A former correctional officer with the Texas Juvenile Justice Department has been arrested and is facing multiple charges involving a 16-year-old juvenile victim.

Democratic state Rep. Gene Wu criticized the department for treating an August 2024 federal report as “nothing.”

A Texas Juvenile Justice Department report says Dallas County officers kept kids in their sleeping quarters for days at a time and faked school attendance logs.

The DOJ found that officers overused pepper spray, kept youths in prolonged isolation and failed to protect them from sexual abuse.

The Justice Department announced Thursday of its findings that the Texas Juvenile Justice Department (TJJD) has violated the U.S. Constitution, as well as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

A former Texas Juvenile Justice Department correctional officer has been arrested for crimes against a child in a correctional facility.

For more than a decade, Texas has been trying to slim down its youth prison system, which has been plagued by years of abuse scandals. This Legislature is reversing that course.

The legislation came after The Refuge, a Bastrop foster care facility, hired a caretaker without knowing she had a history of sexual misconduct with children at a state juvenile facility. Coworkers also concealed evidence of the abuse, which further put the foster girls at harm.

“They didn’t try to fix the brokenness,” his mother says. “They just broke him more.”

Moving the most violent and troubled youths to adult prison makes it easier to help others in juvenile facilities, some prosecutors and lawmakers say. Youth justice advocates say Texas is giving up on the children who most need help.

Joshua Keith Beasley Jr. had been transferred from a Texas youth facility to an adult prison despite a long history of suicidal behavior. Five guards and two supervisors allegedly failed to check on him.

The upper chamber unanimously passed Senate Bill 182 after The Texas Tribune reported that a state-licensed foster care facility hired a caretaker whom the Texas Juvenile Justice Department previously fired for having inappropriate relationships with children.

Plagued by decades of scandals over sexual and physical abuse of children, the Texas Juvenile Justice Department is at a crossroads.

Spurred by reports of inhumane conditions at Texas Juvenile Justice Department facilities, Austin-area teenagers are lobbying the Legislature to reform the system.

Danger and trauma — not low salaries — are what drive most workers to leave the crisis-wracked Texas Juvenile Justice Department.

Texas agencies say they are being hammered by a historic staffing crisis, particularly when it comes to those in the trenches serving the state’s most vulnerable populations.

Critics say state District Judge Alex Kim is sending too many children to the state’s failing youth prison system. The longtime GOP politician points to a rise in teen gang violence.

Gov. Greg Abbott largely remained silent as dangerous conditions caused by a lack of staff persisted at Texas juvenile facilities during the summer.

Without a jolt of funding, the Texas Juvenile Justice Department will struggle to hire workers and regain control over the safety and treatment of almost 600 incarcerated youth, its acting director told lawmakers at a hearing.

On this week’s episode, Matthew speaks with Jolie about the problems within the Texas Juvenile Justice Department and with Eleanor about the state’s efforts to expand postnatal Medicaid.

The state of Texas has essentially controlled her son’s life since he was 11. The Texas Juvenile Justice Department was supposed to keep him safe and help him get better. It has failed at every turn.

The agency is so understaffed that teens have reported spending up to 23 hours locked in their cells, using water bottles to go to the bathroom. A staggering number have hurt themselves or been placed on suicide watch.

Visits to Texas’ severely understaffed youth prisons show suicide attempts without intervention, water bottles being used as makeshift toilets, and a rash of possibly gang-related fights.

Texas’ juvenile prison system is giving employees pay raises to address high staff turnover and staffing shortages that earlier this week prompted officials to stop accepting new children into its facilities.

The Texas Juvenile Justice Department doesn’t have enough staff to keep minors safe or deal with increasing suicidal behavior, its interim head says. Gov. Greg Abbott recently shifted millions of dollars from the long-troubled agency to his controversial border security mission.

The department says it’s looking into whether the Texas Juvenile Justice Department provides “reasonable protection from physical and sexual abuse by staff and other residents, excessive use of chemical restraints and excessive use of isolation.”

Children in Texas’ youth lockups are suffering from widespread sexual assault and other constitutional violations, reform advocates wrote Wednesday in a complaint urging a federal investigation into the state’s five youth lockups. “The state facilities are not just failing the youth in them, they are hurting them,” said Brett Merfish, director of youth justice at Texas Appleseed. As TJJD has encouraged more reliance on county facilities and reduced the number of state youth lockups from 12 in 2007 to five today, there has been a sustained drop in juveniles detained in state lockups. “Mental health is key to youth rehabilitation,” said Beth Mitchell, a top attorney at Disability Rights Texas. The plan requests more funding for county facilities and proposes more state facilities closer to urban centers to address staffing shortfalls.

HOUSTON A 37-year-old woman who worked as a youth development coach at a Texas juvenile correctional facility is accused of having sex with a person in her care, the Texas Juvenile Justice Department announced Monday in a statement. A statement from TJJD says Andrea Banks was suspended and then fired after allegations surfaced on July 14 at the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex in Brownwood. Banks, who has worked for the TJJD since 2011, was arrested Monday and booked into the Brown County Jail. Camille Cain, the Executive Director of the Texas Juvenile Justice Department, issued a statement that read, in part, Without exception, any employee who betrays their oath to protect our youth and commits a criminal act will face the highest penalties allowed under the law. TJJD has zero tolerance for such behavior, and I encourage anyone who suspects abuse, neglect, or criminal activity to report it immediately.

TJJD/Bob DaemmrichAfter 17 young people tested positive for the coronavirus inside Texas state-run juvenile lockups, the Texas Juvenile Justice Department said Wednesday it will test all detainees and staff. Only two employees tested positive in April and May, according to agency news releases. But last month, 28 more employees and the 17 detainees also tested positive for the virus at four of the states juvenile lockups. The youth were all being treated at the lockups, TJJD said in a Tuesday news release. Sean Wilson, 43, worked at the Giddings State School and died on June 28 after testing positive for the virus the week before.