Houston, Texas news: Who is HPD Acting Chief Larry Satterwhite?

HOUSTON — As Houston Mayor John Whitmire announced the retirement of Police Chief Troy Finner in an email to HPD employees, he also announced who will serve as chief in his place: Larry Satterwhite.

Satterwhite previously served the department as chief executive assistant overseeing patrol operations, according to HPD’s command presentation document released in February. In this role, Satterwhite served on “various internal committees that address organizational issues, as well as community concerns expressed by citizens,” according to the document.

He also oversaw various patrol region commands.

“This decision comes with full confidence in Acting Chief Satterwhite’s abilities to lead and maintain the high standards of our department,” Mayor Whitmire said in an email to HPD employees obtained by KHOU 11 News.

It also follows months of scrutiny into the mishandling of thousands of cases marked with the code.

The first public comments on the suspended cases were made in a statement tweeted on February 16, which said that Finner “had learned that a significant number of adult sexual assault cases had been suspended due to ‘lack of staff”, which is unacceptable… this should never have happened and will not continue. »

Then, at a press conference on February 22, Finner announced that up to 4,017 sex crime cases had been stayed and said he first learned of the code in 2021. And on the 26 February, he tweeted that they discovered another 260,000 cases had been suspended with the code.

And during a press conference on March 7, he reiterated that “November 2021 was the first time I was informed of the use of this code during a briefing by the Special Victims Division. At that point I told them the code was unacceptable and I would never use it again.

Since then, Finner announced that all sex crime cases have been reviewed and about 100 of them have DNA results. HPD reviewed more than a third of the other 260,000 cases last week. Most had no leads and 54 charges were filed.