TYC superintendant arrested

Nothing to do with Pyote, just more bad news from somewhere else in this wretched system.

The superintendent of the Texas Youth Commission's Marlin intake center was arrested this morning for allegedly fibbing to Texas Rangers investigating sexual-assault reports at the high-security lockup.

Authorities said Jerome Parsee, 53, was taken into custody at his office about 10:30 a.m. on a Class B misdemeanor charge of making a false report. He was to be booked into a local jail and was expected to be released on bond, according to officials.

According to Youth Commission special master Jay Kimbrough, Parsee allegedly told Rangers that he knew of no sexual-assault reports having been logged at the Marlin Orientation and Assessment Center, the first stop for all new arrivals to the Youth Commission lockups. Rangers subsequently found numerous cases, according to investigators.

Not much to add at this point, other than I expect this won't be the last arrest. (In some sense, it had better not be.) More here. Thanks to Burkablogger Nate Blakeslee for the heads up.

UPDATE: More from Grits and Harvey Kronberg, who reports that one effect of all this may be a steep decline in the TYC inmate population.

Posted by Charles Kuffner on March 23, 2007 to Scandalized!