Senate just approved the sunset bill that continues the operations of the Texas Department of Public Safety, the state’s leading but embattled law enforcement agency.
The vote was 31-0.
Approved after weeks of negotiations and bartering, the bill was approved after 25 amendments were attached — most of them other bills that died in the House.
The Senate-passed version of House Bill 2730 mandates additional civilian management in the agency’s driver-licensing division, makes the Division of Emergency Management answerable to the agency’s governing board rather than the governor, creates a new Office of Inspector General to investigate complaints of wrongdoing, and allows concealed-handgun licensees to take some tests online.
The measure would push ahead ongoing initiatives to streamline and modernize an agency that has faced harsh criticism for more than a year — for security lapses found in the aftermath of an arson fire that gutted the historic Governor’s Mansion, and for an outmoded operational structure and computer systems that audits have shown hampered crime-fighting initiatives.
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May 26, 2009
Tougher law on smuggled phones
A bill designed to toughen up the prosecution of state prison convicts for smuggling and using cell phones behind bars was approved this afternoon by the Texas Senate.
On a 31-0 vote, with little debate, the legislation would make it easier to prosecute convicts and those who help them smuggle cell phones into prisons — and would allow prison investigators to use electronic gear to monitor and detect cell phones inside lockups.
“This is an important piece of public safety legislation — one step closer to eliminating contraband from our prisons,” said state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, the Senate sponsor of House Bill 3228.
Whitmire, the chairman of the Senate committee that oversees the state prison system, was the lawmaker who last fall received a call on a smuggled cell phone from death row convict Richard Lee Tabler.
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May 25, 2009
New restraint limits approved
New limits on when mechanical restraints can be used on pregnant women in prisons and jails, and on people housed in state schools, was approved 31-0 by the Texas Senate late tonight.
State Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, the Senate sponsor of House Bill 3653, said the measure will prohibit the use of handcuffs and leg shackles on pregnant prisoners while they are in labor — unless they are escape or security risks.
The new limitations will apply to pregnant woman in state prisons, Texas Youth Commission lockups, and city and county jails.
Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, successfully attached an amendment to the bill before it was passed that will limit the use of restraints — from physical holds to straight jackets, among other forms of restraints — for people housed in Texas’ state schools for the mentally impaired.
“We should use only the least intrusive restraints,” Zaffirini said, noting that the Senate earlier passed its own bill mandating the same change in restraint policies.
After brief debate, the amended bill was approved 31-0.
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May 23, 2009
A brief spat over railroad cops
A brief spat just unfolded in the Texas Senate over whether railroad cops should get expanded authority to make misdemeanor arrests.
The skirmishing occurred between Sens. Jeff Wentworth, R-San Antonio, and Dan Patrick, R-Houston, on House Bill 3201, which started out life relating to fire marshals and investigators.
It was later amended to allow railroad cops, already peace officers under Texas law, to issue tickets for grade-crossing violators.
That’s when the trouble started.
Police groups protested that the change would give private cops too much power, since they are answerable to corporations and not public agencies or elected officials.
“I don’t think private companies should be able to have a private police force across the state,” said Patrick, who proposed an amendment to take the railroad cops out of the bill.
“We have more dangerous railroad crossings than any other state,” Wentworth shot back. “All we’re trying to do here is make grade crossings safer.”
Sen. Kip Averitt, R-Waco, cited an episode of the TV show, “24,” where private cops go awry.
Patrick prevailed, on a vote of 18-10, prompting this Wentworth response: “We’re just making railroad crossings less safe. I hope you’re happy.”
Even so, he pressed ahead with what “used to be a better bill.”
The Senate then approved the bill. Unanimously.
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Senate: Stop unfair prison industry competition
A bill designed to strengthen safeguards that a prison-industry program will not unfairly compete with private industry was approved this afternoon by the Texas Senate.
Sen. Robert Nichols, R-Jacksonville, the Senate sponsor, said the intent of House Bill 1914 was to ensure the Prison Industry Enhancement program does not give its partner industries an unfair advantage over other private companies and to ensure that it is properly supervised.
Under the bill, the governing board of the current program will be abolished — and its oversight will be transferred to the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, which oversees the state prison system.
“There are statutory deficiencies that need to be corrected,” Nichols said, citing the closure of the Lufkin Trailer Co. in East Texas because of competition from a prison-industry contractor whose operating costs were much less because prison labor was used.
“It is very important that we protect our private industry from state programs. We’re trying to save Texas jobs.”
The prison-industry program uses convicts in the manufacture of air conditioner parts, trailer beds, computer components, windows and veneered wood products.
But Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, questioned whether the measure goes to far, and could kill a successful program that teaches convicts important job skills.
“The folks at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice say it will die if this passes,” Williams said. “You’ve put this program in a straight jacket where it can’t survive.”
Nichols disagreed, arguing that the program as it operates now needs more direction and better oversight to prevent what happened at Lufkin Trailer from happening again.
Nichols said Lufkin had to close its Texas trailer operations because a prison-industry plant with much-lower labor costs could undercut its prices.
In the end, the Senate agreed with Nichols, approving the bill 25-6.
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May 21, 2009
Veto threat alters death-penalty bill
Facing a veto threat from Gov. Rick Perry, members of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee voted this evening to drop a controversial provision from a bill designed to keep defendants from being executed who were involved in a capital crime, but did no killing themselves.
As amended, House Bill 2267 now will require only separate trials for co-defendants in capital murder cases, where one defendant committed the murder and the other did not.
Advocacy groups immediately decried the last-minute change, but said they still supported separate trials.
As approved by the House last week, the bill would have been significant change in the state’s death-penalty law, one that was vehemently opposed by prosecutors and cheered by death-penalty opponents.
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Townsend confirmed as TYC chief
Cherie Townsend, the executive commissioner of the embattled Texas Youth Commission, was just confirmed by the Texas Senate.
Unanimously.
Had she not been confirmed by the Senate, as required by the Texas Constitution, she would have been out of a job on June 2.
She was hired last October, the agency’s fifth top administrator in two years as the commission worked to recover from a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal. Since then, her agency has faced legislative calls to be abolished or merged amid a continuing downsizing.
Earlier this week, the agency’s ombudsman resigned after senators said privately they would not confirm his nomination. He is moving to another agency job.
A Senate vote on Townsend’s nomination had been delayed for weeks, until after budget conferees agreed on a budget for the agency. They did so on Tuesday.
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May 20, 2009
Sunset bills poised to move, or not
With several key “sunset” bills still pending in the Texas Senate, with just over a week to go in the legislative session, tempers flared this afternoon over several proposed changes to four agencies.
The Senate Government Organization Committee took no action on the Youth Commission sunset bill, after several amendments proposed by Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen, delayed its consideration — and perhaps its approval.
“We had a deal. No amendments at this point,” state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, could be overheard saying after Hinojosa’s aide submitted the proposed amendments. “If we’re going to do this, we’ll just kill it.”
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Senate approves prison re-entry bill
More than 70,000 Texas convicts leave prisons each year and return to their hometowns, where they face high hurdles to successfully reintegrate themselves into society.
The Texas Senate this afternoon gave final approval to a bill that would ramp up state programs to ensure that more can resume life as tax-paying law-abiding citizens.
Under House Bill 1711, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice would establish comprehensive reintegration and reentry plans for convicts who have served their sentences or are leaving on parole.
“This will help these inmates transition from prison to our communities,” said state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, the Senate sponsor of the measure. “Making this transition successfully is important to lowering our recidivism rate and improving public safety.
“If these inmates who are getting out can get housing, get a job, get the skills they need to succeed, they will be much less likely to commit new crimes.”
Senate and House budget negotiators have added funding for 64 new prison employees to operate the new reintegration program.
The measure will also create a special task force, involving prison officials and community and social groups, to oversee the increased initiative. And it will require prison officials to better track recidivism rates.
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TYC ombudsman to change jobs
Will Harrell, the Texas Youth Commission whose nomination appeared to be derailed in the state Senate, will become the agency’s director of special projects come June 1, agency officials just announced.
Word surfaced yesterday in the Senate that Harrell’s nomination was in trouble. Without being confirmed by the Senate, he would have been out of a job at the end of this month.
The agency said in a statement that Harrell, appointed as the agency’s first ombudsman two years ago, “will participate in the search for a new ombudsman and other TYC transition issues.”
“I am honored to have served as ombudsman for the last two years as we implemented significant changes to improve the operations throughout the TYC system,” Harrell said in the statement. “I remain committed to this agency in my new capacity and am excited to be a partner and participate in the transition.”
Gov. Rick Perry, who now has to come up with a new nominee as ombudsman, praised Harrell’s service.
“Will has served TYC well as ombudsman during a challenging time in the agency and his hard work, and dedication will continue to benefit the youth and their rehabilitation at TYC facilities,” Perry said in a statement.
As the agency’s first ombudsman, Harrell was credited with developing a program to protect the rights of incarcerated youth. His office conducted 211 site visits to TYC facilities, facilitated the resolution of nearly 400 youth complaints and worked directly with 2,930 youth, according to the Youth Commission.
The Youth Commission statement continues: “Executive Commissioner Cherie Townsend noted that Harrell will continue to be an important voice for youth within the agency.
“Will’s new position will allow him to implement the reform policies he worked to create, as well as monitor that implementation,” Townsend said. “I also hope he will help create additional youth empowerment projects that will further improve the agency.”
Rumored replacement: Shanda Perkins, Perry’s nominee for the state Board of Pardons and Paroles whose nomination was busted last week by the Senate. She has said she has previous work experience in counseling troubled youths.
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May 19, 2009
Death Row phone number still working
Seven months after prison officials busted death row convict Richard Tabler for calling a state senator on a smuggled cell phone, the phone number still works.
And the senator who faced a death threat from Tabler over the phone caper is demanding to know why.
“The number used should have been taken out of service forever,” said state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston. “I would hope whoever has it now would not be another inmate. But who knows. Here we go again.”
Whitmire said today he called Tabler’s number on Sunday after spotting it in his cell phone directory — and was surprised when it went to voice mail, with a gruff-sounding man who warned:
“Look, this is my phone. This is my voice mail.
“So, if you’re looking to leave a message, be sure that you’re leaving a message for me, not nobody else.”
Whitmire said he immediately wondered if some other convict was still using the number. After all, prison investigators determined after his arrest that Tabler had borrowed the phone from another death row inhabitant.
“As usual with the (prison) system, it’s what I don’t know that scares me,” said Whitmire, who heads the legislative joint committee that oversees the prison system.
John Moriarty, the prison system’s inspector general, confirmed he is investigating who the still-active number is being used by. He would not discuss details.
A callback left on the number by the Statesman was not returned. The voice did not sound like Tabler.
“I find this amazing,” Whitmire said this afternoon. So did Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, who filed a bill earlier this session that would have required companies that sell cheap, untraceable cell phones to record identification from buyers.
Corona said the bill was killed by cell companies.
Moriarty and Whitmire said that having such a law would help authorities track illicit uses of cell phones, by criminals who are behind bars and still loose on the street.
“This is a homeland security issue,” Moriarty said.
Tabler, 30, a convicted murderer from Killeen, was indicted on May 1 along with his mother and sister on felony contraband charges in connection in the cell phone smuggling case that sparked a statewide controversy and a rare lockdown of all state prisons.
Tabler was also indicted by the East Texas juryon a felony charge of retaliation, accused of threatening to kill Whitmire after the lawmaker reported to Tabler’s calls to police.
In the indictment, Tabler is accused of using another inmate’s cell phone to make calls, and his mother and sister are accused of buying minutes for that phone.
Tabler was given the death penalty for two Killeen slayings in 2004. His execution date has not been set.
After Tabler called Whitmire in October 2008, Gov. Rick Perry ordered Texas’ 112 state prisons locked down and searched for cell phones and other contraband. In the following weeks, officials found dozens of cell phones, drugs, tobacco and other items.
He also called this reporter, and threatened to kill this reporter and Whitmire at their homes.
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TYC ombudsman out?
Just a week after the Texas Senate blocked Gov. Rick Perry’s nominee for the state Board of Pardons and Paroles comes word this afternoon that another nominee will probably face the same fate.
The nomination of Will Harrell, ombudsman of the Texas Youth Commission, will remain stalled in the Nominations Committee, said several senators.
At issue: Harrell’s past misdemeanor arrests, for driving while intoxicated in 2004 in Austin and in 1991 in Maryland for marijuana possession. The Travis County charge was later reduced to a reckless driving charge, for which Harrell successfully served a year’s probation.
The Austin arrest was an issue when Harrell was hired for the $71,000-a-year job in May 2007, because agency rules at the time precluded the hiring of anyone with a criminal record —including serious misdemeanors.
The policy was later changed so he could be hired.
“He will not be confirmed,” said one senator, who said Perry was advised by at least one senator Monday that Harrell’s nomination was dead. Four others confirmed the same thing.
“It’s not going anywhere,” said Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee and a frequent critic of Harrell and Youth Commission operations. He declined to discuss further details.
Sen. Mike Jackson, R-La Porte, chairman of the Nominations Committee, said Harrell is not on a list of nominees slated to go for a Senate vote. “They don’t come out of committee unless they have 21 votes. So if someone is not coming out, I think you can assume they don’t have the votes,” he said.
Harrell, who was executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas before he took the Youth Commission job, could not be reached for comment.
If not confirmed by the Senate, Harrell would be out of a job after the Legislature adjourns at the end of this month.
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Two TYC lockups on closure list, again
Legislative budget negotiators this morning agreed to try again to close two underutilized Texas Youth Commission lockups, but bowed to House opposition to let both stay open for another year.
Several senators decried the decision, charging that one of the lockups — the Victory Field Correctional Academy in Vernon — has failed fire and safety inspections and is unsafe.
“We should be concerned about the safety of the kids who are there,” said state Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano, a member of the budget committee. “These facilities are not needed … I want to make sire these facilities close.”
Two years ago, the closure of both Victory Field and the West Texas State School in remote Pyote was directed by legislative leaders as a part of sweeping reforms that were approved after the Youth Commission was wracked by a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal.
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Prison guards get 3.5 percent raise
Senate and House budget negotiators agreed this morning to give Texas’ 25,000 correctional officers a 3.5 percent pay raise in each of the next two years — seven percent overall.
That is less than the 10 percent overall raise recommended earlier in the Senate version of the budget, and much less than the 20 percent requested by prison officials last August.
The House-approved budget included a five-percent overall raise.
Cost of the raises for correctional officers is $113 million.
Other prison workers and parole officers will get the same percentage raise as correctional officers at a total cost of $10.2 million.
Once the House and Senate negotiators complete the consensus version of the budget, it will go back to the House and Senate for final approval — perhapswithin the next few days.
Brad Livingston, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said the proposed raises, while less than prison officials requested, “represent a very substantial investment in state dollars in a very tight budget year.”
“Seven percent over two years will allow us to make progress” in filling chronic vacancies in the ranks of correctional officers, he said. The agency is approximately 1,500 officers short.
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May 15, 2009
Deal reached on TYC
Senate and House negotiators reached agreement this morning on lingering budget issues at the long-troubled Texas Youth Commission, agreeing to a slimmed-down budget and an expansion of community-based treatment programs.
Two lingering issues: Whether to close two additional Youth Commission lockups, and whether to sunset the agency again in two years.
Approval of the budget issues marks a first step toward resolution of what has been a thorny, high-profile fiscal issue during the legislative session.
At a morning meeting, conferees from both chambers agreed a budget of $210 million a year; a reduction in the agency’s population of incarcerated youths to 1,800 by 2011, down from more than 4,000 two years ago; and a reduction in staffing from 4,300 to 3,700.
The Senate earlier approved a budget for the Youth Commission of about $215 million a year, and the House approved roughly $240 million a year.
In addition, conferees approved $48 million for new community-based treatment and rehabilitation programs that are designed to divert youths in local programs, rather than sending them to a remote state lockup.
That will bring total funding for those programs to about $95 million during the next two years, conferees said.
Still pending is whether to close the West Texas State School in remote Pyote, and the Victory Field lockup in Vernon. The Senate voted earlier to shutter both because of the agency’s declining population; the House is holding out to keep both open, lawmakers have said.
Negotiators late this morning were also discussing whether to “sunset” the agency in two years, as the Senate wants, rather than in 12 years as the House desires.
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May 13, 2009
Shanda Perkins nomination busted
In a rare public rebuke to Gov. Rick Perry, the Texas Senate this afternoon blocked Perry’s nomination of unemployed Burleson banker Shanda Perkins to become a member of the state Board of Pardons and Paroles.
After a brief debate, the GOP-controlled Senate by a 27-4 vote sent the nominee of fellow Republican Perry back to the Nominations Committee, where it is expected to die.
While Perkins’ lack of qualifications were cited as a reason for the surprise move, several senators said Perkins’ involvement in a 2004 controversy over the sale of sex toys in her hometown of Burleson was a factor.
Click continue reading for more. Click below to see Whitmire in action.
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Confirmation fight brewing?
The Senate Nominations Committee last week handily approved Shanda Perkins to join the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, despite nagging questions about whether she was qualified.
This morning, the chorus of doubters appears growing — possibly enough to block her nomination on the Senate floor by sending her nomination back to the committee.
“She’s appears to be toast. Burned toast,” said one senator.
By several reports, the Senate’s 12 Democrats are lined up to not confirm Perkins’ nomination and two Republicans said privately the are among several GOPers who also oppose it.
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May 6, 2009
Beckworth named DPS interim director
Veteran law enforcement commander Lamar Beckworth has just been named as interim director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, the first African-American to head the state’s primary law enforcement agency.
He replaces Col. Stan Clark, who abruptly resigned Monday amid an investigation into sexual harrassment allegations against him.
The selection of Beckworth came this evening at a special meeting of the Texas Public Safety Commission. Commissioners said the appointment is effective immediately and will continue until a permanent director is named.
The interim job comes with a promotion in rank from lieutenant colonel to colonel.
“Col. Beckworth is a well-qualified individual who is a logical choice as interim director. He will be able to step immediately into the position and provide the leadership to take the agency through the end of the legislative session,” said Allan Polunsky, the commission’s chairman, said in a statement.
Beckworth has been with the agency 31 years, starting as a driver license trooper in Irving. After serving in Kilgore, where he was a Highway Patrol trooper for five years, he promoted to sergeant and was stationed in Brownfield for two years.
After becoming a lieutenant and serving for two years in Garland, Beckworth in 1993 Beckworth was promoted to the rank of major and xserved for nine years as the regional commander in Lubbock.
He then served as assistant chief of the Highway Patrol for six years before being named assistant director of the agency in September 2008.
“I assure you that you will not be disappointed in this appointment,” Beckworth said after his selection. “I task all of our employees to support the mission of our management team. I am excited about the opportunities that lie ahead for all of us.”
Bckworth is the agency’s third leader in nine months. Clark replaced Col. Tommy Davis, who retired in August 2008 amid pressure from state leaders leaders after security lapses by DPS were blamed in the arson-set fire in June 2008 that gutted the historic Texas Governor’s Mansion near the State Capitol.
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May 5, 2009
New audit criticizes TYC
The embattled Texas Youth Commission did not follow state competitive-bidding laws in awarding 11 contracts worth $19.5 million, has continued to spend money on two lockups that were supposed to be closed and has not ensured that mistreatment allegations were investigated quickly enough, a new state audit revealed today
In its report, the State Auditor’s Office reported that while the agency “has improved its investigation of alleged mistreatment,” has strengthened “its security and monitoring of youth and has made progress in its management of agency resources,” it continues to fall short in other areas.
Since early 2007, when the sex-abuse scandal broke that resulted in a housecleaning of most top management, the agency has seen its population of incarcerated youths drop from 4,809 to 2,419 by last month, according to the report.
While the agency has implemented about 72 percent of the recommendations in an earlier audit, the new report recommends that “TYC should continue to strengthen its management of state resources, including contracts, staffing levels and facilities, and its intake and investigation processes.”
Auditors cited the following problems:
“TYC did not competitively bid 11 contracts totaling $19.5 million that it awarded while the agency was in conservatorship from March 2007 to October 2008. While the Texas Government Code grants a conservator a series of powers and duties, it does not specifically exempt a conservator from complying with state procurement rules.”
“TYC has not increased the number of certified sex offender counselors in its treatment programs or retained necessary documentation to support its staffing projections for juvenile correctional officers for fiscal years 2008 and 2009.”
“In fiscal year 2007, TYC proposed closing five residential facilities. As a result, the Legislature reduced TYC’s appropriations for fiscal years 2008 and 2009. However, TYC continues to operate the Victory Field Correctional Academy and the West Texas State School, which were two of the facilities that TYC proposed closing. TYC reported it spent $21.8 million during fiscal year 2008 to operate these two facilities.”
“TYC did not ensure that its Office of Inspector General (1) received and investigated all reported allegations of mistreatment or (2) initiated and completed investigations of alleged mistreatment within 30 days as required by agency policy.”
In a letter responding to the audit, Cherie Townsend. executive commissioner of the Youth Commission, said the agency generally agrees with “most of he conclusions and the recommendations.”
“Agency priorities have been driven by the priorities established in Senate Bill 103 ( the 2007 reform bill) and the reform mandates,” Townsend’s letter states.
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May 4, 2009
House: TYC sunset review in 12 years
By a vote of 140-0, the Texas House today finally approved keeping the embattled Texas Youth Commission as a separate agency until 2021, rejecting a proposal to merge the state’s juvenile prison system into a new agency.
In doing so, the Lower Chamber set up a possible showdown with the Texas Senate, where leaders want to continue the Youth Commission for just two more years —Â along with significant downsizing in the Youth Commission’s budget that the House opposes.
The House also continued the operations of the Texas Juvenile Probation Commission for 12 years, turning back a Sunset Advisory Commission recommendation last fall that the Youth Commission be merged into the probation commission to provide for a seamless system of juvenile corrections in Texas.
The Sunset Commission’s report detailed how the two agencies had not worked together, resulting in a continuing disconnect in services and programs offered juvenile offenders in Texas.
