HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Nearly a year ago, the Texas Attorney General told the Houston Police Department to release more than 100 internal documents related to the controversial practice of suspending thousands of cases due to staffing shortages.
HPD fought to keep those records private, asking the AG to reconsider its decision. But last month, the AG told HPD it is “prohibited from asking for a reconsideration of the attorney general’s decision.”
The AG once again told HPD it has to release those records. More than a year after Eyewitness News requested those internal communications, HPD finally released them to ABC13.
The documents reveal discrepancies on who was told to stop using the controversial “SL – Suspended Lack of Personnel” code and when.
The “SL” code was used by HPD for years to suspend, or stop investigating, cases due to lack of manpower, including some violent cases or cases with workable leads.
“The division has never been fully staffed during my tenure here. Currently, we are down 10 investigators due to vacancies and five others due to extended military leave, special assignment, or other circumstances beyond my control. These vacancies have lasted several months,” a commander of HPD’s Major Assaults and Family Violence Division said in a March 14, 2024, statement collected as part of the Internal Affairs investigation.
That commander said he was assigned to his division in July 2021 and didn’t know the exact date he learned of the SL code being used.
He said that, according to the department’s standard operating procedures, “Major Assaults Unit sergeants may use the SL code to suspend a felony offense if there are insufficient personnel to conduct an investigation at that time, and they should periodically review any such cases to determine when they may be assigned.”
Another commander of the Westside Division said in his statement that the code “has been standard practice for the division” for years.
Despite those claims that HPD commanders knew about the code for years, former Houston Police Chief Troy Finner stood by the fact that he did not know about it until late 2021 because he came up through the patrol division, and not investigations. Finner retired last May after 34 years with the department.
Finner previously said that he ordered the code to stop being used during a Nov. 2021 meeting with executive staff. That meeting and Finner’s command have previously been corroborated to ABC13. However, multiple people interviewed said any orders to stop using that code never went further than that meeting.
Finner previously expressed frustration about his executive team not enforcing his command. He’s also admitted he never followed up on it, saying the Nov. 2021 Astroworld tragedy, where 10 people were killed at a Houston concert, quickly took his entire focus.
In a statement with internal affairs, a commander of Major Assaults and Family Violence said it wasn’t until Feb. 2024 that he received information to stop using the SL code.
Last February is when HPD announced the SL code was been used to suspend more than 260,000 cases due to lack of personnel.
Multiple investigators interviewed as part of the internal affairs investigation into the SL code said it was a common practice to suspend cases long before Finner became chief. The documents show the code was even written in HPD’s standard operating procedures and was often used in training.
“The SL code was put in place by my superiors in 2016, and I was trained on the use of the code. I never received a directive, verbal or written, to stop using the code until mid-February of 2024,” a lieutenant with the Special Victims Division said in his March 19, 2024, internal affairs statement.
And while HPD leadership had maintained that the code was not used in child sex crimes, the documents released to 13 Investigates show those cases were suspended for two years until the practice stopped in 2018.
Still, questions arose in the internal investigation regarding why adult sex crimes could still be suspended for lack of personnel if the practice stopped for another division.
“It has been my strong belief, desire, and plea to increase manpower to avoid the use of this code. Accordingly, I gave the presentation to bring attention to the issue of suspended cases and request 21 additional investigators. Had I received these investigators and been able to maintain a substantial net gain of manpower for the unit, like the (Crimes Against Children Unit), the (Adult Sex Crimes Unit) would have been able to stop suspending cases like the (Crimes Against Children Unit),” a commander in the recruiting division said in a March 28, 2024 interrogation with the Internal Affairs Division.
The investigation into the SL stems from an adult sexual assault that occurred in 2022, but that was never investigated due to a lack of personnel.
When the suspect in the sexual assault was accused of robbery in 2023, police learned the suspect’s DNA matched the suspended case.
“When I learned that the 2022 sexual assault case had been cleared in RMS by use of the ‘Suspended – Lack of Personnel’ clearance code (SL) by an investigator in the Special Victims Division, this was the time that I became aware of the existence of the SL code and its use as a clearance code meaning that that a case had been suspended due to a lack of manpower,” a commander of the Robbery Division said in an April 1, 2024 statement.
While in the Robbery Division, the commander said, “It was not a common practice to use the code SL.”
She too said she never received any directives in 2023 to stop using the code, but that the first time she was told to stop using it was Feb. 7, 2024.
The documents 13 Investigates received provide a glimpse into what top leadership said when the controversial code was first made public, but they weren’t easy to obtain.
Eyewitness News first requested the records last April, and despite two letters from the Texas Attorney General in June 2024 and April of this year telling HPD to release them, the city did not release the records until this week.
On Thursday, 13 Investigates requested an interview with HPD Chief Noe Diaz to ask why they made the prohibited request, but he would not make himself available to answer our questions.
13 Investigates also asked Mayor John Whitmire why HPD, under his administration, was allowed to stall our request.
“It’s important to note that Mayor Whitmire is not directly involved in processing open records requests. The decisions to appeal to the Texas Attorney General were made by the previous HPD administration. The command staff has been replaced following Mayor Whitmire’s appointment of Police Chief Noe Diaz. Upon learning of the SL problem, Mayor Whitmire took immediate action, ordering HPD and its officers to stop using the code. The mayor has complete confidence in Chief Diaz and the department,” the mayor’s spokesperson said in a statement.
