Does HPD's new technology paint a disturbing picture of the department?

(11/13/07 - KTRK/HOUSTON) (KTRK) -- Houston police tell us they need help. The mayor is trying to beef up the department with new hires and overtime. But now, Eyewitness News is showing you for the first time how understaffed the department really is right now.

To find out how short HPD is, we took the department's own information. We looked at hourly snapshots of where patrol cars are and aren't. Don't worry. We're not giving criminals a real time view. This stuff is a few weeks old. These are basically aerial snapshots of police protection to determine how far away cops are when you need their help.

It's the view we all want of our city. Police officers keeping us safe, chasing the bad guys. Plenty of cops to do the police work required in the country's fourth largest city. The mayor promises that one day...

"The criminals are going to have their hands full with HPD," said Houston Mayor Bill White.

But an Eyewitness News analysis reveals it's the other way around. HPD has its hands full just covering the city.

This summer, HPD outfitted patrol cars with GPS tracking devices. As officers drive around Houston, the devices send signals every few seconds detailing exactly where the patrol car is. It allows police dispatchers to see which officer is closest to a crime scene, but also reveals the secret of just how few officers are patrolling our city.

According to our analysis, there is an average of 268 officers available for 911 calls city wide any time of the day; not many when you consider a Houstonian calls 911 every 30 seconds. The highest number of on-duty units is at 3pm when there are 395. But at that hour, more than a third of them are parked at police substations.

the lowest number of units is at 2am, when just 186 officers are available to answer your call for help. It's also when Crime Tracker shows violent crime is near its daily peak.

"There just aren't enough and obviously your GPS will make someone think that," said Hans Marticiuc with the HPD Officers Union.

In the last year, the bodies of six women have been dumped in Acres Homes.

"Whoever is perpetrating these crimes believes the Acres Home community is a dumping ground and that they can do it and nobody is going to say anything," said HPD Assistant Chief Mike Dirden.

But maybe the killer knows no cops are watching. The last body was found in Acres Homes September 22. The GPS data from 10pm the night before shows the closest officer a mile away. At midnight, 1am and 2 am, there are officers on big streets, but not in the neighborhood where bodies have been dumped for more than a year.

"We just pray for more officers," said Acres Homes resident Roman Spiller.

Spiller knows his neighborhood needs them. The women's bodies and lack of patrols make him uneasy.

"Just to see the car, that makes a difference," said Spiller. "Just knowing they're in the neighborhood."

But it's not just Acres Homes. We checked neighborhoods across the city. Recently, business owners in the Houston Heights complained about rising property crime and a lack of police presence."

"We know this," said Heights antique dealer Grace Hart. "We absolutely know they're not paying attention to us."

Hart is a victim of the kind of crime on the rise in Houston. Her store was shot at overnight. She called 911, but it took four hours for an officer to arrive. Bad for her, she says. Great for the crooks.

"When they see we have no protection and there is no one to protect us, they're going to be very excited," she said.

The police beat covering the Heights and near north side is almost six square miles. And while HPD has pledged to improve, our analysis showed less than two officers patrolling there, including several hours when there wasn't a single officer in the entire beat.

The union tells us Houston needs 1,000 more officers. With so few cops on the streets, officers are sometimes reluctant to get into potentially dangerous situations. They know there isn't any backup close by.

"For every empty chair in that roll call room, that's a possible backup for an officer he may not have," said incoming HPD Union President Gary Blankinship.

And if he's reluctant about that, what does it mean for you, the average citizen about to go to sleep, expecting HPD will arrive when you pick up the phone.

"If I was not an armed citizen, it could be frightening," said Marticiuc.

HPD would not sit down for an on camera interview with me, but they wanted us to remind you they have units working undercover across the city that don't show up in the GPS snapshots. Those units are also not available to dispatch to your house, though.

As for police overtime, some is assigned to patrol, others undercover. We've shown you where the units aren't. But we found times when as many as 38% of the on-duty patrol units are parked. We'll pinpoint those locations Wednesday.
(Copyright © 2007, KTRK-TV)

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