As a part of the House-approved bill, a new oversight council will be created to implement a long-term improvement plan for the juvenile justice system and help the two agencies work more closely together.
In 2007, the Youth Commission was embroiled in a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal. The Legislature approved sweeping reforms to curb the abuses and, since then, the agency has seen its population in incarcerated teen-agers drop by nearly half.
Even so, agency officials have requested about the same budget as before. The Senate earlier approved a budget of almost $50 million less, saying it needed less funds because it has less children, and the House approved almost what Youth Commission officials requested.
In its budget, Senate leaders have proposed funding several new community-based treatment and rehabilitation programs that could leave the Youth Commission holding even fewer offenders than it holds now.
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Senate approves racial profiling change
The Texas Senate today tentatively approved a bill that for the first time will centralize the collection of official reports that track racial profiling by local police.
The vote was 20-10.
Under Senate Bill 1120, statistical reports on racial profiling during traffic stops that have been compiled by police agencies since 2001 will now be filed with the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement Officer Standards and Education — in a common form so they can be properly analyzed.
Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, the bill’s sponsor, said the measure will solve two problems with the current system: It will end different methods of reporting by various agencies, and it will mandate that reports from all police agencies are made public — where some departments have refused so far to do so.
West said he plans to seek final passage of the bill in coming days. Once that happens, the measure will then go to the House for consideration.
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Senate: New Internet restrictions for sex offenders
A bill that will place new restrictions on registered sex offenders and would require them for the first time to disclose their Web IDs was unanimously approved today by the Texas Senate.
The vote was 31-0.
Under Senate Bill 689 by Sens. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano, and Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, registered sex offenders in Texas would be restricted from using the Internet or social networking sites, if their conviction involved an Internet crime.
They would also have to disclose their online identifiers to authorities.
Some offenders convicted of sex crimes involving violence or soliciting minors on the Internet would be prohibited from having Internet access, sponsors said.
If passed into law, the measure would take effect Sept. 1.
The Senate version now goes to the House for consideration.
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New Coryell County jail site approved
The Texas Senate today approved a bill that will allow the state’s prison system to transfer a parcel of land outside Gatesville for construction of a new Coryell County Jail.
Senate Bill 2228 by state Sen. Kip Averitt, D-Waco, allows the Texas Department of Criminal Justice to make the property available to county officials.
The land located east of Gatesville is not developed and is used for grazing, prison officials said.
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May 1, 2009
Indictments in prison contraband probe
A Polk County grand jury today indicted death row convict Richard Lee Tabler, his mother and sister and a former death row offender for alleged cell-phone smuggling that sparked a statewide controversy and lockdown of all state prisons.
Tabler was also indicted on a felony charge of retaliation, for threatening to kill state Sen. John Whitmire after the veteran lawmaker reported cell phone calls from Tabler to police and got the convicted Killeen killer busted. Whitmire chairs the Senate committee that oversees Texas’ prison system.
At the same time, a former guard and two convicts were also indicted for bribery amid allegations they paid the guard more than $1,100 over a few months to smuggle tobacco into the Polunsky Unit, where death row is located.
“We are sending a message with these indictments,” said Special Prosecutions Chief Gina DeBottis, whose office is prosecuting the case. “Our investigation is continuing.”
DeBottis said Tabler, 30, was indicted along with Lorraine Tabler, 60; Tabler’s sister, Kristina Martinez, 36, of Salado, on charges of possessing contraband in a state prison — a third-degree felony crime that carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison.
Tabler is accused of using another inmate’s cell phone to make calls, and his mother and sister are accused of buying minutes for that phone — authorities said the minutes are a “component” of a cell phone that is illegal in a prison.
The contraband charges are second-degree felonies and can mean up to 10 years in prison. The retaliation charge will be enhanced to a second-degree felony because of Tabler’s criminal past, DeBottis said, and will could bring a life sentence.
Tabler was condemned to die for two Killeen slayings in 2004. His execution date has not been set. Indicted on similar contraband charges by the grand jury Michael Roy Toney, 43, who prosecutors said was on death row at the time but has since been granted a new trial. He was convicted in the Thanksgiving Day 1985 bombing in Fort Worth that killed three people.
After Tabler was busted last October, Gov. Rick Perry ordered Texas’ 112 state prisons locked down and searched from top to bottom for cell phones and other contraband. In the following weeks, officials found dozens of cell phones, drugs, tobacco and other items.
DeBottis said at least two cell phones and related gear were confiscated from Toney during shakedowns on death row.
In cases unrelated to the death row investigation, the Polk County grand jury indicted former correctional officer Betty Clements, 30, and convicts Darnell Page, 43, and Terrance Holland, 35, on bribery charges.
Prison officials said Page is serving life for on drug and robbery charges from Houston. Holland is serving a 20-year sentence for drug possession, robbery and car theft convictions in Jefferson County, officials said.
DeBottis said the inmates over several months last year allegedly arranged to have money wired to Clements — $1,175 in all — to have Bugler tobacco smuggled to them inside the Polunsky Unit near Livingston, in Polk County east of Huntsville.
On one occasion, DeBottis said, one of the inmates sent Clements a text message on her cell phone to confirm he received the contraband.
Reached by phone late this afternoon, Whitmire applauded the indictments. “People should be held accountable,” he said.
“All this should remind us of how this state should maintain a zero tolerance for all contraband in our state prisons, and how we need to secure our prisons — whatever it takes,” Whitmire said.
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April 30, 2009
ACLU calls for execution halt
With Derrick Lamone Johnson’s execution time nearing, the American Civil Liberties Union has just joined a growing chorus of supporters seeking a delay until it can be determined whether the convicted Dallas killer may have mental disabilities.
In a statement, Terri Burke, the executive director of the ACLU of Texas, asked Gov. Rick Perry to intervene and stop the execution until such time that “Johnson can be afforded a full hearing on his showing that he is mentally retarded.
“Johnson has only recently — on April 27 — been able to establish that he is mentally retarded,” Burke said in a statement. “But Johnson has never had a full and fair hearing on his mental retardation claim.
“In 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Eighth Amendment prohibits the execution of a person who is mentally retarded. The Court has only recently granted relief to indigent death-row inmates who would not otherwise be able to retain counsel in clemency proceedings.
“…(P)rocedural hurdles faced by indigent death-row inmates prevented the development of this claim until very recently,” Burke’s letter states, “and it has not been adequately considered. Mr. Johnson bears absolutely no fault for the late development of this issue.”
No immediate word of any decision by Perry.
The state Board of Pardons and Paroles earlier today turned down Johnson’s request for a a reprieve.
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Execution set for mentally disabled man?
The scheduled execution tonight of a convicted Dallas killer has erupted in controversy after reports that a new test shows Derrick Lamone Johnson may be mentally disabled.
The U.S. Supreme Court has banned the execution of anyone who is mentally disabled.
Angered by a decision of the state Board of Pardons and Paroles to confirm the execution of Johnson without reviewing the medical test information, then to stick with that vote in a second vote today, a group of lawmakers this afternoon asked Gov. Rick Perry to stop the execution slated for 6 p.m. tonight.
“It’s amazing to me how callous this system can be,” said state Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen. “After a cursory review of the file, they vote to hang ‘em high no matter what the new information shows.”
Just as upset are Reps. Senfronia Thompson and Sylvester Turner, both D-Houston, and Terri Hodge, D-Dallas, who petitioned the parole board late Wednesday for a second vote based on the new medical test just received in the case.
“There is no reason why the State of Texas should rush to execute this man, before it can be confirmed whether or not he is mentally retarded,” Turner said. “The parole board appears hell bent on sticking with their decision in favor of execution … It makes no sense.”
Johnson, 28, a 10th-grade dropout, was convicted in the 1999 slaying LaTausha Curry, who was kidnapped, beaten, suffocated and robbed of $10.
Thompson and Hodge said the parole board voted before lunch Wednesday to deny a reprieve, even though they had been advised that Johnson’s new attorney — who just joined the case in early April — was rushing to gather and submit new test results about his mental capacity.
“The test showed he is mildly retarded, in the low 70s,” Thompson said.
Hodge said the attorney got the information to the parole board at 12:38 p.m., after the deadline. While the board initially declined to review its decision, intense lobbying from Thompson, Turner and Hodge brought a review this morning.
In a letter to the lawmakers, Board Chair Rissie Owens said the seven-member board reconsidered a request from Johnson’s attorney for a 180-day reprieve — and decided against it.
“We’ve been through this before with Judge (Sharon) Keller (presiding judge of the state Court of Criminal Appeals) closing the doors at 5 p.m. and not allowing new information to be considered,” Hodge said. “It looks like the parole board tried the same thing … and now is just sticking with it’s earlier decision.
“We should do everything we can to consider all evidence, even new evidence, in these cases before we put someone to death,” she said. “When you talk about the ultimate penalty, we shouldn’t rush, even when it’s the last minute.”
Bruce Anton, Johnson’s attorney, and Owens could not immediately be reached for comment.
Katherine Cessinger, Perry’s deputy press secretary, said the governor’s office by late this afternoon had received no request for a reprieve for Johnson. Perry has the authority to delay the execution, even if the parole board has recommended otherwise.
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April 27, 2009
Senate: Get tough on human trafficking
Criminals who engage in human trafficking for sex or labor would face tougher penalties and a crackdown by law enforcement under a bill approved today by the Texas Senate.
Senate Bill 89 now goes to the Texas House for consideration.
“We often think that modern-day slavery cannot occur, but unfortunately it does,” said Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, D-San Antonio, the author of the measure. “This bill would try to do something about the problem.
(It) gives law enforcement the tools they need to recognize the victims or human trafficking and the prosecute those that prey on the innocent. Everyday thousands of defenseless children and vulnerable adults are trafficked through Texas and forced into jobs as laborers and prostitutes.”
Van de Putte said at least 20 percent of all human-trafficking victims in the United States come through Texas, with I-35 and I-10 among the main trafficking routes. Many of those smuggled as a part of the illegal sex trade are under-age youths.
“As humans, we cannot allow these atrocities to continue,” she said.
Under the measure, a statewide Human Trafficking Prevention Task Force would be created to develop policies to assist in cracking down on the illicit trade, the Texas Juvenile Probation Commission will evaluate alternatives rather than incarceration for youths who are accused of engaging in prostitution and will require state law enforcement training programs to include a component on human trafficking.
In addition, anyone convicted of trafficking in another person “with the intent or knowledge that the trafficked person will engage in forced labor or services, or benefits from” human trafficking would commit a crime.
If the person being illegally trafficked was under age 18 or the trafficking results in the death of a person being trafficked, then the crime would be a first-degree felony.
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April 24, 2009
Crime-gang crackdown bill approved
A wide-ranging crackdown on crime gangs was approved today by the Texas Senate, giving police new powers to track and break up cartel-style border drug gangs that officials say are increasing menacing cities across Texas.
Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, said the measure — a keystone of Gov. Perry’s called-for escalation of enforcement against criminal street gangs — will increase penalties for confirmed gang members who commit crimes, are caught with firearms or drugs and will create gang-free zones around schools around schools and other places where children are present.
“This is an important step,” Corona, the author, said of Senate Bill 11. “This is a dangerous problem that should be a priority. It’s about bringing under control trans-national gangs that are both violent and deadly.”
In addition to cracking down on gang activities statewide, the bill focuses on curbing gang growth by launching prevention problems to keep children out of gangs and to keep gangs from using teenagers as part of their operations to thwart detection and enforcement.
The measure now goes to the House, where passage is expected.
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House approves increasing compensation for people wrongfully imprisoned
People wrongfully imprisoned would be entitled to more compensation from the state under a measure the House passed today.
House Bill 1736 would increase the compensation from $50,000 to $80,000 per year of incarceration. There is an identical bill in the Senate.
Patrick Waller of Carrollton, who served 16 years for crimes he did not commit — aggravated robbery and aggravated kidnapping — was among several wrongfully convicted men sitting in the House gallery. He said he was thrilled the House approved the measure.
“Of course, I could never be repaid for the time I served, but … at least the state’s saying, ‘We wrongfully convicted you. At least we’re helping you get your life back on track,’” Waller said.
See Waller, below, and Rep. Helen Giddings, D-Dallas.
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April 22, 2009
Senate approves proposal barring amusement parks from hiring sexual offenders--except prostitutes
The Texas Senate approved a proposal prohibiting an owner or operator of an amusement park from employing anyone convicted of a sexual offense—except prostitution.
Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, quietly accepted a colleague’s amendment excusing individuals convicted of prostitution, though neither senator directly told colleagues in floor debate that prostitutes were being exempted.
Sen. Eddie Lucio, D-Brownsville, said he offered the amendment so individuals with a history of prostitution would still have a chance to work at amusement parks. “Why should we close the doors if they want to engage in legal employment and start anew?” Lucio said. “Let them work at something legal.”
Patrick said he accepted the change because he’s focused on individuals who prey on children.
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Senate-approved proposal encourages police to record interviews of suspects
Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, won Senate approval of a measure intended to encourage the recording of police interrogations. Ellis said his Senate Bill 116 arose out of concern that convicts freed due to recovered DNA evidence have said they were initially forced into confessions.
The approved measure provides that, when practical, a custodial interrogation should be recorded, in its entirety, using audio-visual equipment or audio equipment. It requires the Texas Department of Public Safety to adopt rules for providing funds or electronic recording equipment to law enforcement agencies.
Ellis called the change, headed to the House, “a very modest step in the right direction.”
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April 20, 2009
Anti-gang bill passes
A bill that would create gang-free zones to curb illicit activities around schools and other places where children are present was unanimously approved today by the Texas Senate.
The measure is a keystone in the anti-gang package of bills that are being pushed through with widespread support this session.
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Habeas change approved
Criminals who were sent to prison — or sentenced to death — based on discredited scientific evidence would be given a new way to challenge their convictions under a bill passed this morning by the Texas Senate.
In recent years, an increasing number of arson and gunshot convictions in Texas have triggered alarm as new technology proved earlier evidence wrong, and convictions were cast into doubt — including at least one case in which the prisoner was executed.
The measure by state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, would allow discredited scientific evidence that figured in a criminal conviction to be considered by an appeals court in order to establish the innocence of a defendant.
“This could help restore someone’s liberty in cases where discredited evidence was used to convict them,” Whitmire said. “I majored in political science, not forensic science, but I know this will improve current law.”
Advancements in forensic testing — DNA, ballistics and arson — have led to new evidence being uncovered in several cases in Texas. Whitmire said that led him to file the bill, which clarifies how discredited scientific evidence can be used in court appeals.
Key issue for those appeals: That the new information could not have been known earlier, when the defendant was convicted, because the science used to validate it has since been invalidated.
Senate Bill 1256 was supported by prosecutors, Whitmire told the Senate.
One case to attract attention was that of Cameron Todd Willingham, convicted in a fire that destroyed his family home in Corsicana two days before Christmas in 1991.
According to investigators, Willingham poured a combustible liquid on the floor and intentionally set the house on fire, resulting in the death of his three children. He was executed in February 2004, but the New York-based Innocence Project and other advocates have since called his conviction into question based on advancements in arson investigations.
Whitmire’s measure, one of several bills this session that seek to upgrade state law based on emerging investigative technology, was approved unanimously on a voice vote. It now goes to the House for consideration.
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April 16, 2009
10 years in prison for one rustled cow?
Saddling up to lasso a growing problem with rustlers, the Texas Senate today approved a bill that would jack up the penalties for stealing livestock.
In a state that once hanged rustlers, the brief debate focused only on whether the new penalties were too harsh.
Senate Bill 1163 makes the theft of any cattle, horses or exotic livestock punishable by up to 10 years in a state pen — er, prison.
Rustling is now a state jail felony, punishable by up to two years in a state jail.
Under the measure, the theft of 10 or more goats, pigs or sheep is a third-degree felony, as well. Under that: Still a state jail felony.
“The problem with rustlers is increasing, especially in my district in the Texas Panhandle,” said state Sen. Kel Seliger, R-Amarillo. “One of the problems it that the evidence is often eaten or done away with … We want to stop this dead in its tracks.”
According to the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, 6,404 cases of rustling were reported in Texas in 2008, compared with just 2,400 the year before.
Seliger said rustling penalties are tougher in Oklahoma, New Mexico and other surrounding states. “That may be why it’s increasing here,” he said.
Sen. Carlos Uresti, D-San Antonio, questioned whether making a third-degree felony was too much.
“Up to 10 years in prison for one cow?” he asked.
“This will deter rustling,” Seliger said.
The Senate agreed, voting 29-2 for final passage of the measure.
Uresti and state Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, voted no.
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April 13, 2009
Juvenile justice picks held up
A growing fight over whether to reverse some of Texas’ two-year-old juvenile justice reforms is holding up the confirmations of four gubernatorial appointees, including Youth Commission Executive Commissioner Cherie Townsend.
State Sen. John Whitmire, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee and the Criminal Justice Joint Legislative Oversight Committee, confirmed today that the nominations of Townsend and Rene Ordonez of El Paso, Ray West of Brownwood and Lea Wright of Amarillo to the Texas Juvenile Probation Commission “are on hold” until an agreement is reached on possible further downsizing at the embattled Texas Youth Commission and other ongoing reforms that could affect the probation commission.
“There’s no reason to confirm anyone until we know what the system will look like,” Whitmire said.
He said that he and Sen. Glenn Hegar, R-Katy, the vice chairman of the influential Sunset Advisory Commission, have placed the hold on the nominations. The Senate must confirm Gov. Rick Perry’s appointees during the legislative session or new appointments must be made.
According to other senators who asked not to be quoted said the development is part of growing discord over maintaining sweeping reforms approved two years ago when the Youth Commission was mired in a sex-abuse scandal. Most of the agency’s management was run off and it was placed under a form of receivership that ended only last fall when Townsend was brought in as executive commissioner.
The Sunset Advisory Commission earlier recommended the Youth Commission and Juvenile Probation Commission be merged to provide a seamless system of youth corrections in Texas. Agency officials have rebuked that plan.
Add to that a wide split over funding for both agencies between the Senate and House versions of the budget. The House version generally provides most of the funding that officials at the two agencies requested, while the Senate version proposes to divert tens of millions of dollars into new community-based corrections programs in Austin, Dallas and other cities.
Then, in recent weeks, the Sunset bill to continue the operations at both agencies has run into behind-the-scenes political wrangling — with Whitmire and other senators accusing agency officials of trying to undo many of the reforms put into law two years ago.
The Senate version of the Sunset bill was abruptly withdrawn from a public hearing within the past week after a late rewrite allowed the Youth Commission to study holding youths up to age 21 again and cut by half the amount of required training, among other changes.
Both were key parts of the reforms two years ago.
Both Sunset versions would allow the agencies to remain separate.
Hegar, Townsend and Spriggs could not immediately be reached for comment.
In recent months, Townsend has begun implementing plans to “right-size” the agency with layoffs and the proposed closures of at least two Youth Commission lockups. That, after the agency has seen its population of offenders drop by almost half in two years.
At the same time, Travis County and three others have submitted for state funding plans for pilot community-based corrections programs that would provide local treatment and rehabilitation programs for hundreds of youths rather than in Youth Commission lockups.
That could further reduce the Youth Commission’s population of incarcerated youths.
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April 3, 2009
Legal prison phones start ringing
For the first time in Texas history, convicts can now legally phone home from their cellblocks.
Not from those smuggled cell phones that caused such a stir a few months ago, when a state senator got a call and then a threat from a death row prisoner, but from new equipment that’s been approved by The Boss.
For every call, state taxpayers will be making money.
Officials today announced that the first seven prisoners — all women — made calls Monday from the 576-bed Henley State Jail in Dayton, northeast of Houston.
During April, 13 additional prisons are expected to get working inmate phones, and 31 more are expected to be added in May, said Paul Cooper, director and general manager of inmate phone systems for Embarq, the company hired to install and operate the new system.
By September, all of Texas’ 112 state prisons and jails should have inmate phones ringing.
Texas is the last state in the nation to allow an inmate phone system.
Only outgoing calls are to be allowed. And those calls can be made only to friends and relatives approved in advance by prison officials.
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April 2, 2009
21 illegal prison "cells' seized
With prison officials poised to expand legal pay phones in Texas prisons, it seems they can’t be installed fast enough.
Authorities said this afternoon that 21 cell phones, 21 chargers, 14 SIM cards and 2 MP3 players “with accessories” were confiscated Tuesday in a dog kennel at the 2,800-man Stiles Unit outside Beaumont.
Prison officials said eight bags of tobacco — illegal in prisons, like the cell phones — were also seized.
At a meeting in Austin tomorrow, the prison system’s governing board is expected to announce the details of new pay phones that are being installed in Texas prisons — a move they hope will lessen the demand for smuggled cell phones. The first pay phones were turned on earlier this week at a prison outside Houston.
“We caught these cell phones before they made it into the unit,” said Michele Lyons, a prison system spokeswoman.
The discovery in Beaumont came as investigations continue into how hundreds of cell phones are getting into state prisons, despite an announced crackdown last fall that includes searches of every employee and visitor.
The crackdown started after death row inmate Richard Lee Tabler called state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, and this reporter on a smuggled cell phone, then threatened both after investigators busted him.
Whitmire, who chairs the Senate committee that oversees the prison system, reported Tabler’s calls to police.
In an unprecedented move, Gov. Rick Perry ordered Texas’ 112 state prisons locked down for 10 days until every cell could be searched for cell phones and other contrand. In all, nearly 200 phones were found — including nearly two dozen on death row, presumably the most secure part of the prison system.
Since then, officials have mandated metal-detector and pat searches for everyone coming and going from state prisons, and have continued assurances that the smuggled cell phones are being curbed.
The Stiles Unit is one of five where most of the smuggled phones have been seized. In February, correctional officer Eric Talmore, 24, was arrested by prison invstigators after he was caught trying to walk in with three cell phones and other contraband concealed in a rice container.
Officials said he faces a felony charge of smuggling contraband into a prison.
