AUSTIN -- Gov. Rick Perry personally instructed state troopers to visit a neonatal intensive care unit in Galveston in their search for Rep. Craig Eiland during last month's Democratic walkout from the Texas House, a legislator said Sunday.

At the time, Eiland, D-Galveston, was miles away in Ardmore, Okla., where he and 50 other Democrats stayed for four days to break a quorum and kill a Republican-backed congressional redistricting plan.

Eiland had earlier criticized Texas Department of Public Safety officers for showing up at the hospital, where his premature twins were then under care.

Rep. Kevin Bailey, D-Houston, chairman of the House General Investigating Committee, said a DPS officer, Lt. William Crais, told him that the DPS went to the hospital under the governor's orders.

Bailey said Crais was one of three DPS officers in a command post behind the House chamber, which Perry visited on the evening of May 12, the first day of the Democratic walkout.

Speaker Tom Craddick had enlisted the DPS' help in tracking down the missing lawmakers after he had put a call on the House, demanding their return. DPS officers visited the Democrats in Ardmore but lacked the authority across state lines to compel their return.



"Crais told me that directly," the lawmaker added.

A DPS spokesman declined to comment on Bailey's remarks. But Perry spokeswoman Kathy Walt denied the legislator's account.

"He (the governor) didn't have a letter," Walt said.

"At the time, the belief was that Eiland was at home in Galveston. And the governor told the DPS, `You need to follow the law. If they (missing lawmakers) are at their homes, you need to go get them,' " she added.

Eiland said, if Bailey's report were true, that the governor's conduct was "abusive and unnecessary."

"They went to the hospital after they knew we were in Ardmore," he added.

Eiland said a Texas Ranger visited the neonatal unit late Monday night, after visiting hours, asking for Eiland or his wife, who had already gone home.

Eiland said he called the officer, told him he wasn't in the state and that the DPS already knew where he was. After the call, he said, the ranger then went to his house and rang the doorbell about 10:30 p.m.

Bailey, who was among the dissident Democrats, said Crais also told him that the DPS wasn't in charge of the search for the missing lawmakers.

He said Crais complained that he and two other DPS officers assigned to help coordinate the search were "basically puppets being controlled by the political people."