Texas Department of Criminal Justice

Abstract

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice is a criminal justice body established by the government of United States in the state of Texas. The primary purpose of TDCJ is to handle cases of criminal justice throughout the state. Apart from this, the department is also responsible for handling adult offenders and managing them in state-run prisons, correctional facilities and state jails. However, authorities running the Texas Department of Criminal Justice have been under tremendous scrutiny from human rights watchdogs and other independent bodies for the fact that disturbing cases of sexual harassment, sexual abuse and rape have been reported in the department. This paper aims to shed light on some of these disturbing cases.

Texas Department of Criminal Justice

Introduction

It is the responsibility of the government to provide protection and security to all its citizens regardless of their social status. Even though numerous departments have been established by the state government of United States in order to provide this protection and security to the population and also uphold justice, several cases have come to light where officials hired in such departments have either shown negligence towards their responsibilities or grossly violated the code that they have taken oath to follow. The Texas Department of Justice abounds with numerous examples in this regard since many cases have been reported in the department over period spanning nearly three decades.

Discussion

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice is headquartered in the BOT Complex located in Hunstville and operates the largest state-run prison system in the country. In all, the prison houses thousands of inmates who are promised food, shelter and protection while serving their sentence behind its walls. The department itself is divided into three major divisions:

Correctional Institutions Division,

Parole Division, and

Community Justice Assistance Division

The Correctional Institutions Division it based in the BOT Complex situated in Hunstville and runs a number of secure correctional facilities. These facilities are mainly prisons that have been established to house individuals who have been convicted of capital offenses and various degrees of felony offenses. Apart from this, the facility also operates state-run jails that house convicts who have been turned in state jail felony offenses (Alarid, 2013). These offenses include assaults of lower level and drugs. Apart from this, domestic violence and property offenses also fall in this category.

The state jails operated by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice are also used as transfer units for felons and criminals who are bound for state-run prisons. The person who has been transferred to a state jail for a state jail offense cannot be held by the jail for a period of more than two years. On the other hand, it is also a legal offense to transfer the person to a prison before he has completed at least seventy-five days in the state jail (Cole et al., 2006). It is during these short days that inmates are subjected to sexual harassments, assaults and even raped at the hands of prison officials as well as other ...