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DNA testing bill passes
In a move to expand DNA tests for more criminals, a Senate committee today approved a state database to include Texans convicted of felonies — even in cases where they avoid prison time.
The Senate Criminal Justice Committee unanimously approved a revised Senate Bill 727 that would add people placed on probation and deferred adjudication for felony crimes to the list of criminals who have to provide a DNA sample to authorities.
Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, the bill’s author, called the measure “a good step … If we expand the state’s (DNA) database, we may find more people who should be exonerated or suspects to crimes.”
A change by the committee exempts juvenile offenders from those criminals who have to provide DNA samples. Those offenders who are placed on probation or on deferred adjudication will have to pay a $34 fee to cover part of the cost of the DNA test.
Though once the subject of vocal opposition by some civil libertarians, who were concerned that it would cast too wide a net for samples as police groups lobbied to collect DNA samples even from unconvicted suspects, the amended measure now appears to be moving quickly out of the Senate.
Ensuring the measure’s fast passage by the full Senate, the committee agreed to place it on the Upper Chamber’s consent calendar — which means it will likely be approved by the Senate without further debate.
Once it passes the Senate, it goes to the House for consideration.
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March 23, 2009
AG shuts down Twitter page
Authorities just a few minutes ago announced they have shut down a Twitter account that impersonated the Austin Police Department.
Listed as “AustinPD,” the Twitter account had hundreds of followers before it was closed late last week, said Attorney General Greg Abbott.
He said he closed the site working in concert with the Austin City Attorney’s Office.
“Postings on the site featured fictitious updates about purportedly official APD activities, status and statistics,” Abbot said in a statement. “For example, one posting claimed announced that APD officers would be “making more stops” at this year’s South by Southwest festival.”
Abbott continued: “Impersonating authorities and posting false information about law enforcement activities poses real problems for both peace officers and citizens who are unknowingly relying upon inaccurate facts. By working closely with the Austin Police Department and the City Attorney’s Office, we were able to prevent the site from continuing to publish fabricated information about official law enforcement activities.”
Abbott: “Citing a state law that prohibits individuals from impersonating public servants, the OAG contacted Twitter, asked the Website to suspend the “AustinPD” account and requested that it preserve any records related to the AustinPD user.”
Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo, in a statement, supported the closure.
“Although some may dismiss the site as a simple prank or minor irritant, the fact is that the information presented was false and misleading and could lead to unwarranted concern by the public,” he said in a statement. “The blog site also served to undermine the APD’s effort to build a spirit of trust and cooperation between the department and the community we serve.”
This afternoon, the account showed this message: “Sorry, the account you were headed to has been suspended due to strange activity. Mosey along now, nothing to see here.”
Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users’ updates, Abbott said.
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March 19, 2009
TYC cuts, after all
The Senate Finance Committee on Thursday approved a pared-down budget for the embattled Texas Youth Commission.
Agency officials had initially asked for $463 million, then in recent days trimmed that back to $430 million.
But under the Senate plan, the agency would get less than $400 million for its two-year budget and most of its proposed initiatives would be cut completely.
The plan is one piece of the overall Senate budget, which will be approved by the full Senate later in the session.
The Youth Commission’s two-year budget is currently around $550 million, officials said, but that includes $100 million in special reform funding in the aftermath of a sex-abuse scandal.
“If you look at the big picture, you’ll see we’re trying to transition to community-based facilities,” said Sen. Kevin Eltife, R-Tyler, chairman of a special workgroup that crafted the recommended budget.
“It’s going to take this into a whole new area that was envisioned when (the reforms) were passed two years ago.”
Under the Senate plan, more than 700 jobs would be cut from the 4,200-employee workforce during the next two years along with $35 million that would be diverted to pay for new community-based pilot corrections programs in Austin and Dallas.
Other cuts would force the closure of the state-run West Texas State School and Victory Field lockups.
The agency had requested 10-percent raises for all its employees. The Senate panel agreed to 10-percent raises for correctional officers, but not for administrators and other staffers, many of who received raises last year.
Also cut: Proposals by the agency to expand the number of beds its operates and leases, to open new regional centers, to expand staffing for the inspector general and ombudsman and to upgrade radios and communications gear, among other initiatives.
Senators noted that the agency has seen its population of incarcerated teenagers drop by nearly half in two years, and said the agency should shrink accordingly.
They cited as proof the estimated $99,000-a-year cost of incarcerating a youth, a $39,000 jump in two years, when the comparable cost of incarcerating an adult is $15,500.
Agency officials had argued they were working to cut costs as they completed reform programs.
“We always favor and support troubled youth being at home for their rehabilitation and treatment, and this is a step toward doing that,” said Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen, an author of the Youth Commission reform bill and vice chairman of the Finance Committee.
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TYC funding cuts derailed?
A Senate push to significantly chop state funding for the Texas Youth Commission appears to be derailing in a behind-the-scenes debate, insiders tell us.
TYC has been blasted by lawmakers for spending almost $99,000 per year to incarcerate each juvenile offender, a 40 percent increase in two years when the number of offenders the agency housed dropped by half.
By contrast, Texas’ adult prison system spends $15,500 a year to incarcerate each adult offender.
Agency officials have insisted they need the additional bucks, saying that juvenile-treatment programs are more expensive and that juvenile institutions are more costly to staff and operate — partly because of reforms that lawmakers made to the system two years ago.
According to insiders, this is where the negotiations stand, hours before the Senate Finance Committee is slated to tentatively map out the Youth Commission’s funding for 2010 and 2011:
The agency last biennium received about $550 million in state funding, including $100 million in one-time funding to address problems raised in a sex-abuse scandal that brought about sweeping reforms in 2007.
In its initial budget request for the next two years, the agency asked for $463 million, even though the number of incarcerated teenagers under its care had dropped by about half and officials had initiated plans to lay off more than 700 of 4,200 employees.
Senate leaders including Senate Finance Committee Chairman Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, told the agency that was way too much.
After a series of closed-door meetings, a Senate work group two weeks ago recommended cutting the agency’s budget to about $360 million, using much of the savings to fund pilot programs in Austin and Dallas that would correct and treat youths at home rather than sending them to a remote Youth Commission lockup.
More local programs were a goal of the 2007 reforms.
A House budget subcommittee, though, gave them much of the original funding they asked for.
Lobbying for full Youth Commission funding intensified in the Senate.
Several days ago, insiders said, agency officials offered to cut their budget request to $430 million. Senate leaders suggested $375 million, although several senators said a more appropriate number would be around $300 million.
In recent days, the $430 million has re-emerged for inclusion in the Senate version of the budget. That reportedly is to include a pay raise for TYC correctional officers.
If adopted at a meeting of the Senate Finance Committee this afternoon, the funding stream would mean taxpayers will spend about $84,000 per year per kid rather than $99,000, according to two Senate number-crunchers.
But $84,000 is still much more than the county incarceration and treatment programs will cost, critics note. Agency supporters insist it is justified, and is less than before.
“I don’t like this at all,” said Senate Criminal Justice Commission Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, an outspoken critic of the agency’s spending and among the senators who have been working to cut the budget even more.
“What we’re getting ready to pay for is an expensive, overly bureaucratic agency that has way too many high-paid central office personnel than they need.”
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March 18, 2009
Child-porn arrest for abuse activist
A former Houston-area member of Bikers Against Child Abuse has been arrested for possessing child pornography, officials announced this morning.
Attorney General Greg Abbott said David Wayne Garvey, 50, was indicted by a Chambers County grand jury on third-degree felony charges. Each charge is punishable by a maximum 10 years in prison.
Abbott said the investigation by his Cyber Crimes Unit began after a tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, indicating that an America Online user attempted to e-mail child pornography in September 2007.
A search warrant on Garvey’s home in Beach City allegedly turned up 83 images of child pornography on a computer, a CD and in e-mails, officials said.
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March 13, 2009
Bill: List DNA in suspect files
Rape victims from years ago whose attackers were confirmed by DNA, but were never charged because of a legal technicality, could still get some measure of justice.
Under proposed legislation announced yesterday, DNA links to suspects — even if they were never charged — would have to be listed in state criminal-history files to protect against future victims and help prosecutors take suspects off the street.
Noting those DNA links, officials said, could also influence decisions about parole, sentences for other crimes and bail for other crimes involving a single suspect.
The measure filed by state Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, and Rep. Allen Vaught, D-Dallas, would address an issue that rape victims have been raising for years.
The main targets are rape suspects who could never be charged, because the statute of limitations for such charges ran out before they were identified.
In the 1980s, the statute of limitations for rape was just five years. And while it has since been lengthened, authorities estimate that dozens and perhaps hundreds of suspects were never charged even though their DNA has been matched to evidence collected at the crime scene.
On Thursday, Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins endorsed the legislation, noting that it would allow some measure of justice for rape victims and provide additional information to police, prosecutors, courts and parole officials about suspects.
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March 12, 2009
Texas Rangers looking into documents reported missing from House parliamentarian's office
The Texas Rangers are looking into hundreds of documents reported missing from the House parliamentarian’s office, officials said today.
Rep. Chuck Hopson, D-Jacksonville, chairman of the House Committee on General Investigating & Ethics, said the panel turned over the mystery of the missing files to a law enforcement agency March 5.
Hopson declined to name the agency. But separately, Tela Mange, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, confirmed that the Rangers, an investigative division of the agency, are reviewing the matter.
Hopson said of the investigators: “We hooked them up with a bunch of people who have knowledge of the event.”
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Prison officers: We need pay hike
At a midday rally, one speaker recalled how Daniel Nagle, a correctional officer at the tougher-than-nails McConnell prison near Beeville, predicted that someone would have to die before lawmakers listened to their demands for a pay raise.
Thirteen days later, Nagle was dead, brutally stabbed by a convict.
“We are waiting and watching,” said Brian Olsen, executive director of a prison officers’ union, which rallied 400 correctional at the State Capitol today seeking a 20-percent pay increase — a jump that would move Texas from 48th in the nation in correctional pay to midway.
“We are not giving up … We remember Daniel Nagle’s words.”
In a somber, flag ceremony punctuated by tears and reverent words for Nagle and the other 50 Texas correctional officers who have died in the line of duty, the crowd of gray-and-blue uniforms made it clear they have no intention of being passed over again for a raise they think is years overdue.
Texas’ prison system has been chronically short of guards for more than a decade, so short that officials were forced to close parts of some prisons because they did not have enough staff to safely operate them. The agency is about 2,300 officers short now, down from nearly 4,000 in September 2007.
“If they can find money for everything else, they can find money for us,” said Don McCoy, a 28-year veteran at the 1,100-convict Powledge Unit near Palestine in northeast Texas. “We’ll be back, again and again, until they approve it.”
Inside the domed statehouse, as budget writers continued work, the 20-percent pay hike proposed by prison officials last summer continued to shrink.
Last week, a House work group tentatively approved a 5-percent increase and put the rest on a long “wish list” of state needs. A Senate work group recommended the entire $450 million hike, but by today there were reports that only a 10-percent increase might survive.
“Five percent is just $42-$43 in additional take-home,” said Olsen said. “That’s almost nothing.”
In their proposed budget, Texas Department of Criminal Justice officials sought 20-percent raises for correctional officers and parole officers, at a cost of $453.4 million.
That would bring the starting salaries of a correctional officer from $26,016 to $30,179, and the maximum salaries from $34,624 to $42,242.
Parole officers would see a starting-salary increase from $32,277 to $37,441, with the maximum salary increasing from $36,363 to $43,636.
Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, and state Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, who attended the ceremony, said officers deserve raises.
“You put your lives on the line every day to protect the 24 million citizens of Texas,” Kolkhorst said.
“We know they need it, deserve it,” Whitmire said. “We just have to find it.”
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March 5, 2009
Senate panel OKs TYC cuts
Three additional Texas Youth Commission lockups would be closed, administrative costs would whacked and the troubled agency would be downsized by at least $47 million under a new spending blueprint just approved by a Senate budget workgroup.
The plan now goes to the full Senate Finance Committee for consideration.
Under the Senate plan, the Youth Commission was denied almost new additional nickel it asked for in its $252 million budget proposal.
Three existing correctional centers would be closed: the West Texas State School in Pyote, Victory Field in Vernon and the Ron Jackson II lockup in Brownwood.
Two new pilot programs were approved in Austin and Dallas to treat incarcerated youths in community programs rather than sending them to a state lockup. If successful, those programs could divert hundreds more youthful offenders from a juvenile corrections system that has seen its population cut by half in two years as the result of sweeping reforms enacted in 2007.
By contrast, earlier in the day, a House budget workgroup approved a much-different spending blueprint for the Youth Commission, closing the Pyote lockup while opening five new centers statewide.
“We’ll always need a TYC to house the worst of the worst juvenile offenders in Texas,” said state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, a member of the work group. “But a lot of these kids could be better addressed in a community program, than by sending them to some far-off state facility.
Added Sen. Kevin Eltife, R-Tyler: “That’s the direction we’re heading, to do what’s right for the kids.”
The agency has been in the legislative dog house in many quarters since a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal made headlines in 2007, and caused the Legislature to enact sweeping reforms.
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Senate backs prison pay hikes
A Senate Finance Committee work group voted this afternoon to fund the full 20-percent in pay raises for Texas’ correctional officers, a $450 million package that was proposed last summer by prison brass.
The move came just hours after a House budget work group decided to cut the proposed pay hikes to just 5 percent, and move them to a wish list of items that may be funded if enough money is left over.
“We think that’s an important initiative that should stay in” the budget, said state Sen. Kevin Eltife, R-Tyler, echoing sentiments from Sens. John Whitmire, D-Houston, and Kel Seliger, R-Amarillo.
Added Seliger: “In the best of times, we’re 4,000 officers short. Now, we’re 2,200 short. I think they need a raise.”
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Prison pay hikes downsized
A House budget subcommittee this morning tentatively agreed to drastically downsize a proposed pay-raise package for Texas’ prison guards, and move it from the sure-thing budget to the wish list.
State Rep. Debbie Riddle, R-Tomball, the chairman of the subcommittee, said the panel had little choice but to reduce the requested 20-percent raise package to just 5 percent.
That cut dropped the price tag from around $450 million to $124.8 million.
And because the state’s regular budget is so tight, Riddle’s subcommittee agreed to move the 5-percent raise to the state’s fast-growing “wish list” of items that should be funded, if extra money can be found. Subcommittee members said they will label it an “important, high priority.”
From here, the recommendation is to go back to the full House Appropriations Committee for review and discussion before the House adopts its version of the state’s upcoming two-year budget.
Senate budget writers so far have said they intend to try to fund the raises — at some level — in the regular budget, not on the wish list.
Prison officials have campaigned for months about the need to raise correctional officers’ salaries to address a chronic hiring and retention crisis. The state currently ranks about 48th among the 50 states in what it pays correctional officers in state prisons.
Today’s proposal will probably not set well with the rank and file.
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New TYC budget plan unveiled
A new spending proposal for the embattled Texas Youth Commission was unveiled this morning in a House budget subcommittee, this one with far fewer cuts than a Senate panel is studying.
Bottom line cost: Some savings over what the agency is spending now.
High points of the new plan proposed by agency officials:
Six existing lockups for teenagers would be converted to “high restriction facilities with lower capacities.”
The troubled West Texas State School in Pyote would be closed, rather than just downsized. That’s the remote outpost where a headline-grabbing, sex-abuse scandal erupted two years ago.
The Victory Field lockup in Vernon would be downsized to 96 beds.
Two new 48-bed “state-operated leased facilities” would be opened at unspecified locations.
The agency would also get approval to spend $25 million build three new lockups in metro areas, at unnamed sites.
Additional capacity would be leased from private operators to house additional juvenile offenders.
The House subcommittee tentatively agreed to approve the spending plan, subject to a final review and discussion.
This, at a time when the agency has seen its population drop by half in two years and as Senate budget-writers are asking why the agency needs any additional beds when its population of youths may be dropping even further.
Discussions continue. Stay tuned.
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March 4, 2009
Boogie from Boogie
When former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis attended an invitation-only dinner at an upscale Austin steakhouse Tuesday might, he was presented a copy of “Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story” — a documentary about the GOP political operative who helped undo Dukakis’ 1998 campaign for the presidency.
The presenter: Boogie, a.k.a state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston.
Atwater, you may remember, got his nickname as a Republican spinmeister and party chairman who made life miserable for the Dems in the 1980s.
Whitmire, as you may not know, earned the nickname “Boogie” as a member of the Texas House in the 1980s, for the zip-up black boots he wore some days. “Boogie boots,” his deskmate called them.
“It had nothing to do with my behavior,” Whitmire said this morning. “I wish someone would straighten that out.”
Done.
And yes, Dukakis was enlightened on Whitmire’s nickname before he left town.
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Dukakis: Texas model in prison rehab
Michael Dukakis knows the deadly spiral of addiction well.
His wife, Kitty, beat a highly publicized, years-long addiction to diet pills and anti-depressants.
As governor of Massachusetts in the 1980s, Dukakis championed cutting-edge treatment programs for imprisoned drunk drivers in his state, which were among the first in the nation. He launched programs to curb teenage drinking and drug abuse.
As the Democratic nominee for president in 1988, he challenged Americans to kick their habit of drink and drugs.
On Tuesday, Dukakis, 75, brought his rehab message to Austin, in meetings with state leaders to urge them to grow Texas’ treatment programs — even expand some to cover Medicaid recipients.
And he brought congratulations: Texas is a national model, by greatly expanding its prison treatment and rehabilitation programs two years ago in a move that was criticized.
So far, recent reports show, that expansion may be paying off — with recidivism rates that appear to be dropping, and with prison growth flat-lining so that no expensive new lockups will need to be built for the foreseeable future.
“Lives are being saved,” Dukakis told the Statesman, in an exclusive interview in his suite at the Driskill Hotel. “There’s nothing partisan about this issue. This issue was not mentioned in any of the State of the State messages this year, but it’s one of the most important issues we face.”
Here’s why, Dukakis says:
For every alcoholic or drunken driver or addicted drug user who receives treatment, achieves sobriety and becomes a productive citizen, taxpayers spend less and less to deal with the problems.
For everyone who kicks a drug habit, less cocaine and heroin and other illicit drugs are consumed in the United States — and that cuts the profits of the drug cartels and street gangs.
“Five percent of the world’s population,” said Dukakis, referring to the U.S., “accounts for 50 percent of the world’s cocaine use. With the war that’s going on on the border, that could spill into Texas, we need to stop providing the cartels’ profits and stop the demand for the drugs.”
“There’s a massive silence on this issue. It’s amazing.”
Dukakis is on the board of a Massachusetts-based group called Join Together that advocates for effective drug and alcohol policy, prevention and treatment.
“I’m here in Texas to first say, congratulations to Texas for doing this (expanding the prison programs),” he said. “I hope all the states can expand their programs like Texas has.
“We not only need these programs, we need education programs beginning in the elementary grades to teach children not to use drugs and alcohol.”
“Programs like these — prevention, treatment, rehabilitation — pay enormously with the lives they save and in the improved public safety that results. If we send people to prison and provide them with no programs, they will come out one day and go back into their community and return to the same cycle of abuse they were in before.”
For her part, Kitty Dukakis is just as outspoken and committed to the same goals as her husband.
“I wish what I have been able to achieve for many others,” she said. “Texas is doing the right thing.”
And from Senate Criminal Justice Committee John Whitmire, D-Houston, one of the Texans who the Dukakis’ came to Austin to congratulate, came this response:
“How often do you hear that — someone from Massachusetts congratulating Texas? Texas is trying. We’re trying to make a difference.”
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March 3, 2009
Dukakis at State Capitol
Michael Dukakis, the former Massachusetts governor and 1988 Democratic presidential nominee, is touring the State Capitol at this hour talking to legislative leaders about the importance of drug- and alcohol-treatment programs.
He and wife Kitty are in Austin to attend a dinner this evening hosted by Join Together, a national advocacy project for effective alcohol and drug prevention and treatment programs.
Meeting in a Capitol hallway a few minutes ago, amid a crowd of nearby onlookers who appeared surprised to see the Boston politician, Dukakis congratulated Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, for sponsoring legislation two years ago to expand Texas’ prison treatment and rehabilitation programs.
A recent study showed the programs have helped Texas’ prison population flat-line in recent months, and predicted the diversion and treatment programs
“Texas is ahead of a lot of other states right now, including my own,” said Dukakis, who initiated several cutting-edge treatment programs in Massachusetts when he was governor in the 1980s.
Answered Whitmire: “The toughest thing you can do in fighting crime is to fight the next crime, and that’s what treatment programs do.”
Among the other Capitol folks Dukakis met with was House Corrections Committee Chairman Jim McReynolds, D-Lufkin.
Dukakis meets with University of Texas President William Powers.
Dukakis meets with Whitmire in the halls of the Capitol.
State Rep. Jim McReynolds, chair of the House Corrections Committee, greets Dukakis outside a committee hearing.
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Gang-free zones to target crime
Crime-gang members who hang around schools and other areas where children congregate could be busted by police under a get-tough bill filed today.
State Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, said the measure would better protect young Texans from a growing threat of domestic and trans-national gangs.
Patterned after the successful drug-free zones enacted years ago, the new gang-free zones would includes areas around schools, playgrounds and universities, “as well as other popular areas for young people,” Carona said.
“We are serious about stopping gang violence.”
Gang members who are caught in those zones could face harsher punishments for crimes, Carona and other supporters said.
In recent months, domestic and trans-national crime gangs have been blamed for an increase in murders, shootings, burglaries and robberies in Austin and many other Texas cities amid warnings from state law enforcement officials that gangs pose a public safety threat.
Carona noted: “The gang threat in Texas is the greatest threat to homeland security.”
“Gangs prey on innocent youths in those areas … and this (bill) will send the message that we’re not going to tolerate that,” Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins said at a late-morning Capitol press conference to announce the bill.
Other senators quickly weighed in with their support.
State Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth: “This problem has found its way to every corner of Texas … Texans have had enough. It is well past time for Texas to send a message to domestic and trans-national gangs.”
State Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano: “(Gangs are) a huge problem in Texas … This bill will fight that.”
State Sen. Joan Huffman, R-Houston, a former judge and gang-crimes prosecutor: “I like to think of this as a hammer” against gangs.
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1 in 22 adult Texans in corrections programs
Texas details from a new study released yesterday by the Pew Center on the States:
1 of every 22 adults in Texas is in prison, on parole or probation.
The national average is 1 in 33.
Texas, Georgia, Idaho, Massachusetts and Ohio had the highest percentages of adults under correctional supervision. In Texas, that amounts to 797,254 people — slightly more folks than were estimated to live in Austin in the 2007 U.S. Census update.
In the United States, the number of people on probation or parole nearly doubled to more than 5 million from 1982 to 2007. The total population of the U.S. corrections system now exceeds 7.3 million.
Bottom line: As Texas and other states lock more offenders in prison, they spend more taxpayer dollars to do so. And while state prison costs continue to increase, in tight budget times, states will have to make tough decisions about whether to continue growing their corrections systems at the expense of education, social programs and other areas of the budget.
In Texas, amid concern about that issue, lawmakers two years ago voted to greatly expand addiction-treatment and rehabilitation programs rather than build expensive new prisons. So far, Senate and House leaders said last week, that initiative seems to be paying off — as the growth of the prison population in Texas has leveled off in recent months.
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February 27, 2009
Death penalty's high cost
Thanks to the tanked economy that is straining states’ budgets across the country,a new push is underway to cut one high-dollar and controversial program: Executions.
In Texas, the capitol of capital punishment, the push will likely dead-end.
In eight states, lawmakers are considering bills to abolish executions to save money. State Rep. Lon Burnham, D-Fort Worth, has filed an abolition bill in Texas — “on moral grounds,” he said, not solely because of the cost.
Supporters of the campaign make this point: The cost of administering the death penalty includes not just the cost of high-security incarceration and the execution, but also years and years of costly court appeals.
The execution itself is a relatively cheap process, compared to the appeals. Prison officials have estimated the cost of keeping a condemned prisoner on death row is about $48 a day.
Some stay on death row for more than a decade before their appeals run out.
While exact statistics on the costs of executions are elusive, because each case is different in timing and court actions, death-penalty opponents have argued the figure reaches into several million dollars per case by the time the ultimate punishment is administered.
Even so, death penalty supporters say cost should not be the motivating factor. It is the the crime, they say, for which the penalty is applied.
“Otherwise, why not release everyone back to the street — that would be the cheapest option,” said Paul Walker, a crime victim and death-penalty supporter. “Public safety can be expensive.”
Nonetheless, death penalty opponents say they expect the abolition bills in other states to be actively debated in coming months, with the high cost as one factor in the considerations.
In Texas? Don’t look for Burnham’s bill to shoot through the Legislature with approval.
What do you think?
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Tense back-and-forth on TYC
A few tense moments last evening in the House Corrections Committee, as Ombudsman Will Harrell was grilled about a controversial report he released questioning the wisdom of one scandal reform.
The questioner: State Rep. Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, an author of the reforms.
Near the end of a lengthy public hearing yesterday, Madden quizzed Harrell about a report that Harrell released contending that the number of juveniles certified as adults for crimes has mushroomed since the reforms removed 19-to-21-year-olds from Texas Youth Commission custody.
Bad thing, the report infers, since more juveniles may be going to prison. Harrell said he regrets supporting that change.
Not so, an irritated Madden shot back.
The number of juveniles certified as adults on criminal charges in Texas has actually dropped, he said. Your conclusion is dead wrong, he told Harrell.
“We actually had fewer certifications in 2008 than in 2003, 2004 or 2005,” he said, blasting Harrell’s report as “terribly misleading.”
Harrell defended the report,but agreed to look into the stats that Madden noted.
Madden then told Harrell that the ombudsman’s job was to investigate issues involving incarcerated teen-agers, not producing such reports. Harrell said state Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen, asked him to produce the report.
Madden then pointedly asked Harrell about the status of an audit he had asked Harrell for months ago. Madden said Harrell had told it then that it was being reviewed by Cherie Townsend, the Youth Commission’s executive commissioner.
“Where is it,” Madden demanded.
Harrell: Townsend is still reviewing it.
Madden: Why does she have it. Aren’t you supposed to be an independent ombudsman?
Harrell: “We’re negotiating with the agency to see if its correct.”
Madden: You made your report on 19-21-year-olds public without Townsend signing off on it.
Bottom line, he told Harrell: Your report is wrong. Before you say we have an alarming trend, you should have your facts straight. You should be spending your time investigating issues on behalf of incarcerated youths, rather than producing reports to lobby the Legislature.
Harrell appeared to stick by his guns on the report and his positions, at several times interrupting Madden.
The pointed conversation surprised several staffers and others at the hearing. Madden is known for being soft-spoken and almost never confrontational.
Additional background may explain the reason: Several lawmakers, including Madden, are piqued at Harrell about a number of things, including the report, and as a result there’s a move afoot to derail the Senate confirmation of recent reappointment to the post by Gov. Rick Perry.
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February 20, 2009
Youth incarceration numbers to flat-line?
The number of teen-aged lawbreakers incarcerated in Texas lockups will flat-line in the next six years, the first such trend in years, new projections show.
From a Legislative Budget Board report:
“The residential population is expected to bed much lower than the population in previous fiscal years . . . Based on 2008 intakes, it is assumed (the Texas Youth Commission) will receive 2,169 intakes per year for fiscal years 2009 through 2014.”
That’s down from 2,994 in 2007, and even more in the previous years.
The Youth Commission now holds roughly half of the youths that it did before a sweeping reform bill in 2007, in the aftermath of a scandal over sex-abuse and an official cover-up.
The new stats are being hailed by those on both sides of a controversial proposal to merge the shrinking Youth Commission with the Texas Juvenile Probation Commission, to provide a “seamless” system for dealing with youth offenders.
Opponents say the figures show that TYC will need to continue to exist as a separate agency. Proponents say that as more youths are removed from TYC and placed into community-based treatment programs, there will be even less reason for a separate agency.
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February 19, 2009
Report: Prison rehab programs appear working
Texas’ prison population has stopped growing for the time being, thanks in part to a controversial changes in corrections policy two years ago that ballooned funding for rehabilitation programs, new statistics indicate.
That means Texas will not have to consider building new prisons that cost hundreds of millions of dollars, at a time when the economic collapse is pinching the state budget, officials said today.
”We put 6,000 treatment beds on line in the past two years … and this is the initial result: Just what we expected,” said Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, who co-authored legislation mandating the greatly-expanded treatment programs in 2007.
Echoing sentiments from colleagues, Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, said the statistics show “a dramatic turnaround.”
Today’s Legislative Budget Board testimony to the budget-writing Senate Finance Committee marked the first public report card on the new programs, which two years ago were championed by corrections advocates as a step forward and opposed by some prosecutors and police groups as too soft on crime.
“Crime is down, the programs are working,” said Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice what operates the 112-prison system. “It’s been proven before that these types of programs have an impact on recidivism, so these new numbers are no surprise.”
Even so, Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley while he thinks some of the reforms have proven beneficial, such as expanded drug-treatment slots, he cautioned against reading too much into the new statistics.
“I would be very skeptical from making a connection between the numbers and legislation that passed two years ago, especially if you look back at at the LBB numbers — their predictions weren’t particularly accurate,” he said. “I would agree that the system does seem stable right now. The parole rate in the last five years has been very stable.”
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Judge Keller charged with violating her duty
The state judicial ethics commission has charged Sharon Keller, the presiding judge of the state’s highest criminal court, with violating her duty and bringing discredit upon the judiciary when she declined to allow a death row prisoner to file an after-hours appeal in 2007. The inmate, Michael Richard, was executed about 3½ hours later.
Keller will face a public trial to answer the charges and could be removed from office, reprimanded or exonerated.
A complaint against Keller, who presides over the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, was filed with the commission more than a year ago. An editorial in the New York Times this morning said the commission’s failure to act during that time was inexcusable.
State Rep. Lon Burnham (D-Ft. Worth) filed a resolution in the Texas House earlier this week calling for Keller’s impeachment.
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Ogden: $161 mil in stimulus package for CJ
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, just announced that around $161 million may be available to Texas in the federal economic-stimulus plan for use in criminal justice agencies.
“How much of that could we use to run the (Texas Department of Public Safety)?” Ogden asked DPS officials.
The DPS, like many other state agencies, is coming up short on budget needs and state funding that is available.
Allan Polunsky, chairman of the DPS’ governing board, said the agency is actively examining that possibility. “We are going to take advantage hopefully of any opportunity,” he said.
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February 17, 2009
No misdemeanors in Patrick DNA bill
Facing a growing controversy over a push by Texas’ big-city police chiefs to greatly expand mandatory DNA tests, state Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, wants to be clear: A bill he filed does not expand the tests to misdemeanor suspects.
Patrick’s measure, Senate Bill 727, would only expand the current DNA-testing law to cover convicted felons who are sentenced to deferred adjudication and and those who are placed on probation.
Under a legislative proposal being pushed by police chiefs of Texas’ six largest cities, DNA would be taken from everyone who is arrested on suspicion of committing Class B misdemeanors up to the most serious felonies.
Currently, DNA samples can be taken from anyone convicted of a felony and from those arrested for particularly violent crimes such as aggravated rape, aggravated kidnapping and murder.
So far, the police chief’s push has not made it into legislation. If it does, it would likely face an uncertain future in the current budget-cutting climate at the State Capitol.
The chief’s proposal has an estimated minimum $32 million price tag.
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February 13, 2009
First prison phones connect March 30
Using voice-identity technology once used to order U.S. military air strikes, Texas on March 30 will begin allowing prison convicts to make legal phone calls for the first time — on old-fashioned, hard-wired handsets that promise to earn taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.
Texas is the last state in the nation to allow an inmate phone system.
Prison officials announced today that the first eight phones will be activated at the Byrd Unit, the prison system’s primary intake and assessment unit in Huntsville. Within a month, five additional prisons will get hundreds more.
Only outgoing calls will be allowed.
All of Texas’ 112 state prisons should have inmate phones ringing by September, when the final lockups are to be hooked up. That’s two months later than initial projections, a delay that officials attributed to planning delays.
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February 10, 2009
Problems for TYC reform model
When the Texas Youth Commission exploded in a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal two years ago this month, state leaders quickly turned to Ohio as a model for its reform steps.
The Buckeye State’s juvenile prison agency had just come through an ugly scandal of its own, and Texas lawmakers thought it might provide a road map for what to do. At one point in 2007, Ohio Youth Services Commission Director Thomas Stickrath was brought to Texas for consultations.
Now, a new report released this morning by advocacy groups suggests Ohio might not have been the model it was thought to be.
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February 3, 2009
Enhancements on hold?
With the Texas Senate apparently posed to hold up for now on any bills with a new fiscal note, Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire said today that tougher punishments are also on hold.
“It’s simple: Enhancements cost money,” said Whitmire, D-Houston. “No enhancements. We don’t have money for them.”
Dozens of bills have been filed seeking enhancements of criminal penalties, as they are each legislative session. Getting tougher on crime is an easy vote-getter back home.
No word from the House, but if the Senate halts enhancements — as it did several legislative sessions ago, triggering controversy — Whitmire’s sentiment could stop many bills dead in their tracks.
And before they ever got started through the pipeline.
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Perry: Emergency for prison security
Gov. Rick Perry today designated the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s request for $66 million to ramp up security in state prisons, partly to curb the flow of smuggled cell phones and other contraband.
The designation was among several issues declared as emergencies so the Legislature can begin considering the issues in the initial 30 days of the legislative session.
Wording in Perry’s order: “Legislation to appropriate funds to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for the purchase and use of screening and detection devices for contraband and personnel, as well as comprehensive security equipment.”
The prison agency sought the funding late last year in the aftermath of a revelations that smuggled cell phones inside prisons posed a growing threat to security and public safety, after a death row convict called — and then threatened — a state senator.
Prison officials applauded Perry’s move.
From Michelle Lyons, the prison system’s spokeswoman:
“We see the introduction of cell phones and other contraband into our facilities as a critical issue, and submitted a request for immediate consideration for funding to address this issue. We look forward to continuing to work with our state leaders to address these security concerns.”
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January 28, 2009
Prison prosecutions for smuggled cell phones
In testifying yesterday at a Criminal Justice Legislative Oversight Committee hearing on prison security, Gina DeBottis, director of the Special Prosecutions Unit that handles prison crimes, said no cell-phone-smuggling cases had been prosecuted — from death row — in the past two years.
Some heard that as no prosecutions at all for smuggled cell phones.
These updated stats from DeBottis this morning:
“I need to clarify that SPU has received no cell phone cases from death row in the past two years. In fact since 1/1/07, SPU has received 171 cell phone cases and has accepted 116 for prosecution. Of those 116 cases, 31 have been sentenced, 40 are pending trial, 33 are pending grand jury, 7 were dismissed and 5 were no-billed by a grand jury.”
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January 26, 2009
Cell phone smuggling continues
More than 200 cell phones have been confiscated in state prison cellblocks since a system-wide shakedown for contraband ended in November, almost twice as many as were seized during the lockdown.
Eight of the phones were seized from death row, where the crackdown started after a condemned two-time murderer called — and then threatened to kill — a powerful state senator.
“We’ve got some hard questions to ask about the zero-tolerance policy they supposedly put into effect,” said Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston.
“What do we have to do enforce zero tolerance? What we see doesn’t look like zero tolerance. Obviously, I’m still concerned.”
Prison officials this afternoon insisted the confiscations of 220 cell phones from convicts at Texas’ 112 state prisons between Nov. 12 and Jan. 15 shows their continuing crackdown on smuggled phones and other contraband is working.
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January 22, 2009
Bill: Shut the evac shelter schools
A just-filed bill would require schools that shelter hurricane and disaster evacuees to close while they are doing so as a safety measure.
House Bill 727 would also prohibit the Texas Education Agency from penalizing school districts that send their students home while they are serving as emergency shelters.
During the Hurricane Ike evacuation last fall, some districts were reluctant to let students stay home for the day because they would lose state money — even as parents complained that some evacuees were parolees and probationers, and should not be on the campus at the same time with students.
At McNeil High School, parents complained that evacuees were drinking beer on school grounds. The shelter there was open while school was in session.
Other problems reported:
Several Austin shelters, including ones in public schools, reported fights, thefts and evacuees head-butting police.
State authorities identified 18 registered sex offenders at shelters in five cities. One evacuee was arrested in Austin for a sexual assault that occurred in a shelter.
One San Antonio shelter reported numerous thefts, public intoxication complaints and an assault. And the Texas Education Agency reported that numerous weapons, alcohol and drugs were found in the shelters.
“In fact, we had some dangerous people in shelters, and I think most schools might want to have the option to send students home if they were serving as a shelter location,” said state Rep. Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, the bill’s author.
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January 21, 2009
Prison agency still pushing guard pay raise
Texas prison officials said today their request for an additional $453.4 million for pay raises for correctional officers is still on the table.
“We are definitely going ahead with that request,” said Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
On Tuesday, Senate and House versions of the base budget prepared by the Legislative Budget Board listed $22.2 million in pay raises for correctional and parole officers. Lyons said today that was a remaining installment in pay raises given all state employees last session.
Lest any correctional staff thinking the $22.2 million was all there would be, corrections officials wanted to set the record straight.
Still undecided: Whether the Legislature will be able to find the $453.4 million the agency wants, in such a tight budget year.
In what could be a help the LBB, in a separate Effectiveness and Efficiency Report just released, makes the case that Texas prison officers could use a pay raise.
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January 15, 2009
Bill to allow prison cell jamming
Two GOP Texas lawmakers today filed federal legislation to allow prison systems to curb a growing epidemic of smuggled cell phones inside the nation’s prisons.
The bill by U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and U.S. Rep. Kevin Brady — entitled the Safe Prisons Communications Act — would allow state authorities to jam cell phone calls with permission from the Federal Communications Commission.
The epidemic was highlighted across the nation in October, when a Texas death row inmate called state Sen. John Whitmire and this reporter — then threatened to kill both of them after he got busted for having the contraband.
In other states, convicts have used smuggled cell phones to order murders, to spark riots and to run drug rings, authorities have said.
“This legislation will fight criminal enterprises behind bars and protect innocent victims and public officials from harassment and threats from criminals,” Hutchison said. “Recent cases of prisoners smuggling cell phones behind bars highlight the need to use current technology to prevent this ability.”
Added Brady: “It is unacceptable that these inmates have been able to threaten people from behind bars, and it must not continue.”
Under the proposal, the legislation will allow a governor or a designee and the director of the federal Bureau of Prisons to petition the FCC to jam cell phone calls at a specific prison.
The FCC will then have to determine whether the jamming would interfere with emergency or public safety communications outside the prison’s walls. And the FCC would have to test and approve devices for use by correctional facilities.
Under current law, which took effect in 1934, jamming of cell phone calls at prisons is illegal.
After the Texas death row convict, Richard Tabler, was arrested, Gov. Rick Perry ordered an emergency lockdown and sweep for cell phones and other contraband at Texas’ 112 state prisons. More than 40 phones and related gear were found, among weapons, illegal drugs and other contraband, were subsequently found — including 18 phones and cell items on death row.
Death row is supposed to be the most secure part of Texas’ prison system.
In Texas, prison officials have reported a sharp increase in smuggled cell phones in recent years, confiscating more than 700 last year alone. In some states, including Texas, the number of cell phones confiscated from prisoners has doubled over the past two years.
In some instances, Texas authorities have said smugglers use brazen methods , such as using slingshots to propel cell phones over fences or hiding them inside footballs and air-compressor tanks, to get cell phones into the hands of convicts.
“Great. Great. Great,” Whitmire, D-Houston, said late this morning when advised of the bill. “It’s about time.”
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January 13, 2009
Four options for TYC future
The Sunset Advisory Commission on Wednesday will get four options on the future of the embattled Texas Youth Commission and the smooth-running Juvenile Probation Commission.
Option 1: Merge them together into a new Texas Juvenile Justice Department.
Option 2: Maintain the two as stand-alone agencies under a single-governing board.
Option 3: Maintain the two as stand-alone agencies with their current governance structures, but with a combined budbget and planning committee.
Option 4: Maintain the two as stand-alone agencies with no organizational changes.
The agencies hate Option 1 and pretty much hate 2.
Proponents of the merger hate anything but Option 1. Opponents are pushing Options 2 or 3 to try and soften the blow.
Most House members on Sunset are said to like Option 1. Most senators are said to like Option 2.
If that’s true, it appears some form of merger may be in the offing for the Youth Commission, despite reports in recent days that lawmakers might leave the agency alone.
Once approved, the Sunset Commission’s recommendations go to the Lege for consideration and possible passage into law.
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TYC merger compromise?
A compromise has emerged in the back-room fight over merging Texas’ juvenile-justice agencies — the embattled Texas Youth Commission and the smoothly run Juvenile Probation Commission.
The idea: leave the agencies separate, but put them under one governing board that could oversee both.
Sens. Bob Deuell, R-Greenville, and Craig Estes, R-Wichita Falls, among other lawmakers, are reportedly shopping the compromise around the Capitol this afternoon, to try for an agreement before the Sunset Advisory Commission meets in the morning.
The Sunset Commission is to vote tomorrow on a staff recommendation to merge the two agencies.
Initial reaction to the compromise is split.
Most lawmakers: Two agencies, two budgets, one board? Won’t work.
Others: Might make sense as a start to combine the two.
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January 12, 2009
Skirmishing over TYC merger
On the eve of the Legislature coming back into session, some intense, behind-the-scenes skirmishing is escalating over a proposal to create a new juvenile-justice agency by merging the scandal-plagued Texas Youth Commission with the Juvenile Probation Commission.
The Sunset Advisory Commission staff recommended the merger last fall, sparking strident opposition from top TYC and TJPC officials.
The Sunset commission on Wednesday is expected to vote to either approve the merger, or junk it and leave the agencies separate.
On Friday, a copy of a plan written last June by TJPC Vickie Spriggs supporting the merger started circulating among lawmakers and staffers. Spriggs is now one of the most vocal opponents of the merger.
Supporters insisted she had changed her mind only when it became a possibility she might end up out of top job. The merger is just as good an idea now as it was then, they argued.
Today, Spriggs’ “official response” was making the same rounds. In it, she insisted that the earlier report was a “confidential document” she drew up at the behest of Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, who supports the merger.
Her take:
“I shared my opinion that the counties still need a state-run institution system and that I could not agree that sending the worst youth to TDCJ was an appropriate option. Sen. Whitmire then requested me to develop options. As you know, we are required to comply with any requests from legislative leadership and so I did.
“Although one plan was reduced to writing, I also discussed two other options that were preferable to the consolidation plan. The first being to hire a qualified Executive Commissioner for TYC and the second was to temporarily place me in that position until a qualified person could be found. Throughout our assistance to Senator Whitmire, I made clear that the preferable option was for TJPC and TYC to remain separate agencies assuming the issues at TYC could be effectively remedied in a timely manner.”
Whitmire’s response:
“She’s probably a little embarrassed about changing her mind and now saying she’s not for it now … But if it was a good idea then, it still is now.”
Meanwhile, supporters and opponents of the merger plan are reportedly working in overdrive lobbying their positions with key legislative leaders in anticipation of Wednesday’s vote.
Merger opponents are accusing supporters of leaking negative stories about TYC to gain votes, which supporters deny. They say the opponents are just trying to protect some high-paying jobs held by their friends.
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January 8, 2009
Madden may be back as chair
One of the Craddick loyalists who may return as a committee chairman under Likely-Speaker-To-Be Joe Straus: House Corrections chief Jerrry Madden.
While Straus, the presumptive next House speaker, and Madden aren’t confirming anything publicly, word around the Capitol is that the Richardson Republican will be reappointed as chairman of the powerful prisons committee.
