HOUSTON — Houston Police Chief Troy Finner revealed on Monday that the department's suspension of reported crimes due to "lack of personnel" included more than sex assault reports.
In a statement posted to X, Chief Finner said a review of the adult sex crime cases suspended because of the "lack of personnel" expands to include all other divisions in the department that were found to be using the same code, and the total number reached to around 264,000 cases.
READ: 'Should have never happened' | Houston police to review sexual assault cases that had been suspended
"We determined that department-wide approximately 264,000 such incident reports since 2016 were suspended with this code," Finner said, "That figure represents about 10% of the 2.8 million incident reports filed with HPD in the past eight years. Of those 264,000 reports, about 100,000 of them are property crimes."
The issue first came to light in mid-February when Finner posted to social media about a "significant number" of sexual assault cases that were suspended. At the time, he called the situation unacceptable.
About a week later, Finner held a news conference and explained that as many as 4,017 of reported sex assaults had been "suspended due to lack of personnel." Some of them went as far back as 2016.
Finner claimed he first heard about the code in November 2021 and asked HPD's Special Victims' Division to stop using it, however, he learned this year, that the code continued to be used.
During the news conference, when KHOU 11 asked for a definition of the code and how much work had been done on the reports before they were suspended, Finner admitted that he didn't know. However, he did say he is launching an investigation into the issue.
Finner said he moved personnel to HPD's Special Victims' Division to help investigate the suspended sex assault cases. On Monday, he said he is also moving additional personnel to other investigative divisions to address these incident reports involving crimes against persons.
Houston Mayor John Whitmire has expressed his concern about this issue since it was made public. On Monday, he told KHOU that he had instructed Chief Finner to be transparent and continue his review as a top priority.
Read his Mayor Whitmire's full statement below:
"I am very concerned. It is unacceptable and I have instructed Chief Finner to be transparent and continue his review as a top priority. Public safety continues to be my highest priority."
Finner said he will hold a news conference in the coming days to provide more details on this latest discovery.
Andy Kahan, victims advocate with Crime Stoppers Houston, said he is at a loss for words after this reveal.
"It's disturbing on all facets and it hits home for us particularly in victims community or advocacy," he said. "How do we deal with victims whose cases been affected by this? Are there statue of limitation in particular property crimes?"
If you were a victim of a crime and believe your case didn't get enough attention, you can contact the Houston Police Department at 713-884-3131.