HPD’s new assistant chief is under investigation for missing city property valued at $25K, docs say

KINGWOOD, Texas (KTRK) — A recently promoted Houston police assistant chief is under investigation after $25,000 worth of property went missing from a police substation.

Adrian Rodriguez, promoted in April following demotions related to HPD’s suspended case scandal, was last assigned as the commander at the Kingwood substation on Rustic Woods Drive.

Last November, the security gates in the back parking lot were removed and replaced with new ones. The old gates were left in a grassy area for months until they disappeared over the weekend of March 23rd, sources tell .

obtained part of the Internal Affairs Division (IAD) report which states Rodriguez asked a liaison with the City of Houston General Services Department if he could take the property because “he wanted to put them in his ditch at home.”

When ABC13 requested surveillance video from HPD from the weekend the gates were taken, the request was denied and referred to the Texas Attorney General’s Office for a decision. The department confirmed “an open investigation being conducted by the HPD’s Internal Affairs Division of alleged improper police procedure by a police officer.”

The City of Houston has a seven-page Asset Disposition Procedure for the disposal of property that is “excess, obsolete, worn or scrap.” Unless approved, all of it is supposed to end up at a city warehouse on Broad Street in southeast Houston, where it becomes available to taxpayers to buy at auction.

Only after requested records on the whereabouts of the discarded gates was a police report filed. The report, dated June 20, was filed three months after the gates were removed. The City of Houston is the complainant, categorizing the incident as a theft and estimating the value of the gates at $25,000.

Chief Rodriguez is not allowed to discuss active IAD investigations, per policy. The Houston Police Officers’ Union (HPOU) has called the investigation minor.

However, the portion of the IAD report obtained by ABC13 provides additional context. The liaison said he gave Rodriguez permission, stating, “I believed I was allowing Chief Rodriguez to take smaller broken pieces of gate material that should have already been disposed of by the contractor. I did not know they were entire gate panels.”

HPD does not comment on IAD probes and stated Friday that Assistant Chief Rodriguez’s status remains “active.”