And we hear that’s partly to continue to keep the House in parity with the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, whose chairman John Whitmire is a longtime veteran who wields much clout.
Straus reportedly thinks Madden has done a good job in chairing the panel for the last two sessions, and Madden has the support of several Democrats and Repubs who helped Straus best Craddick.
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December 16, 2008
Latest in war of words over cell-jamming demo
The Federal Communications Commission, obviously unamused with a verbal blast earlier from Attorney General Greg Abbott over a proposed demonstration of cell-jamming technology at a Texas prison, insists it’s not flip-flopping on anything.
To Abbott’s charge a few hours ago that the FCC was inconsistent on whether the demo could proceed without violating federal law, FCC spokesman Robert Kenny just released this statement:
“FCC Chairman Kevin Martin understands the concerns of state and local law enforcement officials and is willing to work with them on this complex issue.
“My statement from earlier today was perfectly consistent with the way in which we responded to the test completed in a South Carolina prison last month. In fact, we chose not act on a CTIA ( wireless industry trade group) request asking us to stop the South Carolina test.
“Nor did we pursue any enforcement action in South Carolina, and see no reason to treat the testing of cell phone jammers in Texas prisons any differently.”
Response from Texas officials: The demo’s still off. The FCC’s still flip-flopping.
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TDCJ: Still no cell-jam test
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice just announced that despite today’s encouragement from the Federal Communications Commission, they will still not permit a demonstration of cell-phone jamming technology at a state prison.
Just in from Michelle Lyons, TDCJ’s spokeswoman:
“While we appreciate the spokesman for the FCC lending his support to this demonstration, his approval doesn’t make the demonstration legal. Our position remains the same - until there is a legal avenue for us to conduct this demonstration, it will not take place in a Texas Department of Criminal Justice facility.”
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AG tells FCC to quit flip-flopping
Attorney General Greg Abbott appears peeved about a statement from the Federal Communications Commission earlier today encouraging Texas officials to proceed with a cell-jamming demonstration an an Austin prison.
In a statement just released, Abbott spokesman Jerry Strickland says:
“What the State of Texas needs from the FCC is real action — not more bureaucratic double-talk. On October 21, FCC spokesman Robert Kenny told the Associated Press that the commission could not authorize a state to interfere with cell phone signals, saying “We have no authority to grant it even if we thought it was worthwhile or something that was warranted … It’s likely going to take some level of action by Congress.’
“Later, lawyers with the Office of Attorney General who contacted the FCC Chairman’s office were repeatedly told that federal law prohibited even state law enforcement authorities from employing devices that interfere with cell phone signals. Our lawyers spent weeks in discussions with FCC staff in an attempt to find a solution, but each time their answer was the same: Texas cannot not legally jam cell phone signals at its prisons.
“Today’s statement by Mr. Kenny is yet another example of flip-flopping in the nation’s capital. Though he encourages Texas to ‘test’ a device that will illegally interfere with a wireless telephone signal, Mr. Kenny does not cite any legal authority for the state to do so.
“Only in Washington can a federal agency encourage conduct it previously said was unauthorized. Such duplicity is irresponsible and is a disservice to the State of Texas.
“In this case, though the FCC is generally charged with civilly regulating wireless communications, the Department of Justice is responsible for prosecuting criminal violations. Thus, despite the FCC’s encouraging words nearly two months after we began looking for solutions, Mr. Kenny’s statement to the Associated Press already acknowledged that the commission lacks the ability to authorize the state to jam cell phone signals at prisons.
“As a policy matter, Attorney General Abbott strongly supports allowing state corrections authorities to jam cell phone signals at Texas prisons. But until federal officials take action—either at the FCC or in the U.S. Congress — the state cannot legally jam cell phone jamming devices. If the commission has changed its position in the last 60 days and now believes that it can authorize states to jam cell phone signals, then the FCC should stop issuing encouraging statements and start taking real action.
“The commission can say all it wants about a purported ‘commitment to trying to work with law enforcement,’ but as the State’s chief law enforcement official Attorney General Abbott wants the FCC to stop ‘trying to work’ and start delivering real results for Texas.”
For his part, Kenny says the FCC will respond.
Stay tuned.
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FCC: Proceed with cell-jamming test
The Federal Communications Commission has just proposed that Texas move ahead with its on-again-off-again Thursday test of electronic technology to jam the signals of smuggled cell phones in state prisons.
State prison officials cancelled the test yesterday after Attorney General Greg Abbott advised there was no way to avoid violating a Depression-era federal law.
A statement from FCC spokesman Robert Kenny reads: “We would encourage Texas authorities to move forward with their test. We recognize the concerns of public safety regarding this complex issue and FCC Chairman Kevin Martin remains committed to trying to work with public safety officials to address their needs.”
Lawmakers who were angered by Monday’s cancellation said the FCC statement could mean the test is back on again.
“I am told the FCC has told us to go ahead with the test, and we’re in early stages now of getting it scheduled again — possibly this Thursday,” said House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson.
For their part, prison officials said they were unaware of the statement and had no immediate comment on whether their position would or would not change.
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December 15, 2008
Cell-jamming test off
State prison officials today abruptly cancelled a much-ballyhooed Thursday test of electronic jamming technology to curb an epidemic of smuggled cell phones in state prisons.
The surprise about-face came after the same prison officials had earlier approved the test, which was to follow one in South Carolina weeks ago that was successful in blocking cell calls inside a prison there.
Under a Depression-Era federal law, it is illegal to jam radio transmissions — including cellular signals. Federal Communications Commission officials allowed the South Carolina test to take place without prosecution.
Scheduled weeks ago, the test was to have been held Thursday morning at the Austin State Jail.
“Unfortunately, we cannot allow CellAntenna to conduct a demonstration of its ‘cell jamming’ technology at this time,” said Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
“We have had ongoing dialogue with the Texas Attorney General’s Office that brings us to the conclusion that to proceed with this presentation would be a violation of federal law.”
Attorney General Greg Abbott said while he supports jamming cell calls as a way to curb prison contraband, he said this afternoon that his office advised prison officials that the planned test would violate federal law.
“They could be exposed to legal consequences” if the test went ahead, as planned, Abbott said.
Legislative leaders who supported the test were unhappy with the cancellation.
“I think it’s a good question why they’re backing up on this,” said House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson. “But if they don’t want the test on their unit, fine, we’ll find someplace else to do it. We’re in the process of punting right now —looking for some place else to do it.”
Senate Criminal Justice Chairman John Whitmire, a Houston Democrat who earlier prompted the crackdown on smuggled prison cell phones after receiving calls — and a death threat —from a death row convict, said prison officials should go ahead with the test. “This shows some very indecisive leadership at TDCJ, and it proves my point that I just don’t think they get it on this issue,” he said.
“I’m very concerned and curious about why they checked it this out and approved it earlier, and now they say it can’t be held,” he said. “That sends the wrong message, that cell phones really aren’t a problem in prisons, when just the opposite is true.”
“I wonder whether they don’t want to jam their own cell phones and that’s the reason they don’t want to do the test … or that special interests don’t want the jamming, like the phone companies that are afraid the jamming will affect signals outside the prisons, which we know doesn’t happen.”
Despite the criticism, Lyons said prison officials are “committed to ridding our units of cell phones and believe that cellular phone jamming technology would be valuable in combatting the problem.
“But until jamming wireless phone signals becomes lawful, we will not violate federal law,” she said.
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December 3, 2008
Prisons unveil $65.8 million plan to curb contraband
Moving to bolster security, state prison officials this morning unveiled a massive $65.8 million plan to curb an epidemic of smuggled cell phones and other contraband in Texas’ lockups.
The new plan was more than twice as costly as plans for beefed-up security in prisons that were proposed months ago, mostly involving surveillance cameras at some prisons.
It was also one of the largest such requests in decades for Texas’ corrections system, larger than several past programs to build new prisons.
The plans include walk-through metal detectors, electronic parcel screening gear and video surveillance cameras at 19 maximum-security prisons and surveillance gear at the rest of Texas’ 112 prisons.
The plan also includes surveillance cameras for the Polunsky Unit, which houses Texas’ death row and where at least 16 cell phones have been found in the past month.
A cell phone was seized from death row inmate Richard Lee Tabler. Tabler, upset about the arrests of his mother and his sister in connection with an investigation into how he obtained the phone, last month threatened to kill Sen. John Whitmire and this reporter, who broke the story. Officials say that highlights the danger from smuggled cell phones: that convicts could order crimes from behind bars.
Two mobile contraband screening units would also be purchased for random, surprise searches. Officials said six dogs have been purchased that are specially trained to sniff out cell phones.
Brad Livingston, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said the funding will be sought immediately, through special approval of state leaders, instead of waiting for legislative approval next year.
“We have a responsibility to Texans to stop this … right now and right here,” Livingston told the nine-member Board of Criminal Justice, which is meeting at an Austin hotel.
Added Board Chairman Oliver Bell: “The games are over. We’ve just given everyone 66 million reasons about why we’re very serious about this.”
Today’s move is the latest to address a controversy that erupted in October, when a prisoner on Texas’ death row — arguably the most secure part of the state prison system — used a smuggled phone to call a state senator and a reporter, among more than 2,800 calls that were made from the phone in just one month.
As a result, Gov. Rick Perry ordered a rare lockdown of all state prisons and zero-tolerance on all contraband. Some 144 cell phones during a subsequent searches were found along with weapons, drugs and other illegal items.
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November 25, 2008
Cell jamming demo in Texas prison?
Buoyed by the successful test of cell-phone jamming technology last Friday in a South Carolina prison, Texas officials confirmed today they are working on a similar demo in the Lone Star State.
House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden said he has requested a test of the technology at a Texas prison “as soon as it can be worked out.”
A tentative date and site: Dec. 18 at the Travis State Jail in Austin.
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November 20, 2008
More cell phone gear found on death row
Another cell phone charger and SIM card that allows a cell phone to make calls were found on Texas’ death row this afternoon, the latest discoveries after weeks of similar finds.
Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice in Huntsville, said the contraband was found in the cell of Marlin Enos Nelson, who is facing execution for the August 1987 slaying of James Randle Howard in the Montrose area of Houston.
Investigators said searchers had seized a smuggled cell phone from Nelson’s cell on Oct. 24.
So far, since a lockdown and contraband search of Texas’ 112 prisons ended eight days ago, amid assurances that most contraband had been confiscated, five smuggled cellphones or components have been found on death row, supposedly the most secure part of the prison system.
During the lockdown, investigators found 16 cellphones, chargers and SIM cards on death row —among 143 smuggled phones found altogether in Texas prisons.
Authorities are investigating how so many phones got into Texas prisons, especially onto death row.
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November 19, 2008
New contraband sweep on death row
With prison officials embarrassed over the discovery of four more smuggled cell phones on Texas’ death row over the past week, a strike force of just over 100 guards from other prisons has been moved in to conduct a new wave of cell searches, officials confirmed this afternoon.
“They’re conducting surprise searches — top to bottom — looking for any contraband, including phones,” said Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
“Every time we find a phone, we learn another hiding place … So far today, they’ve just found a shank fashioned from a typewriter part.”
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November 13, 2008
Officials say inmate threatened lawmaker, reporter after cell phone bust
Richard Lee Tabler, the convicted killer who made headlines last month for chatting up a state senator from his death row cell on a smuggled cell phone, has threatened to kill the lawmaker and a reporter who broke the story, officials confirmed today.
Prison investigators said Tabler, 29, wrote a letter to them outlining the threats to state Sen. John Whitmire, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee that oversees prison operations, and this reporter.
Inspector General John Moriarty confirmed the letter, and said the written threats are being investigated.
“We’re taking this very seriously,” he said, noting that imprisoned convicts could possibly have someone on the outside carry out their threats.
After receiving the letter, investigators raided Tabler’s death row cell at the Polunsky Unit near Livingston and seized a variety of items, Moriarty said.
Threatening a witness in a criminal case is a felony crime, officials said. Complicating any prosecution is the fact that Tabler already is under a death sentence, officials said.
“Let’s see you put the (expletive) senator and Mike Ward in protective custody for their (expletive) lies,” states a copy of Tabler’s letter that was shown to the American-Statesman.
“Don’t (expletive) with me about my family … Mark my (expletive) words.”
Moriarty said Tabler has been upset about the arrests of his mother and his sister in connection with investigation into how he obtained a cell phone on death row. They were arrested on charges that they bought minutes for his phone to allow him to make calls.
Tabler was sentenced to death for shooting two men in their car near Killeen in November 2004, prison records show.
Bell County officials said Tabler, a onetime construction worker and cook, was a suspect in two other murders.
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Another cell phone on death row
Weeks after prison officials cracked down on cell phones and other contraband in Texas’ death row, another cell phone and some marijuana has been found in the most secure part of state’s prison system, officials said Thursday.
John Moriarty, inspector general of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said the cell phone and “a trace amount of marijuana” were confiscated Wednesday from the cell of convicted killer Mark Stroman just hours after a lockdown was lifted and after authorities had searched all inmates’ cells as part of a system-wide shakedown.
That shakedown was launched after double-killer Richard Tabler obtained a cell phone on which more than 2,800 calls were made in a 30-day period, including several to state Sen. John Whitmire, the chairman of the powerful Senate Criminal Justice Committee that oversees prison operations.
Whitmire reported his calls and Tabler was busted in his cell with a cell phone. His arrest triggered a lockdown of Texas’ massive prison system, the first in more than a decade. That shakedown, which is still continuing at several dozen prisons, was aimed at confiscating all contraband under a new zero tolerance policy by prison officials.
In all, officials disclosed this morning during a public hearing of Whitmire’s committee that a total of 132 cell phones have been found inside prisons during the security sweep, including 46 that were confiscated from employees. The phones have been found on 22 of Texas’ 112 prisons, they said.
Brad Livingston, executive director of the criminal justice agency, said plans are being developed to install additional security equipment to curb contraband once the shakedown ends. All personnel and visitors are being electronically searched and pat-searched as they enter and leave prisons.
Whitmire pointedly questioned prison officials whether enough is being done fast enough. “This is not that complicated. Contraband needs to stop and it needs to stop now,” Whitmire said.
Moriarty said Stroman was suspected of having been involved in smuggling phones and the cards that allows them to be used, but when investigators first searched his cell they found only the four cards.
Hidden in the binding of a law book was a cut-out just large enough to secrete a cell phone. But no phone was initially found, Moriarty said.
“We’re continuing our investigation into how these cell phones are getting on these units — wherever it leads us,” Moriarty said.
Stroman, 49, was sentenced to death for the October 2001 murder of a Dallas convenience store clerk during a robbery.
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October 31, 2008
Consultant urges overhaul of DPS
A new study made public this morning recommends a sweeping makeover of the troubled Texas Department of Public Safety to correct significant, longstanding operational flaws in the primary state police agency.
The 72-page report by Deloitte Consulting recommends combining all law enforcement divisions under a single deputy director, who would deploy them across Texas under a new regional command structure.
Included would be the storied Texas Rangers, a semi-independent investigative unit that for decades has reported directly to the agency’s director and has resisted past attempts at consolidation.
The report also recommends the agency establish a new unit to oversee all counter-terrorism and intelligence functions, “focused on facilitating information sharing and intelligence-led policing and supported by a robust fusion (central coordination) center.”
A cumbersome organizational chart that allowed many divisions to keep their own intelligence information and created occasional “turf wars” over who could have access to secret intelligence data has been a key criticism of the agency in recent years.
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October 29, 2008
Cell-phone detectors eyed for prisons
Stung by revelations that a death row inmate used a smuggled cell phone to log 2,800 calls in a month — including several to a state senator — prison officials confirmed today they are looking to acquire cutting-edge technology to curb the problem once and for all.
The development came as officials released an updated tally from a week-long contraband sweep of Texas’ 112 state prisons following the headline-grabbing episode: 71 cell phones have been confiscated — including five from death row — along with 65 chargers.
Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said the agency is evaluating a variety of specialized equipment that could detect the location of cell phones in prison cells.
“There are a number of vendors out there who offer cell-phone detection technology,” she said. “We’re evaluating a range of technologies from a number of vendors.”
Neither the names of the companies nor the specific types of technology being examined by prison officials were made public.
“No decisions have been made,” Lyons said.
Prison officials’ interest in cell-phone detectors had been rumored Tuesday, but they had not confirmed it until today.
At the same time as the controversy over smuggled cell phones erupted, prison officials were ironing out final details to install pay phones in state prisons beginning early next year — making Texas the last state in the nation to allow convicts routine phone access.
Nine days ago, prison investigators busted condemned murderer Richard Lee Tabler, 29, after linking him to a cell phone that made more than 2,800 calls in one month. Authorities suspect he may have allowed other death row convicts — including several confirmed violent-gang members — to borrow the phone and make calls.
Among the calls made by Tabler were several to state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, who chairs the Senate committee that oversees the prison system.
Tabler’s mother and sister were also arrested on charges that they allegedly bought minutes to allow him to make calls.
Lyons said the new convict pay-phone system could be operational as early as February. A partnership of Embarq and Securus Technologies was selected in August to install approximately 4,000 phones that will be used by most of the state’s 155,000 imprisoned felons.
Depending on the call volume, the deal could generate as much as $30 million for the state, the first $10 million of which will go the state’s Crime Victims Compensation Fund.
Lyons said that as of this morning, in addition to the cell phones and chargers, the shakedown sweep of Texas prisons had resulted in the following confiscations: 85 weapons, 59 tobacco, 12 marijuana, 18 money and 35 cases of unspecified contraband.
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October 22, 2008
Tabler suicide try?
Death row convict Richard Lee Tabler, whose exploits with a cell phone have triggered a massive lockdown of Texas’ prison system, was found with a three-foot section of a sheet hanging from the ceiling of his cell this afternoon, officials confirmed.
Michelle Lyons, chief spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said correctional officers intervened immediately after discovered the sheet, which they feared was being made into a noose.
“He had not used it,” she said.
Lyons said Tabler, 29, condemned to die for two Killeen slayings in 2004, was being moved to the Jester 4 Unit southwest of Houston. The unit houses psychiatric prisoners.
Other prison officials said the incident is under investigation.
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Second arrest in death row cell phone case
A second person was arrested today in the ongoing crackdown on cell phones and other contraband in Texas prisons.
Authorities said Kristina Martinez, the sister of condemned death row convict Richard Lee Tabler, surrendered to Killeen police on a charge of introducing contraband into a prison. Martinez, 36, of Salado, was released on $10,000 bond, prison officials said.
Tabler, 29, on Monday was pulled from his death row cell at the Polunsky Unit near Livingston and detained after investigators alleged a cell phone he had smuggled into prison had been used to make more than 2,800 calls in a month. Investigators suspect at least nine other death row inmates may have been allowed to make calls.
Tabler’s mother, Lorraine Tabler, 60, was arrested Monday as she arrived at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport and charged with introducing contraband into a prison. That charge, a felony, carries a penalty of two years in a state jail, officials said.
John Moriarty, the prison system’s independent inspector general, said investigators have determined that both Lorraine Tabler and Martinez purchased minutes for the phone that Richard Tabler said he had smuggled in.
Moriarty said additional arrests are expected in coming days.
While prison investigators have remained mum on whether guards are under investigation, Gov. Rick Perry said in a statement Monday night that “a guard allegedly accepted a bribe to deliver a cell phone ” to Tabler.
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October 21, 2008
Prison cell hotlines established
As an investigation into the proliferation of illegal cell phones in Texas prisons expanded today, officials established two hotlines for public tips on the problem.
Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said people are asked to call if they receive calls from offenders who have illegal cell phones inside prisons.
One is the Office of Inspector General’s Waste, Fraud and Abuse Hotline at 1-866-372-8329.
The other is Crime Stoppers: 1-800-832-8477.
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New details on prison contraband sweep
New get-tough details surfaced this morning on the massive contraband sweep underway in Texas’ 108 state prisons:
Anyone refusing to be searched will be booted from the prison. Employees who refuse could face termination. Employees who are found with contraband will be fired and face a criminal investigation.
In a memo circulated to all prison wardens late yesterday, prison board Chairman Oliver Bell said that while most prison employees are “honest and forthright, a small number of employees believe they can profit from illegal activity.
“These illegal employee actions will not be tolerated,” he stated, underscoring a new zero-tolerance policy on all contraband in prisons — including tobacco, narcotics and cell phones.
“This includes all state operated and state contracted secure facilities,” he said.
The memo continued:
“Employee, Vendor, Visitor or Offender - Anyone found in possession of alcohol, tobacco products, narcotics or any other prohibited item will be referred for prosecution. Any employee found with contraband will be subject to termination and criminal investigation.
“As an additional measure, we have ordered a system-wide lockdown of all TDCJ secure facilities and a system-wide shake down in search of contraband. If found, the contraband will be seized and collected. All persons, employees and non-employees, found to be in possession of contraband while on a secure facility will be investigated for appropriate disciplinary action and/or referred for prosecution.
“In addition, effective immediately, the Agency will execute “pat down searches,” with reasonable suspicion, and all individuals entering TDCJ secure facility will be subject to such. The Agency will also be increasing security controls and searches for (trustees) and offenders entering and leaving secure areas. Any individual refusing to undergo these searches will not be allowed on site; employees and offenders refusing to undergo these searches will also face disciplinary action.
“Texans should expect nothing less than the safest and most secure prison facilities. The introduction of contraband of any type into these facilities not only jeopardizes the offenders and our staff but it impacts the citizens of Texas and violates our mission to protect those we serve.”
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Two more cell phones found on death row
Two more cell phones were found on Texas’ high-security death row during overnight searches, officials confirmed this morning.
No information was provided on where the phones were found or which convicts had them. John Moriarty, the prison’s systems independent inspector general, and prison officials said the massive sweep for contraband was continuing.
Gov. Rick Perry ordered the lockdown and massive contraband search on Monday after revelations that a death row inmate obtained a cell phone and made hundreds of calls — several of them to the chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee.
