I'm sorry -- it is a question that had to be asked. Why would aides to the governor allow accusations of child abuse to be investigated by the alleged abusers -- especially when one of the complaints came from the second-highest ranking Republican in the US House of Representatives? It seems incomprehensible, unless the policy was approved at the highest levels.

Gov. Rick Perry's staff knew as early as June 2005 that two administrators at a Texas Youth Commission facility were not being prosecuted on allegations of sexually abusing youths in their custody, according to records obtained Tuesday by the Houston Chronicle.

Perry's aides have said that TYC notified them of the initial investigation in February 2005, and that they thought the case was being pursued by prosecutors until they were told otherwise in October 2006 by an aide to state Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston.

Also, other records show Perry's office routinely sent written complaints from parents about their children's treatment in TYC facilities to the agency for self-investigation. A complaint of sexual abuse involving students was forwarded to Perry in 2001 by then-U.S. House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Denton.

I'm particularly shocked at this "business as usual" response from Rick Perry's official spokesperson.

Royer said the governor's office had to rely on TYC to respond to the complaints.

"When constituents write to tell us their insurance company is overcharging them, we refer them to the Texas Department of Insurance," Royer said. "We do not have the staff to investigate complaints about other agencies."

Royer said as far as the governor's office knew, the complaints were handled appropriately.

Excuse me, but if you put complaints of sexual abuse of kids in the same category as complaints of insurance over-charging, I think there is a serious question regarding your judgment. And even if their isn't, your analogy fails -- what the aides did in this question is more the equivalent of turning the complaint of overcharging over to the insurance company to investigate, not the Insurance Commission.

And I guess that as a teacher, I'm particularly troubled by one little point here -- if I find out about alleged sexual abuse and do not report it to CPS or law enforcement for investigation, I can lose my teaching credentials for life and possibly face criminal charges. It looks like the governor's staff and employees of TYC are held to a much lower standard than I am.

Posted by: Greg at 12:37 AM | Comments (33) | Add Comment
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