ALTERNATIVE VIEW

Officers' complaints center on risks posed by lack of staffing

Guards suffer at Texas Youth Commission

It was one more brutal beating at yet another Texas Youth Commission prison: the victim on a concrete floor, unconscious as the attacker kicked him in the head again and again.

But this time – Jan. 3, 2006, in San Saba – the person absorbing the blows was not a juvenile inmate. He was J.D. Perry, a guard. "He kicked my teeth out. He kicked my head like it was a soccer ball," Mr. Perry said of a 16-year-old prisoner. "I didn't wake up until they got me to the emergency room an hour later."

Mr. Perry, 53, suffered retina damage in both eyes. He cannot read or drive now – and, since his medical termination by TYC, has not worked. "They don't take care of their own," he said of the state's juvenile justice agency. "They don't care."

Most of the reforms now sweeping TYC focus on curbing abuse of inmates. But juvenile correctional officers, as TYC's guards are known, say the agency has badly mistreated them as well.

The guards principally blame high inmate-to-staff ratios. Often a single correctional officer will find himself alone, unarmed, and in charge of as many as 26 inmates. "It's dangerous," said Gary Parker, a guard at the John Shero State Juvenile Facility in San Saba. "Anybody that thinks he's going to whip 25 kids – and a lot of them have been fighting since their feet hit the floor – well, that's not going to happen."

Mr. Parker, 57, said he spent 10 years as a guard in the state's adult prison system with relatively few problems. "After eight months at TYC," he said, "I was on Zoloft," an anti-depressant.

Seeks to reduce ratios

Jim Hurley, TYC spokesman, said administrators who recently have taken over the agency want to reduce inmate-to-guard ratios. "These things need to be addressed, and they need to be addressed quickly," he said. "We understand that these JCOs [juvenile correctional officers] are putting their health at risk in some of these situations."

Last year, 16 percent of TYC employees filed workers compensation claims – higher than any other state agency. Nearly all are related to attempts to restrain, or attacks by, inmates.

A U.S. Justice Department report, released last month in response to a 2004 riot at TYC's Evins prison, said guard shortages also contribute to staff-on-youth and youth-on-youth violence. "Without adequate numbers of trained staff on duty, it is not possible to respond in a safe and timely manner when violence and other crises occur," the report said. "Moreover ... correctional officers do not have the time to build the relationships with youths that are necessary to identify potential conflicts on their unit and prevent incidents from occurring."

TYC has long complained that it can't find enough people to fill empty positions. The turnover for first-year guards exceeds 90 percent some years. Last year, TYC had 435 vacancies out of 2,625 budgeted correctional officer positions.

Starting pay is less than $22,000 a year. "We've got to be paying these people more than Dairy Queen to get them to come to work for us," Mr. Hurley, the agency spokesman, said.

Most TYC prisons are in small towns or rural areas, so the hiring pool is limited even under the best of conditions. "They have exhausted their labor force in 10 years here by abusing their staff," Mr. Parker of San Saba said.

Mistrust between labor and management runs deep. Last month, the state auditor's office released a survey of TYC employees in which only 27 percent of the staff agreed with the statement, "I trust executive management."

Nearly all top management has been purged in reaction to the agency's sexual abuse scandal that began unfolding in February. And legislators are considering a bill that would lower inmate-to-guard ratios to 12-1 and would require better training for correctional officers.

Minimal training

Until now, training has been minimal – 80 hours in the classroom – and far below that given to guards at adult prisons. Educational requirements remain relatively low: a high school diploma or GED. "According to one facility staff interview and survey results, some facility staff are unable to read and write," the state auditor's report said. "Staff are given reading and writing exams after they have accepted employment offers."

The screening has been so lax that the agency recently acknowledged that, in more than 100 cases, it has employed people with felony charges or arrests. Last month, a guard at the privately operated Coke County Juvenile Justice Center, a TYC contract prison, was terminated after officials learned he was a registered sex offender.

TYC's evaluation procedures also have come under fire. Employees with serious on-the-job problems have been routinely promoted. For example, in 2003, Ray Brookins was reprimanded after an arrest on the job for failure to pay traffic ticket fines. It was the 10th disciplinary action in two years against Mr. Brookins, the director of security at San Saba, including one for downloading pornographic material onto his state computer.

Later that year, Mr. Brookins transferred to the West Texas State School in Pyote, where, after a promotion to assistant superintendent, he was accused of sexually molesting inmates. That triggered the scandal that led to the purge of TYC management. Such problematic employees are given the job of turning around the lives of the state's most troubled and chronic juvenile offenders, many of whom come from broken homes and have gang affiliations.

Most inmates have some sort of violence in their pasts, said David Williams, county attorney in San Saba. "They're not in TYC for skipping school," he said.

Maria Gray, a veteran guard at the West Texas State School, testified at a legislative hearing last week that the job was stressful, frightening and dangerous. "We're talking gang-related issues, kids fighting," said Mrs. Gray, who has worked at the Pyote prison for more than two decades. "You have to work there to know what we're talking about." Such conditions show the need, legislators say, for a better trained and better treated TYC workforce. "This is not a part-time job, an entry level job to be a guard, a worker in these facilities," said Rep. Tommy Merritt, R-Longview. "This is the most important job we can offer, to rehabilitate these off-the-path children."

Mr. Perry of San Saba went to work at TYC in 2004, after closing his truck and trailer repair business. "I believed in what TYC stands for," he said. "I thought, this is something I can do. I can give back to the community. Maybe I can make a difference in somebody's life."

On a typical morning in 2006, Mr. Perry – bearded and barrel-chested – assembled the young male inmates in the common area of Dorm 7 at 5:30 a.m. "I was alone, locked in a room with 22 students," he said. Mr. Perry told one of them, Arthur Jerold Kirven, that he faced disciplinary action for kicking another student.

"I didn't have anybody watching my back," he said. "The boys behind me started stomping their feet like they were coming up on me. It dawned on me then that something was about to happen.

"These boys are predators. They know how to make their move when you're most vulnerable," he said. "The instant I turned my eyes, that's when it happened." A punch floored him, and the concrete knocked him unconscious. It took four or five minutes for help to arrive, because security staff couldn't find anyone to unlock the dorm door. The whole time, Mr. Perry said, surveillance video shows that he was being kicked in the head by an inmate.

Mr. Perry was medically terminated by TYC in September. Workers' compensation and payments from the state's crime victims' fund match his original salary.

Both retinas were detached, he said, although one has been repaired. He likened his vision now to squinting through an ice cube. "Everything is warped and twisted." Mr. Perry is not sure if he will ever work again. He is somewhat hopeful, he said, that reforms to TYC will make conditions safer for those like him. "Maybe something can be done so that it doesn't happen again," he said.

Arthur Kirven, now 17, has been certified as an adult to stand trial. He is charged with assault on a public servant, a felony, said San Saba County Attorney Williams.

TYC officials say they are exploring several ways of reducing inmate-to-staff ratios. One of them may be to release hundreds – or perhaps thousands – of inmates whose lengths of stay in TYC have been extended for disciplinary infractions.

"Hold your breath," said Mr. Williams. "They're coming your way."

Doug Swanson and Emily Ramshaw
1 April 2007

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