Texas’ 108 state prisons will remain locked down “for as long as it takes” to implement and enforce a new zero-tolerance policy on contraband, Gov. Rick Perry said today.
Authorities believe a guard accepted a bribe to give slip the phone to condemned killer Richard Lee Tabler, who along with at least nine other death row convicts made at least 2,800 calls in just a month. Tabler and his mother were arrested on Monday in an undercover sting launched after state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, reported that Tabler had called him several times.
“That is the highest degree of unacceptable,” Perry told reporters at the Stephen F. Austin Hotel in downtown Austin, where he appeared at a brief ceremony to announce a new title sponsor for the Champions Tour Golf Event.
Perry said investigators intend to determine how Tabler got the phone, and added that violators will face “a steep price to pay.” Under Texas law, cell phones are illegal in state prisons.
Jay Kimbrough, Perry’s chief of staff, said the lockdown of all state prisons — a massive undertaking, the first in at least a dozen years — was completed about midnight on Monday. Texas prisons hold more than 155,000 convicts.
“The shakedown has begun. Physical searches at access points (of all staff and visitors) are underway,” Kimbrough said.
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August 14, 2008
Christina Crain has prison named in her honor
Honoring its first woman chairman, the governing board of Texas’ prison system this morning voted unanimously to rename a Gatesville lockup for women after Christina Melton Crain.
Crain, a Dallas lawyer, recently retired after five years as chairwoman of the nine-member board.
The Gatesville Unit is one of Texas’ primary women’s prisons, holding just over 1,500 convicts. The more than 40-year-old lockup was formerly used as youth prison. It began housing adult offenders in 1980.
During her tenure on the board as a member in 2001 and as chair starting two years later, Crain championed new programs for women offenders as an outspoken advocate of rehabilation and treatment programs for convicts. She argued that such programs saved lives and taxpayer money.
If offenders were not given tools to succeed once they were released from prison, she often said, they would have little choice but to resort again to a life of crime.
Officials said the new name is effective immediately. A number of Texas’ 106 prison have been renamed in recent years for former board chairmen and retired prison officials.
The renamed prison was among several honors bestowed upon Crain at an Austin board meeting this morning — ranging from a commendation from President George Bush, congratulatory speeches from Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, and a table full of gavels, plaques and and other mementos.
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August 6, 2008
Bigger trooper salaries?
If Texas wants to improve its competitive edge in filling its growing number of vacant state law enforcement jobs, it’ll have to pay more — a lot more, at least $50.2 million for the next two years in just four agencies.
That’s the conclusion of a 55-page study released today by the State Auditor’s Office on an increasingly nagging question at state law enforcement agencies: Why can’t we fill our vacant jobs?
The state employs 4,339 full-time law enforcement officers, primarily at the Texas Department of Public Safety (80 percent), the Parks and Wildlife Department (12 percent), the Alcoholic Beverage Commission (6 percent) and the Department of Criminal Justice (2 percent, not including prison guards).
That total is three percent of the state workforce.
Fact: State taxpayers spent $246 million on base pay, hazardous duty pay and overtime pay, and an additional $6.18 million in supplemental pay for things such as certification, extra schooling and bilingual-certified officers.
Fact: Turnover in those jobs was six percent in fiscal year 2007. Statewide turnover was 17.1, according to the study.
The study also found parity in the complexity of responsibilities of senior-level officers in the four agencies. Translation: They’re not being overpaid compared to the rank-and-file they supervise.
The report confirms many of the factoids that have been flying in recent months, as the Sunset Review Commission suggested tweaking DPS’ career ladder to try to keep more of its jobs filled, and the criminal justice department is poised to ask the Legislature to raise salaries to try to fill some of the 3,000 or so correctional officer jobs that are vacant.
But it also holds few surprises, but promises to add to the building chorus of calls for higher pay for state troopers, game wardens, prison guards and others when the Lege convenes in January.
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June 25, 2008
Supreme Court strikes down death penalty for child rape
The U.S. Supreme Court this morning struck down a Louisiana law imposing the death penalty for child rape.
The death penalty “is not a proper punishment for the rape of a child,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority opinion. The decision was 5-4.
This decision threatens Jessica’s Law, which the Texas Legislature passed last year to give the death penalty as an option for repeat child rapists.
More to come.
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June 24, 2008
DPS under Sunset fire
The Texas Department of Public Safety drew intense criticism today from members of the Sunset Advisory Commission, who voiced a lack of confidence in current management over a series of continuing problems.
Members proposed removing all auto licensing and inspection programs from DPS to a new agency that would also combine registration programs now handled by the Texas Department of Transportation.
The criticism stemmed from a recent Sunset report that harshly criticized several operations at the agency, and recommended significant reforms in drivers licensing, information technology and the department’s overall management structure, among other things.
While DPS director Thomas Davis Jr. defended the agency as “operating better than I’ve ever seen it” in his 43 years there, commission members were unconvinced. Public Safety Commission Chairman Allan Polunsky acknowledged “we have some glaring weaknesses,” and pledged significant reforms— sooner rather than later.
“The buck is going to stop with me,” Polunsky said at one point. “If we don’t reform this department and make it relevant to the 21st Century, then that will mean I have failed.”
As for the June 8 arson fire at the Governor’s Mansion that revealed glaring DPS security lapses? Nary a question was asked.
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April 21, 2008
Vita Pro up again?
Late word was circulating today that the Vita Pro case, the Texas prison system’s long-running scandals, may be back on the menu.
According to law enforcement sources, U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes of Houston has scheduled a Tuesday morning retrial to begin in the famous case, which saw prisons director Andy Collins and a Canadian entrepreneur and ex-con named Yank Barry indicted and convicted in a bribery, conspiracy and money laundering case dating to 1995.
In 2001, after a headline-grabbing, weeks-long trial, a federal jury found that Barry paid two $10,000 bribes to Collins for pushing a no-bid contract with VitaPro to feed its product to Texas convicts while Collins was the prison system’s executive director.
VitaPro was a soy-based meat alternative that prison officials put on chow lines — and at one point even sold to other states — as a way to save money, shortly before Austin American-Statesman published the first details of the no-bid, $33 million deal and a flurry of investigations began.
The case grabbed headlines for years thereafter, in a chain of events bordering at times on the bizarre.
The resulting ethics scandal in the prison system brought a housecleaning in the top ranks of the prison system, the first ethics code for prison administrators and a quick drop from the menu amid complaints that the soy additive made convicts flatulent.
A key witness in the case was Patrick Graham, a government informant who was also the key witness in the prosecution of former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards and former Houston Mayor Fred Hofheinz on corruption charges.
After trial, the case was derailed by a court reporter who was accused of messing up the official transcript and delayed the subsequent appeals by Collins and Barry for years.
In September 2005, Hughes threw out the guilty verdicts, ruling that Graham lied. But last August, a federal appears court ordered a new trial, insisting that the jury knew of Graham’s “poor character” and found Collins and Barry guilty anyway.
While the reports of the impending new development in the case could not be independently confirmed with court officials and lawyers this evening, if true, they would indicate a final chapter might be in the offing for the biggest Texas scandal in decades.
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April 10, 2008
New prison board chair
Austin businessman Oliver Bell has been named chairman of the Texas prison system’s governing board, likely the first African-American ever to hold the post and the first Austinite in decades.
Bell replaces Dallas resident Christina Melton Crain, whose term expired.
Crain will be replaced on the board by Lubbock attorney J. David Nelson. A graduate of Texas Tech, Nelson is an attorney and a partner in the law firm of Nelson & Nelson.
Nelson will serve until February 2013.
Bell, who has served on the nine-member board for four years, is the first chair from Austin in decades. He may also be the first African-American chair.
Crain and prison officials announced the appointments in electronic messages to prison brass, and Perry’s office confirmed it this afternoon.
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April 2, 2008
Parole law the problem?
Criticized for not following mandatory parole guidelines, Texas’ top parole official told the Senate Criminal Justice Committee the problem is not the parole board’s fault.
It’s the law, insisted Rissie Owens, chairwoman of the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles.
Under state law, the parole board must explain its decisions if they deviate from parole guidelines.
For years, they have not done so. And for years, they have been criticized for violating state law, without much explanation.
“When we vote on a case, we don’t know whether we are deviating from the guidelines … because the guidelines are based on percentages, and we don’t see those percentages until the next month,” Owens explained.
So the law is the problem? asked state Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen.
Yes, responded Owens. The guidelines set certain percentages of cases for approval, she said later.
Committee Chairman John Whitmire, who has been after the parole board for months for not following the law, said he remains unconvinced. After all, the Houston Democrat said, the parole board knows when it votes what the guidelines for approving an individual case are, and if it goes against that then it should know right then.
It’s semantics, he said.
“If we need to change the law to make it clearer for the members of the parole board, then we may do that,” he said.
Bottom line for most Texans: The more the parole board follows its guidelines, the more people who are good risks may be paroled. The more it does not, the more people who stay in prison.
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March 27, 2008
State approves prison guard pay hike
Starting pay for Texas’ correctional officers will get a 10 percent boost in May.
The Texas Board of Criminal Justice this morning unanimously approved raising the starting pay for guards from $23,046 to $25,416, and jumping up the pay about as much for those who stay on the job for 16 months.
Officials said the pay hike will affect about 8,000 correctional officers.
In addition, the board also approved giving new hires a $1,500 bonus to sign up at prisons that are the most understaffed. Twenty-two state prisons are have less than 80 percent of the guards they should have.
State prisons have been critically short of guards for months and months. The turnover rate for new officers within their first year on the job is 43 percent, compared to 24 percent overall.
Brad Livingston, executive director of the prison system, said the pay increase — the largest in years — is designed to avoid even more critical staffing shortages during the late spring and summer, the times of the year when vacancies are highest.
“We hope this makes a difference,” he said. “Our (correctional officer) staffing is the most critical issue we face.”
When prisons are short of guards, convicts cannot always be supervised as closely as they should be, and some prisons have been forced to keep inmates confined to their cells to avoid trouble.
Livingston said his agency is about 3,500 guards short.
Cost of the pay hike? Almost $20 million, including $15 million for the higher pay and $4.5 million for the signing bonuses, according to Livingston.
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January 31, 2008
Prison growth flat
Texas’ prison population is growing slower than expected, and new prisons will not be needed within the next two years as earlier projected.
That’s the conclusion of a Legislative Budget Board study to be made public on Monday, a report that attributes the good news on a slowdown in the number of new felons, a slightly increased parole rate, fewer revocations to prison from probation and parole and the projected impact of new treatment and rehabilitation programs approved by the Legislature last year.
The report has been eagerly awaited by prison officials and legislative leaders, since it is the first hint on whether two expensive new prisons — authorized by voters in November — would have to be built.
Their construction could have triggered other problems, as well, as existing prisons struggle with chronic staffing shortages that have recently raised security fears and legislative concern.
Details: The report predicts Texas’ incarcerated population will average 156,364 this year, and rise to 158,470 in 2012.
That’s much less than projected a year ago. Then, the state was estimated to be more than 17,000 beds short by 2012, at growth rates at the time.
Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire and House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, advocates of the $218 million in new diversion and treatment programs, hailed the news.
Those megabucks include funding for more than 5,700 new prison beds — most of them in treatment and rehab programs, not traditional prisons.
“For years, Texas has been the toughest state in the nation on crime,” Whitmire said. “With the expanded treatment and the new diversion beds … Texas will continue to be the toughest on crime, but we will nows also be the smartest.”
Madden: “Not only are we saving taxpayer money by creating diversion programs, we are also strengthening public safety by increasing our prison capacity. The additional beds will ensure we have space to lock up violent and repeat offenders, but the state will also save money in the long run by treating and diverting low-level offenders.”
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January 30, 2008
Valentines Day? Off
To some, it perhaps hinted at a kinder, gentler Texas prison system, on a portion of the agency’s Web site that wished viewers Happy Valentine’s Day in a sweet, bottom-of-the-page graphic.
It showed two silhouetted lovers, sitting on a bench beneath a tree, holding hands.
How nice.
We happened upon the sweet sentiment this afternooon while surfing the Texas Correctional Industries pages of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s site.
A quick call to prison officials initially drew surprise — followed by a very un-cupid-like response.
“Apparently a graphic artist at TCI was trying to spruce up their site, and they added it,” explained Michelle Lyons, a TDCJ spokeswoman in Huntsville. “It had gone completely unnoticed … I didn’t know it was there.”
Bottom line: “It’s being taken off now.”
Within an hour, the holiday greeting was gone.
Okay, so no more touchy-feely. Enough of that Happy Valentine’s Day stuff.
An no word on whether other the site had conveyed holiday sentiments unbeknownst to prison brass.
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January 29, 2008
TSEU on TYC
With rumors swirling that Texas Youth Commission soon plans to launch a whole series new reforms, after controversy over some launched in past months, the Texas State Employees Union weighed in this afternoon on what it thinks should be done.
Top of their list: Shift your emphasis away from corrections and more toward rehabilitating youth.
“It’s intended to be a blueprint for substantially improving the quality of services provided by TYC,” said Seth Hutchinson, TSEU’s lead organizer at TYC.
Highlights of the union’s list:
Provide a safe environment for both youth and staff.
Provide quality rehab programs to youth.
Use community-based centers to keep youths closer to their families.
Stop privatizing rehab and treatment programs.
Youth Commission officials have remained mum on their upcoming plans.
See the full list.
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Too-short TYC search?
The Texas Youth Commission’s five-day application period for a new executive director is under fire.
Too secretive, complains Jim Harrington, director of the Texas Civil Rights Project. “A sham and harmful to TYC reform efforts,” he says.
“Unless someone knew what to look for, you could easily miss it, and I think that is clearly intentional,” Harrington said in a statement. “Virtually all the top-level administrative positions are ‘open until filled’.”
He continues: “This position is the most critical one for TYC, especially after all the scandal. The state should be conducting an intensive search for the right person for this leadership position, a search that could take as long as three months. When a job opening like this is only posted for 5 workdays — and not even prominently displayed, but buried deep in general employment listings — one smells duplicity and that a ‘fix is in’ for a particular candidate.”
Harrington wants Gov. Rick Perry and legislative leaders to order the application period extended. So far, none have.
Youth Commission Conservator Richard Nedelkoff earlier said he planned to act with all deliberate speed in filling the agency’s top jobs, to ensure that the ongoing reforms stick.
Most of the agency’s top management was kicked out last spring amid a sex-abuse and cover-up scandal, and Perry earlier placed the agency under conservatorship — a form of receivership — to ensure that reforms were made.
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January 23, 2008
Prison board approves phones for inmates
In an historic step, without debate or dissent, the Texas prison system’s governing board this afternoon approved a new rule that will give most convicts regular access to pay telephones — the last state in the nation to do so.
The unanimous vote came after the Legislature last spring enacted a law mandating the phones, one for every 30 convicts in the nation’s third-largest corrections system that houses 154,000 felons.
With approximately 120,000 convicts expected to be eligible to make calls — minus those in solitary confinement and disciplinary cells — that could mean 4,000 phones in Texas’ 112 prisons. And with cutting-edge technology, to boot.
Under the policy, the pay-phone system will use technology called “personal 22biometric identifiers” — fingerprints, retina scans or voice recognition — to allow only approved convicts to make calls from dayrooms in their cellblocks, in dorms and at other locations inside prisons.
“Technology has improved to allow us to ensure security,” said Brad Livingston, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. Added Christina Melton Crain, chairman of the prison board: PThat’s a big, big part of the reason we can do this.”
While once a highly controversial topic — gubernatorial candidates a decade ago vowed never to allow prison phones, corrections directors predicted it would lead to criminal enterprises being run behind bars — the project now comes with a hefty financial enticement: The state could earn well over $15 million in commissions on convicts’ calls.
But ringing phones from incarcerated felons promise to be months off. Though the ban has officially been lifted, prison officials must now develop specifications for what kind of multimillion-dollar phone system they want, after which they will have to solicit bids from vendors that have been lobbying intensely for several years for the change.
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December 10, 2007
Prison board: 3 new members
The state prison system’s nine-member governing board has three new members.
Gov. Rick Perry announced this afternoon the appointments of Dallas attorney Eric Gambrell, San Antonio businessman R. Terrell McCombs and Arlington social worker Janice Harris Lord.
The vitals on each, from Perry’s office:
Gambrell of Highland Park is a trial partner with the law firm of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer and Feld, and is a member of the Town of Highland Park Zoning Commission. He also is chair of the Dallas Bar Association Memorial and History Committee, a nominating committee member and fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation, and a past member of the United Way of Metropolitan Dallas Campaign Cabinet.
He received a bachelors degree from Texas A&M University and a law degree from the University of Texas. He replaces Pierce Miller of San Angelo and his term will expire Feb. 1, 2013.
McCombs is vice president of McCombs Enterprises, and is an executive board member of the San Antonio Sports Foundation and the University Health System Foundation. He is also a past chairman of the North San Antonio Chamber of Commerce, and chairman of the Joint City/County Bond Oversight Commission and San Antonio Mobility Coalition Inc.
McCombs received a bachelors degree from the University of Houston and a masters degree in business from George Washington University. He replaces Adrian Arriaga of McAllen. His term will expire Feb. 1, 2013.
Lord is a national consultant on crime victim issues, a member of the National Consortium of Crime Victim Assistance Standards and a curriculum developer for the National Victim Assistance Academy and Texas Victim Assistance Academy. She has a broad background focusing on homicide, catastrophic injury, death notification, ethics in victim services, and spiritually-sensitive victim services.
Lord received a bachelors degree from Phillips University and a masters degree from the University of Texas at Arlington School of Social Work. She replaces Patricia Day of Dallas. Her term will expire Feb. 1, 2009.
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December 5, 2007
Corrections veteran hired by prison operator
Gary Johnson, the former head of Texas’ prison system, has been hired as a regional vice president for a Florida-based operator of private prisons that became mired in controversy two months ago over conditions at a West Texas youth lockup.
Geo Group Inc. announced that Johnson will head its central region, which includes Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana. The territory includes the ill-fated Coke County Juvenile Justice Center, which made headlines in October after Texas Youth Commission officials yanked more than 100 youths from the lockup after alleging squalid conditions.
Geo operates private prisons in several states and in other countries.
Johnson replaces Don Houston, who heads to the firm’s Florida office. Its Texas office is in New Braunfels.
Johnson, a veteran corrections official, served as executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice from August 2001 until he retired in late 2004 after 28 years. He has since been a corrections management consultant based in Austin.
He could not immediately be reached for comment.
His wife, Bonita White, is director of the criminal justice agency’s Community Justice Assistance Division.
While Johnson was executive director, the agency signed five-year contracts with Geo to house state prisoners at several lockups. He will oversee the operation of those lockups in his new job at Geo.
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Judge Meurer weighing DA race
The long line of would-be successors to Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle just got longer.
State District Judge Jeanne Meurer, who’s retiring from the bench after 20 years, confirmed Wednesday that she’s weighing a race if Earle retires after more than three decades in office.
“It’s a high probability,” said Meurer about her possible candidacy.
But she added that she hasn’t made a final decision because Earle hasn’t announced his intentions.
“It’s real easy to say you’ve made a decision when there isn’t a decision to make,” Meurer said. “I’m very serious about it, but I would never run against Ronnie.”
Would-be candidates began lining up in the wings, pending Earle’s decision, a few weeks ago, although no one apparently would oppose Earle’s re-election.
Among those mentioned as possible candidates are several of Earle’s assistants — Gary Cobb, Rick Reed, Mindy Montford — along with First Assistant County Attorney Randy Leavitt and U.S. Magistrate Robert Pitman.
Although Meurer is retiring from the bench and building a house in Colorado, the 54-year-old judge said she wants to remain “engaged in working in this community.”
Meurer said she talked to the governor’s office about a post at the troubled Texas Youth Commission but nothing came of it.
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November 29, 2007
New TYC med chief
The Texas Youth Commission has a new medical director: Dr. Rajendra Parikh.
Parikh, a pediatrician, will start in February, officials announced this afternoon.
He is currently the medical director of ambulatory pediatrics and a professor of pediatrics at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center. Previously, he ran a private pediatric practice in St. Louis.
The job has been open for some time.
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Pepper spray specifics
For all you legal wonks, as requested, here’s the detail on the new pepper-spray restrictions at the Texas Youth Commission.
This, from Advocacy Inc. and Texas Appleseed, the advocacy groups who filed suit to stop a liberalized spray policy :
“Youth with respiratory/health problems that contraindicate use of OC spray will be identified and placed on a” no-spray” list, which will be circulated to all staff authorized to use pepper spray.
“As a general rule, pepper spray should not be used in the TYC facility in Corsicana, which houses youth with mental and emotional issues, unless necessary to prevent loss of life or serious bodily injury.
“If a youth’s mental condition would contraindicate the use of OC pepper spray, a mental health professional must be given an opportunity to establish control of the situation before OC spray is used. The only exception is if use of the spray is necessary to prevent serious bodily injury or loss of life.
“For youth confined in a room in a security unit or an isolation room, pepper spray can only be used when necessary to prevent serious bodily injury or loss of life.
“TYC cannot use OC spray unless a youth’s behavior poses a risk of ‘imminent harm.’ This requires nonverbal aggressive behavior. In the absence of non-verbal aggressive behavior, TYC has agreed that manual restraint must be attempted prior to the use of OC spray.
“In order for TYC staff to use OC pepper spray to protect youth, staff, or others from imminent harm or to prevent an escape, TYC must engage in a two-part test: they must first determine that imminent harm exists and that manual restraint is not a practicable method for dealing with the situation under the circumstances presented.”
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Prison fashion a go
“They look great.”
With those words from members of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, the state’s prison system today got its first fashion makeover in decades.
The gray uniforms worn by guards in the nation’s second-largest prison since the 1960s will be supplemented by a new “Class B” uniform starting in a month or so: A navy polo shirt and gray military-style pants.
It’s a uniform style already worn by prison guards in most other states, officials said.
