State Employees Paid to Molest Kids - Help me Understand...

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In cold bureaucratic language, the official reports describe lurid acts: High-ranking officials at an isolated state juvenile prison were molesting young male inmates. The top official at the Pyote facility for much of the time under investigation was Lemuel "Chip" Harrison, the superintendent. He said that he had not seen the TYC report, but, "I don't know of anybody who ever covered up anything."

Many prison staffers at the West Texas State School complained about the abuse to their immediate bosses and to officials in Austin, the reports say. But, for more than a year, no one in charge did anything to stop it. Evidence was ignored or covered up. Two years after a Texas Rangers investigation concluded, no one has been prosecuted.

Some former employees say similar problems afflict many prisons run by the Texas Youth Commission, whose official mission is to "fix broken children."

Fix broken children? You're going to fix broken children? With what? Broken adults?

:shk:

This case brings to light an unsettling reality that many of us are already familiar with - but it's stories like these that help outsiders see what goes on inside the system.

Sex abuse of state wards has always been a problem, and it's a notoriously slippery one. These kids are often at the mercy of their warders, who use them in all kinds of horrific ways. Being in a position like that of some of these wards is not something I'd wish on anyone, the hopelessness, the fear, the powerlessness. It's a horrible way to live. It results in even more strain on an already stressed person, and the results speak for themselves.

Wards of the state have always had serious problems with criminality, recidivism, exploitation, drug abuse, and suicide. Nobody has ever questioned why, because we mostly already know the answers. These kids come from messed up situations, and instead of being rehabilitated with a stable, loving environment, many of them are exploited and abused by the very people paid to protect them, case officers and jailers and reform school employees.

I think most of us have sympathy for these kids, just based on whatever situation led to them being locked up in the first place. But when they have to suffer through this as well, we really have to ask ourselves what business the state has trying to fix this problem - all it seems to do is make matters worse. Don't we have an obligation to these kids to, at the very least, not make their lives worse?

What a travesty. I couldn't believe I was reading this:

"In hindsight, we should have fired Ray Brookins when they first found pornography on his computer," said TYC spokesman Savoy.

Instead, he was promoted to the West Texas State School in 2003. TYC executive director Harris said agency officials failed to check Mr. Brookins' personnel records when he was hired in Pyote.

The agency has since changed its promotions procedures to include the checking of personnel records, Mr. Harris said.

[emphasis mine]

www.dallasnews.com

[edit on 2007/3/13 by GradyPhilpott]

Well, it doesnt sound like there is an official policy to molest these kids. Im sure its just a case of perverts being attracted to a job that will enable their perversions.

The cover up, though, thats state employee union crap. They couldve been prosituting these kids out of the school and killing the ones that wouldnt comply and the union would still stick up for them. Sa,e thing for all of those public school teachers who get caught messing around with kids and the clergy who get caught and just moved and hidden.

They all try to protect the system as a whole rather than cut the dead weight.

The irony is, Id probably have more respect for these unions a.k.a. mafias if they would just come out and say "Steve had porn on his computer. An unsavory genre of porn at that. So he's fired."

That way Id feel like they were doing their job. Instead they gang together and protect the criminal, no matter what the crime.

The church is worried about its image and the schools dont want to loose their union control and ability to extort the people.

they aren't promoting the concept of lolesting or abusing the kids, nor are they suggesting it be done. They are ignoring the acts and trying to avoid public scrutiny and criminal investigations into these things.

When a guard molests a kid and gets caught several things can happen. The guard can lose his job, and usually does. If this was a known problem and nothing was done about it, the administration will be in hot water. If the admin didn't know, they still might be in hot water for not properly monitoring these issues, listening to the kids, doing background checks etc. Another inevitable event is the lawsuit from the kid, the kid's family etc. These things can result in other kids coming forward, bringing more charges, more suits etc. Yet another aspect of this is the loss of revenue when you are no longer on the receiving end of new children as a result of past history. If you have charges open, or lawsuits or investigations, you are liable to be shut down or lose your gov't contracts for housing these kids.

This is one of the worst crimes a person can commit in my mind and covering it up, protecting the molester/abuser is, in my eyes, the equivalent of doing it yourself. Unfortnately, the folks running these places don't look at the ethical side of it, they look at the monetary side of it and it is in their best interest to keep these things quiet. It's much like the church and their manner of dealing with the priests that get accused of these crimes. Sure, it's wrong but losing all that money would be more wrong so let's move the priest, deny the claims and move on to other issues.