Assistant police chief promoted to chief in Grand Prairie, city announces
Grand Prairie’s city manager promoted one of the city’s assistant chiefs to police chief on Monday.
Assistant Chief Daniel Scesney will officially become the police chief on Jan. 18, according to City Manager Tom Hart.
Hart promoted Scesney, who has been with the police department since 2001 and has been assistant chief for three years, the city said in a press release. Scesney has commanded both the Special Operations and Investigative Service Bureaus.
Grand Prairie’s current police chief, Steve Dye, announced in September he will step down as chief to focus on his role as the new deputy city manager. He has been serving a dual role as police chief and deputy city manager for a year and a half.
Dye has been in law enforcement for 35 years, eight of which were with the Grand Prairie Police Department as chief.
Dye said at the press conference that Scesney and another assistant chief competed for the chief position and were put through a thorough process to determine who would get the job.
Scesney thanked the community, family, friends, city management and the police department at Monday’s press conference.
“I am very mindful of the fact that being a police chief is something that is earned every single day in the minds of all of our officers,” he said at the conference. “That is a fact that is not lost on me, and I will come in every single day to do that.”
Scesney, 45, was a military police officer in the United States Marine Corps and has served in almost all divisions and bureaus at the Grand Prairie Police Department, including patrol, SWAT, narcotics, property crimes, domestic crimes, and major crimes.
Scesney was also Rookie of the Year in 2003; Patrol Officer of the Year in 2006; Detective of the Year in 2010, 2013 and 2015; the 2018 recipient of the Chamber of Commerce’s Public Service Award; and received the Distinguished Leadership Award from Texas Christian University in 2019, the press release said.
He is scheduled to graduate from TCU in May with a master of science degree in criminal justice and criminology.
“We were blessed to have exemplary internal candidates,” Hart said in the release. “After a thorough process that involved interviews with City Council, department directors, community leaders and members of the police department, we were able to select between win-win options.”
This story was originally published December 9, 2019 at 3:00 PM.
