TYC Scandal Exclusive: Perry Aide Alfonso Royal Was To Head Agency Upon Harris’ Retirement Before Scandal Broke

[This was originally published Friday night. However, due to the weekend, I'm not sure everyone saw it. Therefore, I'm moving it back up for the day.]

Alfonso Royal, the policy advisor to Governor Rick Perry who was aware of allegations of abuse at Texas Youth Commission facilities was slated to become head of the agency later this year, Capitol Annex has learned.

Royal, who advises Perry on criminal justice and other issues, was slated to be named Executive Director of the TYC following the retirement of former Executive Director Dwight Harris. Harris had planned to retire later this year and had already notified Perry’s office of his plans to do so.

Capitol Annex has learned that Royal lobbied for the post aggressively within the Governor’s office, and that Perry Chief of Staff Deirdre Delisi had even consented to his appointment.

Royal had been notified as early as 2005 that there were problems related to sexual abuse a the Commission. Emails released to Capitol Annex and media outlets around the state show that he had even asked for and received updates about problems at certain TYC facilities.

And, though Governor Perry claimed he was unaware of any problems with TYC until the scandal exploded on to the front pages of The Dallas Morning News and other major daily newspapers in the state, Royal was intimately aware of some of the more greusome aspects of the scandal according to documents released to the Austin American-Statesman:

Interviews and documents confirm that one of Perry’s aides, Alfonso Royal, was forwarded graphic investigative reports about sexual abuse at the West Texas State School from Texas Ranger Sgt. Brian Burzynski on Oct. 30 or 31, 2006. The documents also indicate that Royal knew in October, just days before Perry was re-elected, about a West Texas district attorney’s lack of action in the case.

Perry’s press secretaries had previously denied that Royal — a budget and policy analyst who oversees the Youth Commission among other agencies — had a copy of the reports. “To this day, we have not seen a copy of that report,” Perry spokesman Robert Black said Tuesday. “If someone can prove we did, bring them forward.”

After being provided with a copy of what Royal had been sent by a legislative staffer, Black and Ted Royer, Perry’s deputy press secretary, changed their story.

This brings forward a number of questions. In particular, it is especially alarming that Royal, the man Perry was to place in charge of the agency, would not have forwarded the investigation report to his superiors or mentioned it to the governor. He didn’t even keep a copy of it:

Royal did not keep a copy of the report, Royer said. And the governor’s office routinely deletes its e-mail after seven days, Black and Royer say.

Black and Royer said they did not know whether Royal notified any of his superiors about the reports and, if he did, what their reaction was.

And, consider this as well:

Copies of Royal’s phone records provided to the American-Statesman show he called Burzynski’s Fort Stockton office on Nov. 2 and Nov. 3, and Reynolds’ law office on Nov. 3.

In the next month, Royal spent a total of 12 1/2 minutes on seven phone calls that he made about the case — to the district attorney and Burzynski’s offices, according to the phone records. By contrast, he spent 24 minutes on a Nov. 3 call to a restaurant in Midland owned by a member of the Texas Alcohol Beverage Commission.

Clearly, even the purported future head of the Texas Youth Commission didn’t bother to sweat the allegations too much, which is very troublesome. Speculating on why he failed to inform the governor of the allegations, it is possible he feared that opening the can of worms would have derailed his chance to head the commission.

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