Pay raises alone won’t solve staffing shortages in “nightmare” Texas youth prisons, ex-workers say

As blood began seeping through her pants, Tiffany Jones helplessly watched the clock. She was the lone adult in a Texas juvenile prison dorm watching a dozen teenage boys, and her increasingly desperate radio calls for a bathroom break went unanswered.

Jones wasn’t supposed to be alone with the boys out of their cells in the first place on that August day, but chronic short-staffing at the Texas Juvenile Justice Department often forced this federal standard to be overlooked.

When she felt her period begin at around 9:30 a.m., she...