By Lance Lowry
Austin - In a three page letter delivered Friday to the US Justice Department, Texas Governor Rick Perry informed the US Justice Department Texas would not be complying with the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA).
The 2003 PREA law passed unanimously by Congress and signed into Federal law by then President George W Bush, set guidelines for the US Justice Department to implement standards and criteria to reduce sexual assault in prisons and jails.
In Perry's Letter he states: "No one argues against PREA's good intentions; however, DOJ recently adopted rules making it impossible for Texas - and, I suspect, other states - to comply with PREA. The rules appear to have been created in a vacuum with little regard for input from those who daily operæé søte prisons and local jails, They are inconsistent with other federal laws, such labor laws and the Juvenile Justiçe and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDP Act), mandate staff ratios that impose substantial financial burden on communities and impose compliance dates impossible to meet."
Rick Perry's decision to not certify Texas prisons in compliance with PREA standards now means the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) may face a loss of Federal PREA funding. In addition to loss of Federal funding, this latest decision will open Texas up to Federal court litigation and increased liability for the state and correctional staff.
Warning Given to States
In a September 4, 2013 interview published in US News & World Report, Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va, who help author the PREA legislation., suggested that "sometimes you can enforce it with lawsuits." Because of the 1994 Supreme Court decision in Farmer v. Brennan, he said, prison officials only need to display deliberate indifference to be liable. "Damages could reach billions in some states," he said. Judge Reggie Walton, a Federal Judge appointed under President George W Bush, who also heads the PREA Commission agreed. "You're going to see large money damages being awarded" against non-compliant prisons, he said. "They could be astronomical. ... If [a prisoner is raped] multiple times, it could be million-dollar verdicts."
Lame Duck
While Rick Perry may be seen as saving taxpayers billions of dollars during his term, this latest move may cost the state billions more in the future. The state's budget appears to have been balanced on future taxpayers backs by continuing to pass the liability on to the next politician.
Texas prison remains understaffed and continue to be even more dangerous since the Texas Department of Criminal Justice's Safe Prison Program began. Understaffing and inexperience plague the agency. This last session Texas politicians continued to ignore the staffing issues and only gave Correctional staff a 5% raise spread out over a 2 year period, while other state law enforcement enjoyed a 20% raise.
10 Years to Get It Done
While most correctional officials are over burdened by the new PREA standards, Governor Perry's letter is not the solution for implementing PREA standards. The PREA Commission is headed by a Federal Judge appointed by former President George W Bush. This law was passed and signed into law in 2003. Governor Perry had over 10 years to send this letter prior to the standards being set. Like many things in Texas Government, this demonstrates the reactive, instead of proactive leadership that has molded the Texas prison system into what it is today.
Click Here to view Rick Perry's three page letter to US Attorney General
Texas prison remains understaffed and continue to be even more dangerous since the Texas Department of Criminal Justice's Safe Prison Program began. Understaffing and inexperience plague the agency. This last session Texas politicians continued to ignore the staffing issues and only gave Correctional staff a 5% raise spread out over a 2 year period, while other state law enforcement enjoyed a 20% raise.
10 Years to Get It Done
While most correctional officials are over burdened by the new PREA standards, Governor Perry's letter is not the solution for implementing PREA standards. The PREA Commission is headed by a Federal Judge appointed by former President George W Bush. This law was passed and signed into law in 2003. Governor Perry had over 10 years to send this letter prior to the standards being set. Like many things in Texas Government, this demonstrates the reactive, instead of proactive leadership that has molded the Texas prison system into what it is today.
Click Here to view Rick Perry's three page letter to US Attorney General
I truly wish that the people that wrote this would come and work in any prison for a week. These offenders feel that when a woman doing her job it is their right to masturbate on them but yet they want their privacy. So maybe it should be a felony for them to do this as it is a form of raping a woman
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on this as I am a female CO in a male prison in Texas. You have several offenders who repeatedly masturbate on female bosses and nothing is done to them. And at my unit there are offenders who will claim rape bc someone didnt pay up for their sexual favors or they want off that building onto another where their partner is being held at. PREA is SERIOUSLY being abused.
