A tipster warned of a “dysfunctional” attitude at a local police department. That was an understatement.

Like many investigations, it started with a tip.

A retired law enforcement official contacted KHOU 11 investigative reporter Jeremy Rogalski last year and alerted him that the Coffee City, Texas, police department had hired a “really dysfunctional” officer.

Rogalski didn't know at the time that there were more than a dozen officers with criminal backgrounds in the department. Even more of them had faced disciplinary action in previous law enforcement jobs. KHOU's months-long investigation would ultimately uncover myriad problems with the department, from an active arrest warrant for the police chief to an entire department of officers that one expert described as “essentially bounty hunters.”

But the first thing that struck Rogalski was the sheer size of the department. Coffee City has 249 residents. The department had 50 officers.

“Fifty police officers in a town of 250 people – that’s an interesting story,” Rogalski said. “That’s a talker.”

Still, Rogalski and his colleagues on the investigative team weren't sure it was a story for them. For one thing, Coffee City is more than three hours north of Houston, out of KHOU's viewing area. Would their audience even care? Rogalski also realized that digging into the dump would require a lot of work. He would have to submit dozens of requests for each officer's personnel files.

He decided to do just that. Rogalski made nearly 100 inquiries to all of the officers' former departments, asking for their personnel files, including any disciplinary actions and the reasons for their departures. The requests cost about $1,000 and resulted in nearly 9,000 documents.

“So we were able to see that this wasn't just a story about a small town that wrote a lot of traffic tickets,” Rogalski said. “Coffee City, Texas, was a magnet for troubled police officers, and more than half of these officers had questionable work histories.”

These dubious work histories included suspensions, demotions and firings. KHOU found officers with a history of excessive force, public drunkenness, and criminal charges that included aggravated assault and family violence. A civil servant was fired from his previous job for telling a citizen on Facebook: “You should kill yourself, do the world a favor.”

At the center of KHOU's investigation was Police Chief JohnJay Portillo. After arriving in Coffee City in 2021, he quadrupled the police force and hired many officers with problematic pasts. Portillo, who surprised KHOU reporters by agreeing to an interview, had a checkered past himself. In his bid for police chief, he did not mention that he had been charged with driving under the influence in 2004, which is why he did not appear in court.

Coffee City Police Chief John Jay Portillo surprised KHOU 11 reporters when he agreed to be interviewed. (Courtesy: KHOU 11)

Coffee City residents deserve to know who is serving their community, Rogalski said. “If there's a sign on the side of your patrol car that says 'Protect and Serve,' do you want someone who's been arrested for family violence to answer the call when it's a domestic situation?” Do you want someone who has had a DWI themselves to pull you over for a DWI? If someone has been suspended, demoted, terminated, or dishonorably discharged from another department, do you want them to serve your community?”

The locals always knew that there were many overzealous police officers in the city. Investigative photographer and editor John Gibson said that when he lived in nearby Tyler, Texas, 20 years ago, he remembered Coffee City's reputation as a speed trap town. During reporting trips to Coffee City, residents told KHOU that there appeared to be an unusually high number of officers in the small town.

Few could have guessed that there were 50 of them. That number, Gibson said, didn't make sense at first. The department didn't even have enough police cars for that many officers. Everything started falling into place when KHOU discovered that the department had a squad of officers working out of Houston who were calling people with outstanding warrants. They received compensation for each case they collected, even though state law required officers to be paid a minimum salary.

“Many officers were never in town,” Gibson said. “They’re doing this search division thing and working from home.”

KHOU aired its Coffee City investigation over a three-day period last August. They had to act quickly after the interview with Portillo for fear that he would resign or the situation would otherwise change before they could go on the air, Gibson said. One of the challenges in putting together the three-part series was keeping the message simple.

“This project was a bit ironic in that what was technically interesting was not illegal. They are a “speed trap city” – completely legal. “They have 50 officers on the roster – that's unusual, but not illegal,” Gibson said. “When we get to the third part, it is illegal for them not to pay the minimum wage. This is technically against the rules. And how interesting is that?”

To captivate the viewer and “inject some energy” into the piece, Gibson wanted to start with a motif that everyone can relate to – the small town that will captivate you. He ensured that the headline – a town of 250 residents and 50 police officers – stayed with the viewer no matter how far in-depth the story went as it explored the various problems with the department.

The reaction was quick. Within two weeks, the City Council had voted to fire Portillo and disband the entire police department. In December, Portillo was charged with six felony counts of tampering with government records for failing to disclose his DWI charge in his Coffee City application. Several other former Coffee City officials face criminal charges.

Investigations executive producer Jennifer Cobb said she's never seen a story she's worked on produce such rapid change. The success of the investigation — despite her team's initial doubts — is a reminder to take risks on stories that pique their curiosity, Cobb said.

“I now use it as my reminder to keep an open mind when I'm curious about something, even though it may not seem like the safe thing or the story that makes 'sense,'” Cobb said. “Sometimes it’s good to take a breath, take a chance on stories and see where they take you.”

KHOU's investigation won two national Edward R. Murrow Awards and a Poynter Journalism Prize for local reporting. The latter award, sponsored by the Seattle Times and named after Times CEO Frank A. Blethen, recognizes journalism that holds local governments accountable for their actions (or inactions) and comes with a prize of $2,500 endowed with US dollars.

Since the story aired, Rogalski has heard from viewers around the world. Several Coffee City citizens, including the mayor, thanked him. “He said, 'This was kind of brewing in the background, but we never really had the time, the wherewithal, the resources or the energy to delve deep into it ourselves.'”

Some viewers warned of other Texas police departments with similar problems, and KHOU subsequently ran a story about “itinerant officers” in Houston who had found employment with police departments despite being dishonorably charged from their previous law enforcement jobs.

“I really think it (the Coffee City investigation) has struck a chord with people in this day and age when it comes to police officers honoring the oath they took,” Rogalski said. “This is a problem that transcends geography, whether you're in the tiny Coffee City in Texas or anywhere in the United States. People can understand that.”