Texas’s Troubled Sexually Violent Predator Program

It may surprise some readers, but Texas law allows the state to confine a “small but extremely dangerous” group of people even after they have served their prison sentences.

Under what is known as the Sexually Violent Predator Civil Commitment law, some repeat sex offenders will be involuntarily committed to receive long-term supervision and treatment for their “behavioral abnormalities” as a way to protect the public.

These are people like James Edward Jarvis, who was found by a jury last year to be still too dangerous to be released after serving more than half of a 40-year sentence for aggravated sexual assault of a child and being approved for parole. Jarvis, who had pleaded guilty to seven violent sex crimes in Galveston, Tarrant and Dallas counties, was taken into the custody of the Texas Bureau of Civil Commitment, which houses nearly 500 “sexually violent predators” at a secure facility in Littlefield, near Lubbock.

This law is necessary and we support its implementation.

But on two occasions over the past year, the Texas State Auditor found troubling financial mismanagement of the state’s contract with the Utah company that operates the facility.

Separately, the Legislature last year expressed concern about “administrative challenges” facing TCCO and passed a law requiring tougher penalties for sex crimes and other offenses committed by residents of the facility.

But it’s clear that lawmakers can’t stop there. They must continue to keep a close eye on how the state manages this dangerous population.

In a July report, the state auditor found that the Health and Human Services Commission overpaid Management & Training Corp. of Utah for mental health services to TCCO residents between September 2022 and November 2023. Of the $1.2 million paid to the contractor, $242,099 was an overpayment. TCCO is administratively tied to the commission.

In its response to the auditor, the commission acknowledged the errors that led to the overpayment, agreed to make necessary changes and said it had recovered virtually all of the overpaid funds.

We are concerned that this is not the first time the state auditor has found problems with this contract. Last year, it found that TCCO improperly extended it, in violation of state contracting requirements, at the same time that a decreasing number of residents were participating in mandatory weekly group therapy sessions.

At the time, TCCO denied any wrongdoing and said its contract negotiations ended up saving the state $23 million because the contractor agreed to expand the Littlefield facility. TCCO Deputy Director Jessica Marsh told us the expansion was critical to meet the influx of “customers,” as they are called.

Treatment takes a long time, Marsh told us last year, “to address years or decades of ingrained deviant behaviors and thoughts.” Jarvis, for example, was diagnosed with pedophilia and antisocial personality traits.

The Legislature gave TCCO a difficult mandate: to house and treat some of the state’s most dangerous people while protecting their civil rights and those of state workers. It’s a difficult balancing act, but lawmakers must continue to work to achieve it.

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