Nathaniel Quarterman, director of the institutions division of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said the new duds will be cooler for correctional officers who wear protective vests and have been well-received by the rank-and-file so far.
The new uniforms are the result of a two-year study, Quarterman said.
Guards who like the old uniforms can still wear them, officials said, in whole or in part. The current pants — gray with a blue stripe down the side seam — can also be worn with the new polo shirts.
The new uniforms were approved earlier by prison officials, and were modeled for the first time publicly on Thursday for the prison system’s governing board. They gave a quick thumbs up.
“They look great,” said Board Chairman Christina Crain of Dallas, echoing comments by others.
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Deal reached on pepper spray
After months of blistering criticism and litigation, Texas Youth Commission officials have agreed to restrict the use of pepper spray on unruly youths.
Two advocacy groups that had sued the troubled agency — Texas Appleseed and Advocacy Inc. — announced that Youth Commission officials have agreed to a compromise after more than a week of negotiations.
Under the deal, pepper spray cannot be used as a first option to control unruly youths, as it has been for several months.
It cannot be used on youths who refuse to obey orders but are not posing a risk of imminent harm. The use of pepper spray will also be limited at the Corsicana Residential Treatment Center that houses offenders with mental impairments.
Youth Commission spokesman Jim Hurley said the consensus covers “how we will proceed from this point forward under the old policy. We look forward to obtaining public comment at the hearing on Monday regarding the new use of force policy that we are proposing.”
Advocacy groups praised the compromise as a step forward.
“This new policy addresses our major issues and, if enforced consistently over the long term by TYC staff, it will better protect incarcerated youth in the state’s care,” said Texas Appleseed Chairman Jim George, lead counsel in a lawsuit filed against the agency by the groups over pepper-spray use.
Richard Lavallo, attorney for Advocacy Inc., said in a statement that he hopes the Youth Commission “will give this policy a chance to work before moving forward with any proposed change in its use of force rules.”
The agency has proposed a policy change that would allow a wider use of pepper spray. A public hearing on that change is set for Monday.
After a court hearing about 10 days ago in which testimony showed the use of pepper spray in Youth Commission lockups had skyrocketed since officials approved the spray as first option, Judge Gisela Triana ordered the two sides to work out a compromise.
“We believe that the Texas Youth Commission is now on record as supporting a more enlightened approach to use of pepper spray than what is being outlined in the proposed new use of force rules,” said Deborah Fowler, legal director for Texas Appleseed.
Texas Appleseed Executive Director Rebecca Lightsey said the Youth Commission has an opportunity to squelch the controversy and enforce a policy that protects both youth and staff. “With adequately trained staff, we would expect to see the numbers of pepper spray incidents drop under this new, clearly defined policy,” she said.
Texas Appleseed and Advocacy Inc. initially reached a settlement agreement with TYC in late September over their lawsuit challenging the legality of an Aug. 2, executive directive instructing employees to use pepper spray to maintain order before other less restrictive interventions, including physical restraints, were used.
The suit alleged the Youth Commission failed to follow the Administrative Procedure Act in changing the pepper spray policy, claiming that three teen-agers with mental and emotional disabilities had been physically or psychologically harmed by pepper spray.
The spray can cause skin burns, disorientation, panic and breathing difficulties, officials have said.
Citing evidence that the Youth Commission was not following the terms of the settlement agreement, the advocacy groups had filed to force compliance. That landed the agency back in Triana’s courtroom and triggered the negotiations.
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November 27, 2007
TYC back on OT
Overtime is okay again at the Texas Youth Commission.
Just a few minutes ago, the agency announced that employees will start being paid for their overtime hours effective immediately.
Hours worked during the past month since OT was suspended will be paid in a special check to be issued by mid-December, according to a statement.
Acting Executive Director Dimitria Pope suspended OT in October after top officials were shocked because the OT bill had used most of the OT budget for the year, in just two months. At the time, agency officials claimed they could not properly track overtime payments and said they were investigating why so many extra hours had been logged.
The move angered many employees, who questioned why Pope and other Austin officials were so surprised by the cost, considering chronic understaffing that was plaguing Youth Commission lockups in many areas.
In this afternoon’s statement, the agency attributed that huge OT bill to “the shortage of juvenile corrections officers at numerous TYC facilities … Another factor was the lack of a uniform staff schedule throughout the institutions.’
Pope promised that a uniform staffing plan will be completed by early January to ensure all overtime worked is evenly distributed among staff, and to “develop strategies to work overtime more efficiently and consistently given the realities of current staff shortages.”
The cost of OT during the time it was suspended: $1.4 million, about what it was in the month prior.
The statement money for all the extra OT being racked up will come from money budgeted for staff positions that are currently vacant.
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Fashion price
From our news item about the proposed new uniforms for Texas prison guards came a flood of response. More than two-dozen emails and calls, in all.
You like the possible change. You really, really hate it. You want to know what it will cost.
From the Home Office in Huntsville: The “retro classic” uniforms cost $26.09 apiece, the new “polo-style” duds $27.62 apiece.
No bargain, perhaps, but not a Neiman Marcus deal either, by a long stretch.
The Texas Board of Criminal Justice, after a scheduled unveiling of the new fashion design, is slated to vote on whether to adopt new design during a Thursday meeting in Austin.
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Pepper spray, an update
Another delay has surfaced in the court-ordered negotiations over use of pepper spray on incracerated youths in Texas.
Attorneys for the scandal-plagued Texas Youth Commission and two advocacy groups that filed suit in September to stop a new liberal “spray first” policy — Texas Appleseed and Advocacy Inc. — were unable to reach an agreeement by noon today.
So, they’re continuing work to try to agree on limitations on when Youth Commission guards and staff can spray — or not sppray.
This is the third extension, after State District Judge Gisela Triana eight days ago ordered both sides to work out an agreement.
Reported hangups: A provision proposed by the state that would allow pepper spray to be used once a high-security cell is opened, but not before. And wording to ensure that youths don’t get sprayed for passive resistence to a guard’s orders — for things like not getting out bed fast enough, not being in compliance with dress code.
Advocates want to ensure that kids aren’t sprayed as a first option, that it is only used after mediation and physical restraints fail. That’s what the agency’s current policy says.
Youth Commission officials say they must be able to use pepper spray to control unruly youths, to protect both staff and youths from injuries. They have insiisted the liberalized pepper-spray rules are necessary to give them flexibility to properly manage their youth lockups.
A deal is possible tomorrow, says a source close to the talks. But as the clock continues to tick, we’re not holding our breath.
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November 26, 2007
Deadline extended, again
A court-imposed deadline for new rules on when pepper spray can be used on youths incarcerated in Texas Youth Commission lockups has been extended again.
Negotiations have been underway for the past week between attorneys for the Youth Commission and two advocacy groups — Texas Appleseed and Advocacy Inc. — over restricting the use of pepper spray until the agency adopts a new use-of-force policy sometime next month.
The two groups sued the agency in September, claiming a new policy allowing the use of pepper spray as an initial option to quell unruly youths violated state law. The agency agreed in October to rescind the controversial rule, ending the suit.
But the case landed back in court a week ago, after the groups alleged in court filings that Youth Commission officials reneged on the deal. And state District Judge Gisela Triana, after hearing testimony that the use of pepper spray has skyrocketed in recent months, ordered the two sides to negotiate an amenable solution.
A Wednesday deadline was extended until today. And according to sources familiar with the negotiations, Triana extended the deadline again — until noon tomorrow — after a deal remained elusive.
Stay tuned.
Permalink | | Categories: Criminal justice
Prison guards' uniforms to get makeover
For the first time in almost 40 years, Texas’ prison guards are about to get a fashion makeover.
Officials confirmed today that in coming months, the state’s more than 25,000 correctional officers could begin wearing navy polo shirts and black, military-style pants as an alternative to the gray, police-style uniforms that have been a prison staple since the late 1960s.
Gone will be one longtime staple of prison life: Guards in gray, convicts in white.
One thing will remain the same: American flag on one shirt sleeve, prison-system emblem on the other and a State of Texas seal on the front.
The pants? Two cargo pockets, adjustable waistband.
The change is subject to approval of the prison system’s governing board, which will meet Thursday in Austin to consider the switch. Similar to styles already adopted in most other states, the new uniforms are to be unveiled at that meeting.
“The new uniforms are designed to be more comfortable, especially for those officers who have to wear (protective) vests on duty,” said Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
“I think people will be excited about them.”
Most everyone, it seems.
“Its a good move, but there’s been kinda mixed reaction so far because some old-timers like the current uniform that shows their years of service … stripes on the long sleeves, one for every five years of service,” said Brian Olsen, executive director of the union that represents Texas correctional officers,
“Inmates know those stripes. They’re less likely to mess with someone who’s been around for a while.”
Lyons and other prison officials said the new uniforms will be optional. Guards can continue to wear the old uniforms, or they can wear a combination of both.
Like the old uniforms, the new ones will be made by convicts in prison factories, Lyons said. She said the cost is about the same.
The last time Texas changed the uniform was about a decade ago, when the basic gray uniform was modified ever so slightly. Before that, the biggest changes involved allowing female guards to wear slacks instead of skirts and abolishing neckties and hats.
“This has been in the works for a long time, months and months,” Olsen said. “It’s change … and the system is very slow to accept change.”
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November 21, 2007
Pepper spray deadline extended
A deadline for court-ordered negotiations concerning the Texas Youth Commission’s expanded use of pepper spray has been extended until Monday to give both sides more time.
Janis Monger, a spokeswoman for Texas Appleseed, said a report from the talks will be filed next week with state District Judge Gisela Triana, in a court challenge over expanded use of pepper spray on incarcerated youths that was filed in late September by Appleseed and Advocacy Inc.
On Monday, after a hearing in which newly released state statistics showed a drastic increase in the use of pepper spray in recent months, Triana ordered attorneys for the Youth Commission and the two advocacy groups to try to agree on proper restrictions for using pepper spray.
Facing the lawsuit and continuing criticism, the scandal-racked agency is moving to adopt new rules on pepper spray use by sometime in December, officials have said.
The groups sued the agency in September, claiming an Aug. 2 surprise policy change by Acting Executive Director Dimitria Pope violated state law. A settlement was subsequently reached under which the agency rescinded the change and agreed to follow the Administrative Procedures Act in the future.
The Administrative Procedures Act mandates public notice and a public comment period before policy changes.
Then, a few weeks ago, the advocacy groups filed to reopen the court case, alleging that Youth Commission officials were continuing to use pepper spray under the Pope-approved change. That allowed guards and staff to use pepper spray on recalcitrant and misbehaving youths as an initial option, before trying to restrain them, rather than as a last option as required under the previous, longstanding policy.
Pope and other Youth Commission officials have defended the change, saying it was designed to reduce increasing injuries to staff and youths from the use of physical restraints.
But national juvenile-corrections experts have said the use of more pepper spray on incarcerated youths is a step backward, and one that could result in more altercations and a blow to a rehabilitation-centered environment.
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November 16, 2007
TYC pepper spray case to court
Texas Youth Commission officials are getting hauled into court over their pepper spray policy.
Agency officials have been ordered into a Travis County district court Monday morning to explain why they have not complied with an October court settlement in which they agreed to limit the use of pepper spray in juvenile detention lockups.
Under the settlement, Dimitria Pope, the Youth Commission’s acting executive director, agreed to rescind her Aug. 2, 2007, directive allowing guards to use pepper spray more frequently, before they try to physically restrain incarcerated youths.
Attorneys for Texas Appleseed and Advocacy Inc. had sued the Youth Commission to block the expanded pepper-spray use, arguing the change violated state law. Then, two weeks ago, they asked a judge to force the Youth Commission to comply with the settlement — which they quickly promised they would.
They didn’t.
Each of the plaintiffs has a mental illness or serious emotional disability, and one suffered skin burns after being sprayed three times with pepper spray to prevent him from harming himself, according to Texas Appleseed Board Chairman Jim George.
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November 1, 2007
TYC HR chief out
Within days of surprised Texas Youth Commission officials suspending overtime payments because they spent more than half the OT budget during September, the agency’s veteran human resources chief has announced his departure.
Eric Young, who has held the post since February 1991, announced in an e-mail to co-workers that Wednesday was his last day. He gave no reason.
But Jim Hurley, the agency’s spokesman, said the OT flap had nothing to do with it. “I think he’s said he would be leaving,” Hurley said. “The overtime issue did not figure into it as far as I know.”
On Monday, Dimitria Pope, the Youth Commission’s acting executive director, suspended the payment of overtime for guards during November after discovering the supposed cost-overrun. Instead of getting paid, she said guards will “bank” their OT until officials determine whether the expenses are proper.
The move has angered guards statewide, with some insisting they will refuse extra shifts beginning today. If they do, they would face disciplinary action — disobedience of an order to ensure that proper security and staffing levels are maintained at Texas’ youth prisons and halfway houses.
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October 30, 2007
OT suspension sparks furor
The Texas Youth Commission’s decision to suspend the payment of overtime for juvenile correctional officers starting Wednesday until officials can sort out the agency’s latest management snafu is not setting well with the rank-and-file, to say the least.
Our story today about the decision — which came after the agency spent nearly 57 percent of its 12-month OT budget in September alone — sparked a flurry of e-mail and phone calls.
A sampling:
J.T. in Brownwood: “If they’re not paying, I’m not working any OT. A lot of the other JCOs feel the same way … They can fire me … I’ll go to work for TDCJ and make more money anyway.”
M.B. in Crockett: “(The Texas Department of Criminal Justice) forced its COs to bank OT, and that backfired in high turnover … This last (legislative session, the Legislature) outlawed banked OT at TDCJ. So why is TYC still allowed to do it?”
C.C. in Austin: “What”s it gonna take for (Gov. Rick) Perry and the big legislative reformers to see that this place is still a mess? This is not a system failure. It’s a failure of management.”
J.V. in Waco: “Thanks for the story. Keep telling the public what it’s like here. It’s still a mess. I often ask myself what’s fixed.”
T.C in Austin: “When will you and the rest of the press go away and leave this agency alone so it can make the changes that are necessary? You can’t do that under a microscope.”
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October 18, 2007
South Texas prison riot
A privately run South Texas prison remained on lockdown Thursday after a dispute between rival prison gangs over control of cellblock tables erupted into a running chain of violence that left 19 convicts hurt.
Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, who has demanded greater scrutiny of private prisons in recent weeks after a West Texas youth lockup was closed three weeks ago because of squalid conditions, called for a full investigation into why the episode took so long to quell.
State prison officials promised that such an inquiry already was underway.
Officials with Corrections Corporation of America, which runs the 1,069-bed Willacy County State Jail, did not immediately return phone calls for comment.
State officials released this timeline:
At approximately 9:45 a.m. Wednesday, a disturbance erupted between members of several rival gangs in one of the facility’s four 54-bed housing areas. Convicts simultaneously began assaulting each other.
The initial disturbance, involving approximately 50 convicts, was quelled after guards used pepper spray and chemical grenades.
Two hours later, new fighting broke out. Eight separate fights between convicts were reported during the next few hours in dorms and a classroom. Most were quelled with chemical grenades.
Reputed members of the Texas Syndicate, Mexican Mafia and three street-gang cliques were involved in the disturbance, according to investigators. No serious injuries were reported and no staff members were injured.
By Thursday afternoon, investigators said six assailants were in custody.
Whitmire said the disturbance underscores the need for close monitoring of privately run prisons in Texas, many of them located in remote rural areas.
“We were very fortunate it was brought under control with no more serious injuries than there were,” the Houston Democrat said.
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October 12, 2007
Two youth prison officials fired
The top two officials at a troubled West Texas youth prison were fired late Thursday after their supervisors claimed they could not locate them for several hours after a bomb threat emptied the lockup for several hours, officials said today.
Texas Youth Commission officials said Mike Davis, superintendent of the West Texas State School in Pyote, and Assistant Superintendent Billy Hollis have been suspended without pay and recommended for termination for alleged gross negligence.
Dimitria Pope, the agency’s acting executive director, told a Senate hearing this morning that neither official could not be contacted for several hours after the pre-dawn bomb threat on Thursday.
“The staff tried to contract the administrators, without success,” she said, saying the bomb threat was first logged at 12:30 a.m., even though it was first reported to Austin officials at 4:30 a.m. “I’m concerned about the time lag.”
No bomb was found and the remote lockup was reoccupied after several hours, investigators said. No injuries were reported.
Both Davis and Hollis had been in their jobs for just a few months.
The prison gained notoriety earlier this year as the place where two administrators were accused of sexually abusing incarcerated teen-aged boys, while Austin officials looked the other way. Former Assistant Superintendent Ray Brookins and former Superintendent Paul Hernandez are facing criminal charges.
The abuse and alleged cover-up by some TYC officials spurred lawmakers last spring to enact sweeping reforms and led to a shake-up of top management at the agency.
The firings are the latest at the still-troubled agency. Last week, Pope fired seven employees involved in monitoring a privately run youth prison in Bronte after Austin officials discovered unsanitary and unsafe conditions.
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September 26, 2007
Criminal court lets DeLay decision stand
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals today refused to reconsider its decision affirming the dismissal of an indictment accusing former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and two associates of conspiring to violate state election laws.
In June, the court, by a 5-4 vote, agreed with lower courts which ruled that conspiracy did not apply to the election code in 2002. The Legislature later changed the law.
DeLay, who has retired from Congress, and two associates, Jim Ellis and John Colyandro, still face charges of conspiring to launder corporate money into campaign donations arising from the same events.
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September 25, 2007
Prison guard's horse put down
The horse ridden by a Huntsville prison guard killed Monday during an escape was euthanized overnight after veterinarians discovered it had been shot during an initial gun battle, officials confirmed today.
Michelle Lyons, chief spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said an initial examination of the animal showed gravel wounds from where the escapees allegedly struck it with a stolen flatbed truck as they fled a garden field outside the Wynne Unit, at Huntsville’s northern edge.
But later, after the horse exhibited other symptoms of a more serious injury, another check showed a bullet hole under its girth strap, Lyons said. The horse had to be put down.
Investigators said a bullet recovered from the horse’s body is being held as evidence, and officials believe it was fired by the escaping convicts, Both were recaptured within three hours within three miles of the prison.
The horse was being ridden by Correctional Officer Susan Canfield, 59, who officials said was knocked off the horse and run down as the escapees fled the prison in a stolen flatbed truck.
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July 5, 2007
John Hill hospitalized
John Hill, the former chief justice of the Texas Supreme Court and attorney general, is in serious but stable condition in a Houston hospital, a family spokesman said Thursday.
Hill, 83, had a pacemaker installed early last month, Ross Margraves said, and left the hospital. He shortly returned to St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital to regain his strength.
“He’s hanging in there,” said Margraves, managing partner of the Houston office of the Winstead law firm, where Hill is a senior partner. “He’s full of tenacity and he’s tough as a boot.”
Hill served as attorney general from 1973 through 1978, the year he won the Democratic nomination for governor before losing to GOP nominee Bill Clements of Dallas. Hill won election as chief justice of the Texas Supreme Court in 1984. He was previously secretary of state.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Comings and goings, Criminal justice
May 27, 2007
TDCJ sunset, yes
There’s no coup d’etat involved, no hair-pulling and no nasty floor fight.
But at this late hour, there’s some nail-biting going on because the House still has not approved the conference committee report on Senate Bill 909 — the sunset legislation for Texas’ prison system.
The Senate approved the compromise bill earlier today.
But the House is now debating the controversial 10-Percent Rule, and it looks like it could go for a while. At one point, 39 speakers were signed up — and if each took their alloted time, it could run the clock on that bill and everything else.
Midnight is the deadline for passage in the House.
Stay tuned.
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May 26, 2007
TDCJ sunset a go
Final details of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s sunset bill — Senate Bill 909 — have just been agreed to by House and Senate conferees.
Still in are 10 House amendments: Taste tests for prison food vendors, preference for higher nutritional items, meetings between prison management and employees on various issues, revolving-door prohibition to keep prison employees and CJ board members from serving as parole commissioners, a zero-tolerance policy against sex abuse in prison, mandatory studies of recidivism, prison alternative programs and a prisoner exchange with Mexico, a mandate to arraign suspects within 11 days and a mandate to review adjudications in certain court cases.
Out are 19 House amendments: Everything concerning probation and parole, funding formulas, correctional health programs, the creation of a special prison chaplaincy division and a mandate that some defendants be placed on community supervision rather than sending them to prison.
Bottom line, say negotiators: Much of the stuff Gov. Rick Perry wanted in the bill is now out, and several things he wanted out are still in.
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May 25, 2007
New prisons, again
Late word: The long-discussed restrictions on building new Texas prisons have suddenly disappeared.
First-available copies of the proposed state budget are missing a provision that would have placed constraints on prison officials before they could build new units. Such things as the effectiveness of diversion programs, paroles rates and other factors, plus review and approval by the Legislative Budget Board, would have to have been considered.
No more.
A disappointed Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, who had championed the changes as a way to support cheaper and more effective drug-treatment and rehabilitation programs, reported just a few ago: “All the qualifiers have been stripped out of the budget.”
“Now, all that will have to happpen is to get (Legislative Budget Board) approval,” he said.
And that much-ballyhooed, new Legislative Criminal Justice Oversight Board that was supposed to help ride closer herd on the adult prison system and the scandal-racked Texas Youth Commission?
It’s funding has been cut to zero.
Legislation creating the board is in a Senate-House conference committee. Stay tuned to see whether it gets cuts, as well.
Prison officials have been arguing against it. Prosecutors have been arguing against any new hurdles to build new prisons. Senate and House criminal justice leaders had been pushing for both.
Somewhere, in a backroom deal in recent days, they disappeared without explanation.
Permalink | | Categories: Criminal justice
TYC bill heading to governor
The House today accepted the final version of Senate Bill 103, the sweeping reform package for the scandal-racked Texas Youth Commission.
The Senate had already agreed to the latest version of the plan, which was hammered out by members of both chambers. The measure now goes to Gov. Rick Perry, who is expected to sign it into law.
