D

Live Blog Feed

What the Dallas Police Dept. Will Never Tell You

Posted on October 13th, 2009 10:53am by Josh Hixson
Filed under Police

I was in Dallas police headquarters the other day, doing some research for a story, when I got the rare opportunity to see the inside of a Dallas public information officer’s office. Public information officers are the men and women you see on TV or quoted in the newspaper when a crime happens in Dallas — they are the official voice of the Dallas Police Department.

Anyway, while discussing a case with the officer I happened to notice post-it note on the wall near the telephone. At the top of the note it read, “Never Mention” and went on to list four things:

Confessions
How or why suspect was identified
Evidence
Weapon type

I’m guessing here, but it’s safe to assume that these pointers are designed to keep information from leaking to the public that would tip off any at-large suspects.

9 Comments to “What the Dallas Police Dept. Will Never Tell You”

Opie T. Miest @ October 13th, 2009 at 11:00 am

Plus avoiding tainting the jury pool. Plus withholding key information that will allow officers to determine if an informant or a spontaneously confessing kook is telling the truth.
Michael Davis @ October 13th, 2009 at 11:01 am

It’s also to protect witnesses.
Publicnewssense @ October 13th, 2009 at 11:37 am

How about wrecking the case by giving defense attorneys a way to cast doubt on the truthfulness of officers — if a PR guy says one thing and the cop on the stand says something else, who is lying?
Haven’t you ever been to a criminal trial?
In the know @ October 13th, 2009 at 11:51 am

Police withhold some information to make sure a confession is real and to protect witnesses. Nothing unusual about that. There has been some turnover among the PIOs and they get little or no training before they are sent out to deal with reporters in the nation’s fifth largest media market.
JB @ October 13th, 2009 at 2:36 pm

5. ongoing investigations
6. Robocop
7. Walker, Texas Ranger
8. Pete Delkus’ forecast
9. Wade Phillips
10. that weird cube thing that was just built downtown
12. Chief Kunkel’s “Dartboard face of the week”
11. Oprah
12. The City of Arlington
Dallasite @ October 13th, 2009 at 2:51 pm

13. Dallas’ crime rankings.
14. The next weird cube thing being built next to the convention center.
15. “I read this on a blog…”
16. The number of exonerated convicts in Dallas.
Scout0820 @ October 13th, 2009 at 3:41 pm

17. “You’re not that drunk. As long as you promise to drive straight home, I won’t take you in…”
DPD @ October 13th, 2009 at 6:47 pm

18. Number of hooks let go due to no chase policy.
Former reporter @ October 14th, 2009 at 8:49 am

Rare opportunity? You guys need to get over to DPD more often. As for the list, it’s also a way to answer as few questions as possible to the media, who like to know how a suspect was identified (that’s part of the “who” in our 5 w’s). Did the suspect confess? Also something inquiring minds want to know.