HOUSTON – The fallout continues over thousands of incident reports suspended due to the lack of personnel.
“I think the credibility of previous statements by the city of Houston about ‘crime was going in the right direction,’ It’s been revealed that that was a spin,” Mayor John Whitmire said.
The mayor addressed concerns with the city’s crime rate on the same day he announced who will oversee collecting data from police.
KPRC2 Investigates first highlighted this problem earlier this month, and 2018 seems to be the year where there was a massive difference.
In homicide cases, HPD reported 107 cases, however if you look at the numbers that were reported federally, it jumps up to 281—making a difference of 174.
We compared numbers from other crimes that revealed a much higher calculation.
On top of thousands of incident reports being suspended, Mayor John Whitmire is sounding the alarm about the city’s crime rate—something he says is being manipulated because of inaccurate reporting.
KPRC2 Investigates was first reported the local and federal numbers the Houston Police Department provided to us and the National Incident -Based Reporting System also known as NIBRS. They don’t match.
For aggravated assaults, HPD reports 4924 cases. However, 13,800 crimes were reported to NIBRS. That’s a difference of more than 8,000.
For robbery, HPD reported 3649 crimes. More than 8,700 were reported to NIBRS, which signals a difference of 5,100.
For motor vehicle thefts, HPD reports 4566 cases. 11,969 cases were reported to NIBRS. That difference is more than 7,400.
I showed the numbers to Houston Police Officers Union President Douglas Griffith, who believes the difference in statistics in 2018 has to do with the reporting to NIBRS.
“We used to deal with the Uniform Crime Report, and that was numbers that went to the FBI from every state, every department, that was supposed to send it to this clearinghouse, who then discerned what the stats were,” Griffith said. “We switched to NBIRS, and I will say that may have been in 2018, and the reporting standards are different than they were from the Uniform Crime Report. So, I believe that that could be a reason,” he said.
Last week, Chief Troy Finner was asked about the NIBRS reports being off.
“I don’t feel comfortable with any of the statistics,” Chief Finner said.
“Understand, a lot of these numbers that are reported to the FBI are numbers that help us get federal grants. So, if our numbers are higher, we’re going to do better with federal grants,” Griffith said.
More money is something the mayor wants for the department, as they tackle staffing issues and bring in a new panel to investigate how HPD handled the incident reports across the last eight years.
“We need to find out why there is a difference and make sure that we’re all reporting properly to the FBI,” Griffith said.
Former Police Chief Art Acevedo released a statement to KPRC2 News:
“I’ve been asked to comment on the use of the case management code, “SL, suspended - lack of personnel” by investigative units at the Houston Police Department to suspend or close criminal investigations. To be clear, the use of this code was not authorized by me nor was I apprised of its use. While acknowledging the longstanding issue of understaffing within HPD, along with the challenges posed by outdated record management and analytical technology, it was my expectation that comprehensive investigations be conducted and completed whenever evidence and leads were present.”