The legislation will mandate independent investigations and new accountability measures, and restructure the troubled agency’s management and operations, to guard against any future scandal over sex abuse and official cover-ups.
Permalink | | Categories: Criminal justice
Prisons option still in
Late word is that the controversial option to build three new prisons remains in the state budget.
The mystery over whether it was in or out has been dominating criminal justice observers, even the legislative leaders in charge of the issue, for the past week.
Building the new prisons would come with strings, at least as of late Thursday. Prison population numbers would have to exceed targets, and they could be built only with the approval of legislative leaders and the Legislative Budget Board.
Other CJ budget details just confirmed:
The budget will include funding for around 9,000 new slots — both lockup and treatment beds — as part of more than $206 million in additional funding. That’s the largest boost since the early 1990s, when the state was building prisons fast and furious and took a later-aborted shot at opening more than a dozen drug-treatment units.
Among those new beds will be around 1,400 in Intermediate Sanction Facilities for parole violators, 1,900 in state jail treatment programs, 1,500 each in specialized drug-treatment programs such as the Substance Abuse Felony Punishment units and the In-Prison Therapeutic Programs, 800 in community-based residential treatment for parolees, 500 in special units for convicted drunk drivers and 300 in halfway houses.
In addition, the budget will include an additional $13 million for local probation programs and $10 million more for mental-health diversion programs.
Those details confirmed by House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, and Senate leaders.
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May 24, 2007
TYC reform, 1 vote to go
The Texas Senate today gave final approval to Senate Bill 103, the sweeping reform package for the scandal-racked Texas Youth Commission.
Unanimously, the Upper Chamber adopted an agreed final report on the measure by state Sen. Juan Hinojosa, D-McAllen, that will mandate independent investigations and new accountability measures, and restructure the troubled agency’s management and operations, to guard against any future scandal over sex abuse and official cover-ups.
Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst on the final vote: “Since the day my Senate colleagues and I first learned about the abuse of inmates in the Texas Youth Commission, our first priority was to ensure the safety of the young people in custody and to clean out the bad actors. Now we can begin to rebuild the TYC and restore public trust in the agency by implementing tough, new accountability measures that are included in this legislation.”
Final approval by the House is expected Friday, after which the bill goes to Gov. Rick Perry for his expected signature into law.
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May 9, 2007
Treating prisoners could save money, study says
Texas could save more than $493 million during the next four years if new drug-treatment and community programs for convicted felons are adopted, new estimates from a private think tank suggest.
The forecast by the Texas Public Policy Foundation bolsters the arguments of Senate and House criminal justice committees that have endorsed pending legislation to drastically expand the number of treatment, probation and community-based rehabilitation programs as an alternative to building new prisons.
Even so, the Senate version of the budget bill includes funding for three new prisons in the proposed budget — at a cost of more than $1 billion over the next decade, including $233.4 million to build and $750 million to operate.
The House-passed version has no funding for new prisons.
“Through key legislation and prioritizing alternatives to prison in the budget, the Legislature can avoid spending billions of taxpayer money on new prisons over the next decade,” said Marc Levin, director for the foundation’s Center for Effective Justice.
According to the new study, a bill to divert nonviolent, low-level drug offenders into treatment programs they would pay for could save the state between $49.8 million and $80.6 million over four years, based on past population trends. Similar programs have proven successful in other states.
That shift of prisoners from prisons to treatment programs, along with other proposed changes involving parolees and more intensive probation supervision, could save Texans $493.5 million between 2008 and 2012 because fewer prison beds would be needed, the study states.
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May 8, 2007
Truitt challenge KO'd
The Texas House late this afternooon turned back a challenge to final passage of the massive Texas Youth Commission bill.
By a vote of 92-43, members tabled an amendment by Rep. Vicki Truitt, R-Keller, that would have removed the 16 new inspectors general at the scandal-racked agency from a special retirement system that includes state troopers, correctional officer and game wardens, among others.
Truitt said the retirement fund is currently fiscally unsound, and that additional employees should not be added. She noted that juvenile correctional officers in Youth Commission lockups cannot join the special retirement fund, which pays more in benefits.
House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, sponsor of the reform bill, said most of the new IGs are part of the system as former inspector generals for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. He indisted that adding 16 people would make no difference to the retirement fund.
After 30 minutes of debate, the House agreed. After killing Truitt’s amendment, they approved the reform bill 141-0.
Truitt voted yes.
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TYC reform snag
Final passage of the Texas Youth Commission reform bill hit a snag in the House this afternoon, not over details of the sweeping makeover.
But over what retirement plan the agency’s 16 new watchdogs will have.
As House members were casting their votes to approve the measure a final time, Rep. Vicki Truitt, R-Keller, questioned whether the retirement plan for the new inspectors general is appropriate.
The same plan reportedly covers state troopers. It also covers inspectors general for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, after which the Youth Commission’s new investigative division is patterned.
House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, agreed to delay the final vote on CSSB 103 until 4 p.m., as supporters scrambled to keep Truitt’s questions from derailing the last vote on the bill.
Stay tuned.
Permalink | | Categories: Criminal justice
Craddick: Bill improves TYC
House Speaker Tom Craddick on passage late yesterday of CSSB 103, the Texas Youth Commission reform bill:
“The allegations of abuse that have taken place at various TYC facilities are appalling. Chairman Madden has spent a great deal of time crafting legislation that will help prevent future mistreatment of these children. I am pleased to see this legislation pass the House so we can immediately put into place changes that will improve the system.”
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May 1, 2007
Jessica's law awaits House-Senate negotiations
Legislators are poised to negotiate House-Senate differences on a proposal stepping up penalties against individuals who sexually assault children.
Rep. Debbie Riddle, R-Tomball, asked the House today not to concur in Senate amendments to the so-called Jessica’s law. Members agreed.
Riddle said she wants to work with senators on a conflict between the House and Senate over whether to impose the death penalty on offenders upon first offense or upon a second offense broken up by a long prison term.
She said she also wants to explore whether a Senate tweak would subject a teen-ager in a consenting relationship with a younger teen-ager to dire consequences.
“We’ve still got time,” Riddle said. “It makes more sense to correct these concerns now while we are able to do so rather than wait until next session… We need to polish it.”
Rep. Ellen Cohen, D-Houston, urged Riddle to keep in mind the expertise of professionals who work with children required to testify in such cases. Cohen said imposing the death penalty could jeopardize the safety of children; their attackers might kill them to prevent witness testimony.
Riddle said: “Our desire here is to craft the best piece of legislation that we possibly can in order to protect the children of Texas.That is our goal and that is the direction we are headed.”
The House negotiators will be Riddle and Reps. Dan Gattis, R-Georgetown; Aaron Pena, D-Edinburg; Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, and Joe Deshotel, D-Beaumont.
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April 12, 2007
House spurns failure-to-identify measure
House members today spurned a proposal by Rep. Dianne White Delisi making it a crime if someone fails to identify themselves when a police officer stops them—a change from existing law making refusal to identify a crime in the event of an arrest.
Delisi noted that more than 20 other states have put in place a similar stipulation, which was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
A pile of members, including Houston Reps. Harold Dutton and Senfronia Thompson and Austin Reps. Dawnna Dukes and Valinda Bolton, suggested the proposal would encourage police harassment on racial grounds.
Rep. Borris Miles, D-Houston, suggested the debate was the second time this year the House has bogged down over racial implications. An earlier debate resulted in a member yanking down a proposal affecting the removal of monuments and statues. (Scroll down here for that account.)
It fell short of final approval by 116-23, shortly after Rep. Dwayne Bohac, R-Houston, stepped to the microphone at the rear of the chamber and wondered if the change was necessary.
“It goes too far,” Bohac said. “If I am going to err, I am going to err on the side of civil liberties.” A spatter of floor applause followed.
Among those who ultimately voted no; Rep. Patrick Rose, D-Dripping Springs, who had been one of three main authors of the measure. It had won tentative approval by the House on Wednesday by a non-record voice vote.
Rose said later that today’s debate changed his mind.
“I developed concerns about the implications of the bill,” Rose said, stressing that he keeps plenty of respect for Delisi and law enforcement officials that favored its approval.
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March 28, 2007
TYC conservatorship expected
Gov. Rick Perry, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and House Speaker Tom Craddick have announced a news conference after the House adjourns today to talk about the problems at the Texas Youth Commission.
Legislative sources said the leaders are expected to announce that Jay Kimbrough, the governor-appointed special master over the troubled agency, will be named conservator, which lawmakers have been pushing for from the beginning.
Conservatorship would give Kimbrough certain legal powers, including hiring and firing employees, that he doesn’t have as special master.
The move comes just days after the House Corrections Committee passed legislation requiring a conservator to be appointed. The Senate has already passed a similar bill.
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March 21, 2007
TYC measure tumbles in House
A proposal pitched as beefing up the prosecution of misdeeds at Texas Youth Commission facilities ran aground in the Texas House today.
Rep. Jerry Madden, R-Plano, chairman of the House Committee on Corrections, said after the unexpected turn that he expects to persuade members of the panel to return House Bill 427 to the floor by early next week.
The measure would authorize local prosecutors in each county to request help from a special prosecutorial unit already in place at the agency that manages the state prison system, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
Leaders of the GOP-majority Legislature have scrambled to reach legislation addressing shortcomings in the commission responsible for housing juvenile prisoners. Action has simmered amid reports of sexual abuse of residents of schools, including a facility in West Texas.
“I can’t move any faster,” Madden said after today’s derailment. “We’re trying to move it very, very rapidly. I agree that some people are throwing up road blocks… we need to be prosecuting these cases that are being found right now.”
The measure tumbled to a point of order raised by Rep. Larry Phillips, R-Sherman. Phillips raised the point only after Democratic Rep. Jim Dunnam of Waco, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, won approval of an amendment to create a special prosecutor responsible for overseeing cases involving the abuse of youths in commission facilities statewide.The prosecutor would be appointed by a panel of former justices of the state’s highest criminal court of appeals, the Court of Criminal Appeals.
Dunnam’s change won approval after nearly two hours of wrangling — including a member-by-member vote verification suggesting that seven members were not on the House floor even though they were shown recording votes for or against setting aside Dunnam’s idea.
Austin Reps. Dawnna Dukes and Eddie Rodriguez, both Democrats, were among members whose vote buttons evidently got punched though they were not on the floor.
Dukes, not feeling well, said she was at a physician’s office; she shortly reached the floor. Rodriguez also arrived later.
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March 14, 2007
Longview Republican files TYC measure
Rep. Tommy Merritt, R-Longview, filed a measure today which he described as authorizing $5,000 rewards for individuals who report either the abuse of residents of Texas Youth Commission facilities or cover-ups.
House members gave Merritt unanimous approval to do so—an action that was necessary because he missed Friday’s deadline to file legislation.
House Speaker Tom Craddick, R-Midland, declined to refer the measure immediately to a panel.
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House Democrat foresees Dewhurst acting on TYC
Rep. Jim Dunnam, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, suggested in a flurry of questions to House Speaker Tom Craddick today that since Gov. Rick Perry could now be out of state, the acting governor—Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst—could crack down on the Texas Youth Commission.
Dunnam, of Waco, asked Craddick from the microphone at the rear of the House chamber if Perry is in the state. Craddick said he does not know. (Perry left Tuesday on what his office called an economic development trip to the Middle East; he’s slated to return March 21, a week from today.)
Dunnam then inquired whether Dewhurst, as acting governor, would have the power to place the TYC, under fire for its slow response to reported attacks on juveniles in its West Texas facility, under conservatorship.
“I suggest you go and visit with the lieutenant governor,” Craddick said.
Dunnam also asked if Dewhurst would have the power, as acting guv, to fire the commission’s board and appoint replacement members. And he followed up by asking Craddick if the Republican speaker would recognize a motion to take up a resolution urging Dewhurst to put the agency under conservatorship and fire and replace its board—steps that Perry has resisted.
Craddick said Dunnam could file a resolution, but he wouldn’t be recognized to bring it up “at this time.”
Dewhurst has been silent on whether he’ll employ temporary gubernatorial powers to take TYC-related actions in Perry’s absence.
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February 27, 2007
TYC conservatorship?
The chairman of the Senate committee that oversees the troubled Texas Youth Commission confirmed this morning that placing the agency under conservatorship was being actively discussed by legislative leaders.
Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire’s comments came after Sen. Steve Ogden, chairman of the powerful budget-writing Senate Finance Committee, said he would have the agency placed in conservatorship if he were “king,” because of revelations in a sex-assault investigation that two administrators molested teen-aged inmates at the West Texas State School in 2004 and 2005.
Whitmire’s comments marked the first public acknowledgement that legislative leaders were actively considering conservatorship of the agency, and might seriously consider moving ahead with such a plan.
Under conservatorship, a rarely used remedy, the control of a state agency is taken over by a new management team to correct serious systemic problems or pervasive wrongdoing.
Whitmire’s committee is set to grill Youth Commission officials at a hearing this afternoon. “And if it appears at the end of the day that the problems are as big as they appear, we may just move to do something (on conservatorship) today,” he said.
Officials said the last state agency to be placed in conservatorship was the Texas Commission on Alcohol and Drug Abuse, in the 1990s, amid allegations of pervasive contract and financial irregularities.
Whitmire said legislative leaders are researching how to impose conservatorship on an agency, through the Legislative Audit Committee. Other lawmakers said the discussions began in earnest on Monday.
“I think you’re going to see some action to clean this up situation, right now,” Whitmire said.
In comments on Monday, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst seemed to echo today’s concerns of Whitmire and Ogden. “We have a mess” at the youth commission, he said, and Senate leaders are actively considering ways to correct the problems. He offered no specifics at the time.
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February 22, 2007
Jessica's Law gets first OK
Jessica’s Law has won its first approval toward enactment in Texas.
The House Committee on Jurisprudence yesterday unanimously approved House Bill 8, a measure that would deny parole to some first-time child-sex predators and make the death penalty an option for violent repeat offenders.
The current statute of limitations on sexually violent offenses against children would be extended by 10 years, and satellite-based monitoring would be required for the most violent predators, even after they completed their sentence.
The measure has become known as “Jessica’s Law”, in memory of Jessica Lunsford, a 9-year old Florida girl who was murdered in 2005. A convicted sex offender has been charged in her death.
In a prepared statement, Rep. Debbie Riddle, a Tomball Republican who authored the bill, called the vote “a positive message to the whole state that politics is not going to stand in the way of the safety of our children.”
Gov. Rick Perry earlier designated the passage of Jessica’s Law a priority, giving the House and Senate the go-ahead to approve it as quickly as possible. A similar bill is pending in the Senate, but has not yet been voted on by a committee.
After yesterday’s committee approval, HB 8 now goes to the full House for debate. No date for that has been set.
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February 20, 2007
Naishtat, West: Add homeless to hate-crimes protection
Austin Rep. Elliott Naishtat and Dallas Sen. Royce West, both Democrats, seek to add homelessness to categories that can be considered in charging people with committing hate crimes. The pair touted House Bill 1360 and Senate Bill 536 today, which would add homelessness to existing protections based on race, color, disability, religion, national origin, ancestry, age or sexual preference.
Since 1999, there have been 36 violent attacks and six deaths of homeless residents of Texas, according to the National Coalition for the Homeless.
California and Maine have taken steps to curb hate crimes against the homeless.
Naishtat said: “Texas should be the leader on curbing this disturbing trend.”
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: Criminal justice, House, Senate
February 6, 2007
Perry: Transfer DLs
Gov. Rick Perry’s planned changes for Texas’ criminal justice programs, to be unveiled later this morning in his proposed state budget, also include major changes for the Texas Department of Public Safety.
The most significant changes in years, in fact.
Under Perry’s plan, which still needs legislative approval, the DPS drivers’ license program would be transferred to the Texas Department of Transportation, and the 219 troopers now assigned to that division would be shifted to the Texas Highway Patrol.
Four separate investigations divisions at DPS — Texas Rangers, Criminal Law Enforcement, Motor Vehicle Theft and Criminal Intelligence — would be consolidated under the Rangers.
Troopers would also have their workday lengthened from eight to nine hours, with the additional hour’s work paid as overtime. The estimated pay boost from that? About $9,000 a year.
DPS currently has about 2,400 troopers.
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New prisons or no?
In his proposed 2008-2009 state budget to be made public later this morning. Gov. Rick Perry will propose adding 1,600 prison beds to Texas’ already huge system.
But no new prisons could be the result.
How’s that, you say?
Perry’s proposal calls for 1,000 additional medium-security beds and 600 more from the conversion of a Texas Youth Commission lockup to hold adults. The 1,000 beds could be for DWI offenders, perhaps using existing facilities that are now holding maximum-security felons, Perry aides say.
The 600 youth commission beds, of course, are already built.
That’s basically the same plan that Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, and House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson, already have proposed as part of their prison reform plan.
Explains Perry’s press secertary Robert Black: “The 1,000 could be for DWIs, yes, or other programs. It doesn’t necessarily mean two brand new prisons.”
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January 29, 2007
Burleson new SAC chief
With an executive order, Gov. Rick Perry today created the long-awaited state Criminal Justice Statistical Analysis Center to provide objective analysis and assessment of state criminal justice programs and initiatives.
The new entity will collect, analyze and report statewide criminal justice statistics; evaluate the effectiveness of state corrections initiatives, and disseminate its analysis to policy-makers, researchers and the public in order to enhance the quality of criminal justice and crime prevention at all levels of government.
Janna Burleson, Perry’s policy advisor for criminal justice issues, was named director of the new center that replaces the Criminal Justice Policy Council that was cut from the budget and closed three years ago.
Perry’s top aides had confirmed in December that plans were underway to establish the new center, after calls from legislative leaders to do so, to assist with solving an ongoing crisis from crowded prisons.
Having a statistical and analysis unit will be helpful in determining which programs to approve and in measuring incarceration trends, they said.
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January 17, 2007
TBCJ meeting canceled
Due to hazardous road conditions, freezing rain and ice and the sub-freezing temperatures forecast across Texas for the next few days, the meeting of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice scheduled Thursday and Friday has been canceled.
Officials announced the cancellation this morning, and said the meeting will be rescheduled.
The board oversees the operation of Texas’ corrections system.
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January 11, 2007
Perry: Alternatives can be good
Gov. Rick Perry agrees that prison alternative programs need a legislative look-see.
Just so long as violent felons stay locked up.
While there has been legislative speculation in recent weeks about where Perry stood on what promises to be a major issue in the current session, The Guv clarified things during an afternoon interview with Statesman.com.
Just a little, perhaps.
His comments:
“We need to look at all the alternatives that are out there. If there are some more cost-effective ways to deal with those who have perpetrated crimes or not lived within our rules, I am for looking at those alternatives.
“But by and large, if we have very violent criminals who have proven that they cannot live within the rules of society, lock them up. Get them away from our law-abiding citizens.
“That one doesn’t lend itself to a yes or no very well without looking at some of the alternatives to incarceration that may be palatable to the Legislature.”
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January 10, 2007
Condoms and kazoos
Who would’ve thought a discussion of prison reforms would end with an impromptu kazoo concert?
It did at the Sunset Advisory Commission.
Just after the panel voted today to adopt its recommendations concerning the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, a dozen protesters from the local activist group ACT-UP stood up, unfurled banners and started playing kazoos as they strolled out.
Big black banners reading “Condoms Cost Pennies, Denial Costs Lives” and “Prisoners Deserve Attention.” Black T-shirts. Spiked, flourescent-striped hair.
Just the kind of folks that the button-down, conservative Lege always enjoys socializing with.
No prob, though. As the group slowly marched out, the hearing continued, and no one at the podium even whimpered.
Bottom line: ACT-UP is upset that no one recommended passing out condoms in state prisons to curb the spread of HIV — an admirable goal, other than the fact that convicts are prohibited by prison rules from canoodling with each other, anyway.
Lovely change of pace, though. Why couldn’t the concert have been staged yesterday, during the Speaker Election Fight in the House?
That would have just been special.
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January 9, 2007
Prison reform hinges on speaker's race
Just as handicapping is fast and furious at the Capitol this morning on who will be elected House Speaker, criminal justice officials and lobbyists are hedging their bets on what it will mean for prison reform.
Or what it could do to prison reform.
Forget the Senate, which has no leadership race and a longtime criminal justice chairman, Sen. John Whitmire, who is leading the charge for more treatment and rehab programs instead of building a bunch of new prisons.
House Corrections Chairman Jerry Madden, who’s with Whitmire in that charge, is solidly behind House Speaker Tom Craddick.
If Craddick wins, Madden most likely stays put. If Craddick loses, the Plano Republican will probably be out.
Who would winner Jim Pitts then name as chair of the House corrections committee?
More than a dozen names are being bandied about; most have no perceived fire for reform like Madden.
That could change the equation, especially if the new House chair is someone allied with prosecutors and law enforcement groups who don’t think much of the proposed reforms.
So, in a strange twist, most reform supporters seem to be hoping Craddick wins reelection. And a number from the other side are rooting for Pitts, in the belief that if Madden gets the boot and they can then get a leg up in lobbying to build new prisons.
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January 4, 2007
Sunset report now OK
After earlier parking the Sunset Advisory Commission’s prison reform recommendations to develop their own, legislative leaders apparently have changed their mind.
One reason: The hot House Speaker’s race.
Insiders said today that the commission at a meeting next Wednesday is expected to approve the staff recommendations for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and Board of Pardons and Paroles.
In December, the Sunset chairman, Sen. Kim Brimer, R-Fort Worth, said the recommendations would be set aside to allow Senate and House leaders to expand on them as part of a planned overhaul of prison, parole and probation programs.
The staff recommendations recommended more drug and alcohol treatment programs, more rehabilitation initiatives and enhanced parole and probation programs as an alternative to building expensive new prisons.
Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, a member of the Sunset commission, said that the plan now is to build and expand on the staff recommendations throoough legislation, after they are approved by the commission.
Approved or not, any changes to current programs and laws have to go through the Legislature.
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