DeleteAs you both stated above it is wrong for offenders to masturbate on female officers bc it is wrong anda form of rape. Not all offenders or ex offenders are like that. What is also wrong though is for correctional officers to abuse the power that they have over the people they are responsible for andsuppost to safe gaurd over the offenders well being. It is not the job of the officers to humiliate or punish offenders just bc they are locked up bc by beinglocked up we are being punished for our choices we made. The only time there should be added punishments or humiliation is if rules are broke. i have seen both first hand. Disrespectful inmates as well as officers who abuse there powers. On either side it is not right but not all offenders are as u described and not all officers abuse there power. One of the things that is really lacking is respect on both sides. Alot of offenders have a chip on there shoulder believing that society owes them something and officers believe that all offenders are the same. We are not the same just as all officers are not the same
DeleteWell Robert, you are mostly correct. However, all offenders are the same in one aspect. In prison they are all convicted felons. Which means they have done something in the free world to hurt or in some cases kill other members of society. Every Correctional Professional is put through training where they are taught to be firm, fair, and consistant. Without that, inconsistancies would lead to safety issues and bogus complaints of unequal treatment. So, all offenders should be treated the same. Currently, inmates have more "rights" inside a prison than the officers do. How does that make for a safe enviornment where "rehabilitation" can occure? Abuse of power does exist in the prison setting, as it does in any area of society. However, it does not justify what inmates do to officers who are trying to support their families by doing this incredibely thankless job..
DeleteOur Governor needs to work in our prisons for 1 month and then open his mouth
DeleteI Agree, the people who make the laws, have no idea what it's like to work behind the walls. As a Texas Prison RN, I hate walking on a wing, and having offenders masturbate while watching my every move. It's a disgrace what prison employees must tolerate, while the offenders have more rights than we do.
DeleteRobert, you are an idiot! Go back and read what you posted and decide.
DeleteI worked at the Smith Unit, they did pretty good at if any inmate masturbated to a female boss they were wrote up and after I do believe 10-15 write ups on that said inmate they are registered as a sex offender when they get out. I wrote up plenty of inmates due to that shit.
DeleteI am a female CO in a male facility, and while I do not enjoy seeing male nudity, it is part of the job, just like for
ReplyDeletea female nurse, doctor, paramedic, etc.
Unfortunately female are forced to view male genitalia, where a male working on a female facility is not subject to all the viewing thanks to privacy measures. Perry is opening up Texas to more than just lawsuit from inmates, but now women can sue because the state in going to continue this practice of cross gender viewing for female and not males. Discrimination at its best.
DeletePREA took our Unit to being more understaffed n short. There are more females that work our Unit n usually there is never enough male staff. I feel PREA has made my job lazy.
ReplyDeleteThanks for covering this. Typically I'm skeptical of what RickPerry says/does when it comes to Criminal Justice or TDCJ. However, in this case, I think he might be correct. I need to do a little more research and find out what prompted the Feds to try to make changes, but it would appear that Perry made the correct decision here. I'm full well aware that he's been no friend to TDCJ in the past, and that this may well just be a political move on his part, but it could be a political move that actually helps.
ReplyDeleteRick Perry is taking this stance because it will require actually staffing the units, which will mean paying staff. PREA would be easy to comply with if we had an adequate number of male staff. Female units have no problem complying with these requirements.
DeleteAlthough I don't like PREA, Perry is no friend of correctional employees and should have been there pay raise time. With TDCJ lack of staff on male units, it makes PREA hard to comply with. Cross gender viewing is not the same for males and females. Female officers are required to view more male gentalia on a male facility, than a male working on a female facility. I hope 10,000 females run down to EEOC tomorrow to file, because they will win.
PREA affects not just COs but all women working in prisons. I walk thru a shower area every day to get to my job. I have to wait on the male CO wirking the door to bring a large screen for me to walk behind. Men are not subjected to this. I dont want to look at nude men but the ideaof protecting inmates from anyone seeing then nudeis rediculous. It ties the hands of every CO working. But also let me say the 5% raise was for Correctional staff only. I work around as many as 20 inmates each day. I only got 2% why. Are all inmates not the same. Hiw dies the legislature justify this difference. Just curious
ReplyDeleteTIme to piss all of you off. I work in extreme dangerous conditions on a job that pays good because of the long. hours. I knew what to expect when I took it. i know where the gate is also. I do not think women should work in close contact with male prisoners, or males working in close contact with female prisoners.Just seems like common sense to me.If you were my sister , mother, or wife you would not work there
ReplyDeleteThere were a couple of good points made here. But i would like to shed light on another aspect of this situation. What about the female CO's who not only allow male prisoners to masturbate on them but encourage it? What about the female CO's who refuse to where a form concealing smock , but wear very tight revealing uniforms and when they attention from male prisoners they want to complain about it. Also, the criminal penalties for indecent exposure in prison are the same as outside of prison. If anyone in or out of prison is convicted of indecent exposure 3 times in Texas they must register as a sex offender. Do the female guards pursue criminal charges against male prisoners who expose thenselves? No. They whine about it.
ReplyDeletePerry needs to go play by himself we are tired of playing!!!!
