Clements Unit


The William P. "Bill" Clements Unit is a state prison of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice located in unincorporated Potter County, Texas, United States, east of the City of Amarillo. It is located on Spur 591 off of Loop 335.
As of 2016 it had 3,700 prisoners.

History

The prison opened in March 1990. It was named after Governor of Texas William P. Clements.
In June 2013, according to a report surveying 92,449 adult prisoners in 606 prisons, jails, and special confinement facilities from February 2011 to May 2012 by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, of the prisons holding men the Clements Unit had the eighth-highest rate of prisoners who reported that prisoners stated that they had, during the past year, experienced sexual victimization from another prisoner; the percentage was 6.8%. The percentage had decreased from its percentage in 2008. In 2008 the Bureau of Justice Statistics ranked Clements as the second highest in its category. For 2011–2012 8.1% of prisoners at Clements reported sexual intercourse or sexual contact with staff members, making it the fifth-highest in its category. In 2008 it was the second-highest in that category with 9.5%. Jason Clark, a TDCJ spokesperson, said that many of the accusations "could reflect offender attitudes toward other offensive behavior or legitimate security precautions" and that many were not actually sexual assault. The study also said that the Clements Unit had the worst rate of employee-on-inmate sexual assault of any facility in the country. The state of Texas counts all allegations towards this total even if proven false. Several offenders are under constant video surveillance due to constant false accusations.
In 2011 a male prison nurse had a prisoner do sexual favors for him. Domenic Hidalgo, the prison nurse, pleaded guilty in 2013 and received a four-year probation term.
Prisoner Alton Rodgers died on January 19, 2016 after being found unresponsive in his cell. His cellmate was accused of murdering him. By February 2016 officials of the TDCJ recommended dismissing a supervisor and giving disciplinary action to 17 other employees.