Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

Jay Kimbrough

AUSTIN – Gov. Rick Perry on Friday appointed a special master to investigate reports of sexual abuse and a cover-up at the Texas Youth Commission, though he stopped short of placing the troubled juvenile detention agency under a conservatorship.

In addition, Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle said his office is exploring allegations that TYC officials tampered with documents and lied to the Legislature to suppress damaging information surrounding the abuse.

State leaders have been working to sweep out the commission after an investigation by The Dallas Morning News found that top-level West Texas superintendents molested youths at the Pyote facility. On Friday, The News published new allegations that guards at the Brownwood youth detention center sexually abused female offenders in their care.

The scandal also spread with news media reports showing that an internal report about the abuse was altered to eliminate references to top TYC officials.

Lawmakers said they were "shocked and dismayed," by the reports and promised to act swiftly.

Sen. Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, said the allegations were the most serious he had heard in his 17 years in state government.

And he said an independent investigator was imperative because those in the system would be the least willing to recognize the problems.

"They don't really want to look under the rock they're standing on," Mr. Ogden said.

Even with limited powers, Mr. Perry over the last week had managed to rid TYC leadership of the executive director and the board chairman. The governor also pressured his other six board appointees to name his handpicked man – Ed Owens, a top official over the state adult prison and criminal justice system – as the new TYC executive director.

But criticism continued to mount, with Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and the state Senate calling for the governor to place the entire agency under a conservator, who would essentially take over the agency and freeze board action.

On Friday, a special committee comprising Mr. Dewhurst, House Speaker Tom Craddick and a handful of top lawmakers officially wrangled for three hours behind closed doors over the direction they wanted the governor to take.

In the end, the committee triggered the power needed by the governor to act by declaring that problems at the agency constituted "gross fiscal mismanagement." With that finding, the governor was empowered to either place the agency under conservatorship or enact a rehabilitation plan that could prevent the abuses from recurring.

Mr. Perry chose a hybrid course of action.

"With a special master the state will aggressively investigate reports of abuse and hold people accountable for their actions," the governor said in a statement.

"And we will develop a long-term plan that will rebuild this broken agency from the ground up," Mr. Perry said.

He tapped Jay Kimbrough, former deputy attorney general and former Homeland Security director, as the master. And he asked the attorney general, Department of Public Safety and Texas Department of Criminal Justice to lend the personnel and resources that Mr. Kimbrough might need.

Mr. Kimbrough also was key the last time a state agency was placed into a conservatorship. Lost and misspent funds prompted Gov. George W. Bush in 1995 to place the Texas Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse into such an arrangement.

"He is imminently qualified to take on this task and this role," said press secretary Robert Black.

The governor decided to go the route of a special master because it would allow Mr. Owens and the new board chairman time to revamp the agency, provide an independent investigator to sort out wrongdoing and allow state auditors to work with Mr. Owens to craft a rehabilitation plan that will correct the failures at the agency, Mr. Black said.

"The governor is very grateful to the Legislature for giving him all the tools that he needs to go in there and fix this problem and address this challenge," Mr. Black said. "By using all the tools and going in both of these directions he can accomplish that, hopefully in short order."

Mr. Dewhurst applauded the appointment of a special master but emphasized that the option of placing the agency into conservatorship was still available.

In addition, he and Mr. Craddick named a special joint legislative committee to investigate wrongdoing at TYC and to report back to the Legislature by the end of the month.

The Texas Rangers in 2005 investigated and substantiated the sexual abuse of young men in West Texas, but TYC officials and the local district attorney failed to take any action.

Regarding the matter of document tampering, the Austin American-Statesman reported that a 2005 internal report on the sexual abuse was recently altered.

Four paragraphs that were deleted said the concerns about sexual abuse had been forwarded to Lydia Barnard, then-chief of juvenile corrections and to executive director Chester Clay.

District Attorney Earle said that he could not prosecute sexual crimes committed in other counties, but that he could examine whether a government document had been tampered with in Travis County.

"Oversight of state agencies such as the Texas Youth Commission is the job of the Legislature. That job depends on accurate information," Mr. Earle said. "Our job is to enforce the law relating to the integrity of government information."