ReplyDeleteI read some of the PREA act and the state allready handles most of the concerns mention but for the state to fullfill all nessasary requirements of the act would involve createing a seperate orginization to handle the investigations the couciling and the advocate acompaning of the inmates during forensics investigations in essence a special victiams unit/advocates orginazation then bootstraping them into tdc with overiding authority to come into the prison and investigate oig allready does this job http://shsucj.blogspot.com/2013/07/investigating-crime-in-texas-prison.html i believe to fullfill the requirements of the PREA act would require bringing in another 140 police certified officers or more specialing in special victims along with advocates and councillors disregaurding the cost involved or the administration needs to go along with either adding to oig or creating another branch to work under or with oig you first need to have the manpower that are willing to do the job as TDCJ is currently understaffed and expected to stay understaffed as long as the economy doesnt tank and the only way the staffing problem is ever going to get better is for taxes togo up and officer pay to rise. As I am not a politicion I have no problem stating that Pay scale + working conditions + dangers involved in carrying out your duties + boredom of any type of corrections or police work + knowledgable supervisory personell /rank = ability to retain valuable workers while TDCJ pay scale /benifits far exceed working for fast food flipping burgers and are quite adequate for a single individual they come far short and in some cases require foodstamps to raise a family "Yes A V37,000 year worker with wife and 3 kids Qualifys for foodstamps" that right there should tell you the pay scale is ridiculious i believe a sgt with wife and 3 kids would qualify and while the hot and cold temperatures of the working conditions would have been common to most workers 40 years ago in those same 40 years the jobs and buildings and such have been renivated or eliminated so that most people work in controlled environments now. While staffing issues have allways been issues with TDCJ the laws and changeing of job duties for TDCJ for the last 40 years have gone from 1970's where my father told me of the staffing being short on the unit he worked at they only had 7 that night he said so they had 1 officer on each of the corner towers and 3 bosses working the halls with turn keys and tank inmate bosses working runs those where fazed out as having inmates in charge of tank disipline and movement where demed inhumane growing up the child of a TDC boss wasnt fun working there changes a person much like constant combat while the job is very boring the potential of never turning your back on anyone feels alot more difficult then being a normal police officer would where they would have short and more
ReplyDeleteintense encounters the constant full shift of lower level but still potentially deadly encounter is very wearing. The supervisory/political or rank climbers of today while perhaps not at fault for the staffing issues only increase the difficulty in a tedious job the fact that the majority of the workers are over weight old or unmotivated or all of the above only makes the ranks job harder and makes the few"motivated young/under 60 in decent shape/can pass all the tests without the need to depend on part of the PT test to make up for the parts they cant pass" Intolerable causeing them to look for and find better easyer or less stressful job most of the time at lesspay "many person has quit and went to flip burgers till they found a good paying job rather then deal with TDC of today" rank to political and harsh often with the workers governors have never taken there responsability as The Leader of TDCJ seriously or as if its part of there job even "Until an Offender called the Governor on a cell phone from prison" IF you want to fix TDCJ getting someone a prepaid cellphone and the governors number to prank call him and tell him hes an offender in prison might be the onlyway otherwise elect a Governor that will raise taxes and pay our Teachers TDCJ, and other Texas employees a wage that atleast keeps them off foodstamps
ReplyDeleteMr. Perry needs to join up and go to the academy then work at a Maximum Security Unit for 6 months (we don't want him to sweat that much) that way he can see, hear and do the work for him self ,,ask officers questions ,let them know ,show them he is listening and that they dont have to be in fear that what they say will go and get them in trouble with their unit..
ReplyDeleteinstead of having someone just walk into his office with paper work with stuff they wznt you yo see, and that was already been looked over by some one else,,
No one has hit the point of the original act yet. This act was initiated to keep inmates from being sexually assaulted or harassed while in a prison environment. At the time of inception it was believed by many that inmates were being preyed upon as soon as they were incarcerated. During the early years (as with any law enacted by our government) the original purpose was modified by ACLU types into the myriad of requirements it has become today. I know a few auditors who tell me the left leaning folks are behind the audit tools and actually are looking more at inmate privacy issues rather than security issues. I am about to give you some numbers (please check out my figures. I won't be exactly on the figure but the figures will be close enough) In 2011 and 2012 approximately 2.2 million people were locked up in juve centers and adult prisons which may be governed by PREA. Of the 2.2 million there were approximately 8000 allegations each year respectively. Of the 8000 PREA allegations, between 800-900 each year were sustained. Of these approximately half were inmate/staff relationships. The allegations may be as simple as a homosexual inmate being called a derogatory name like "faggot". This is a PREA violation. I must support Gov. Rick on this. I think it will cost a lot of money to modify facilities and pay auditors to come out. I think the money would be better spent on college campuses or military posts where there is a far higher occurrences of sexual assaults. That's my 2 cents worth.
ReplyDelete