From January 1990 until last September, Jose Rodriguez was a guest of the State of Texas in its Graybar Hotel chain. He had been convicted for burglary of a habitation using a deadly weapon, attempted aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and auto theft. Last September he was paroled to a halfway house in Dallas County. In December 2017 he was transferred to a halfway house in Houston. In March of this year he was outfitted with an ankle monitor and released to live in a home.
On July 5 Rodriguez cut off his ankle monitor and a warrant was issued for his arrest. Before he was captured on July 17, Rodriguez went on a crime spree which included the robbery-murders of a homeowner and the managers of two mattress stores.
An angry Houston police chief told a press conference his cops were going to crack down on parolees. Chief Art Acevedo said:
“Two things community needs to know: We are going to be flies on stink on parolees. They are not going to like living here unless they want to be responsible members of the community.”
I have long criticized the lack of real supervision given to parolees. Parolees cannot be adequately supervised only on Mondays through Fridays, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., with office appointments and forewarned field visit appointments. Many, if not most, parole violations occur during the nighttime and on weekends.
And those ankle monitors should not be a substitute for good parole supervision. Jose Rodriguez was not busted because he had cut off his monitor, but because of an extensive manhunt by cops after he went on his deadly crime spree.
Nationwide, about 50 percent of parolees are returned to prison, some for violations of parole conditions, but most for committing new crimes. Parolees who completed their parole did so on their own without adequate supervision from their parole officers. Some of those who ‘succeeded’ on parole committed crimes for which they were not caught.
If Chief Acevedo keeps his promise about his cops being “flies on stink,” parolees in Houston can expect to get the kind of supervision from cops that they should have been getting from their parole officers.
Howie, keep in mind this is the police chief that does everything in his power to support illegals, put as many officers into feel-good community programs while service calls are holding all over town, and has single digit clearance rates for many crimes. He also has gone on record as stating he needed thousands of additional officers to perform the tasks charged with before this new initiative, Harris County not having the manpower to fare any better at this time. So let’s say this isn’t his latest purely political program and ask, just where will the manpower come from? Will rape victims be piled on again, will domestic violence cases be put on the back burner, or will this just become his latest excuse to avoid assisting ICE get rid those who need to be shown the door?
From Channel 13: “According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, the state of Texas has 84,000 parolees under supervision. More than 20 percent are in the Houston region. Of those, 2,500 have active arrest warrants and 520 of those are parolees with violent histories.” They haven’t done much with those existing warrants and violators, nor does the DA’s office seem to treat parole violations with much concern, so let’s see if the local media will start asking Mr. Acevedo the hard questions for a change instead of giving him a pass for his political leanings.
Peter, you are spot on in your remarks about our politically correct police chief. In the Rodriguez case I think he means it, but he is in a no win-no win situation. If officers are diverted to be on parolees like flies on stink, it means he will have to establish a special unit to do this, and then people will complain that his cops are not going after burglars, rapists and robbers.
I am no fan of Kim Ogg, but I can understand why she is not going after parole violators. What we are talking about here is that many of those warrants have been issued because the parolee violated one or more Conditions of Parole, and not because he committed a crime.
And the parole division is not anxious to have a parolee returned to prison because that will hurt their ‘success’ statistics.
The whole parole system needs to be changed so that parolees will be supervised in the evenings and on weekends, instead of just on Mondays-Fridays, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. No more office visits unless the parole officer has to see the parolee for some special reason or if the parolee wants to see his parole officer. And all field visits should be made on a surprise basis, not by appointment. Of course, this will require budgeting for an adequate number of parole officers, and you won’t see that happening.
As for the media, the Rodriguez case has already blown over and you won’t see anything about parole until the next ‘Rodriguez’ comes along.
Mark the date. I agree with PeterD. Art Acevedo and Sylvester Turner are sanctuary city advocates. I can’t see either making enhanced parolee administration any kind of priority. A current article in the news notes Houston has more parolee halfway houses than Dallas, Austin and San Antonio combined. My hunch is the state pays to subsidize these arrangements and some well connected friends of the administration are profiting from same.
On another topic, was there any telling, obvious factors that were missed or is it just a really risky proposition to parole someone for 28 year old violent offenses? What’s the common sense takeaway?
Reader, the Department of Corrections had no choice but to release Rodriguez because his good time-off credits added to time served totaled up to his whole sentence.
I like what Houston PD is doing. TDC should start sending more parolees to Houston whenever possible, so that they get the kind of supervision they need.
Get real, Richard. Sending more parolees to Houston would be disastrous. HPD is not now supervising parolees and won’t be able to supervise them like flies on stink.
For Houston officers to be on parolees like flies on stink, Chief Acevedo will have to establish a special Parolee Surveillance Unit. There are about 17,000 parolees in Houston. How many cops would have to staff that surveillance unit in order to keep an eye on 17,000 parolees? There is no way the Houston city council will provide the necessary funds to establish and maintain such a special unit.
And the legislature is not about to provide the funds necessary for an adequate number of parole officers.
So you better get down on your knees and pray that TDC not send any parolees to Houston who have no roots here.
Houston doesn’t seem to be lacking speed traps. Why not repurpose the HPD speeding ticket writers and use them to hunt down parole violators? Every other policing agency in town seems to be in the speeding ticket game, I’m sure no one will miss them.
Mr. Daniels, I don’t see that ever happening. First of all, the couple dozen traffic enforcement officers are bringing in millions to city coffers. A local traffic lawyer claims most of Houston’s tickets are written by a tiny number of their force so cutting that group is unlikely. Second, MADD would be upset since those are the same officers that enforce DWI’s. I’ve heard a lot more people die from drunk drivers than parolees so it might not make sense. And lastly, it’s my understanding that open felony warrants are served by SWAT officers so sending the chubby motorcycle officers to handle hardened criminals would be a departure from their norm. The police chief could stop expanding his community outreach officers but this being Art Acevedo, I think it’s more likely they regroup the former squad used to handle such people he did away with previously.
Assume that there are 50 cops running speed traps on a daily basis (that’s probably high, but we’ll go with it). 17,000 parolees/50 cops. Thats 340 parolees per cop. That works out to about 16 per day or 2 an hour. . . . How well do you think that’s gonna work? Do some math!