DALLAS — Dallas Police Department crime statistics show the city saw a steady decline in violent crimes in 2022 after peaks in 2020 and 2021 -- with some exceptions.
In regards to murders, the city saw a slight drop, with a total of 214 victims and 207 incidents in 2022.
This continues a decrease which has been happening since 2020, when the city counted a total of 254 victims and 242 incidents.
Victims counts each individual person affected by a crime, while an incident counts each individual report. For example: If someone fires a gun into a car with four people in it, that's one incident with four victims.
In comparison to 2021, the year-over-year decrease is much smaller, although still a consistent drop. In 2021, Dallas counted a total of 222 victims and 215 incidents.
Here are the numbers since 2019:
- 2019: 205 victims, 197 incidents
- 2020: 254 victims, 242 incidents
- 2021: 222 victims, 215 incidents
- 2022: 214 victims, 207 incidents
Assault victims and incidents saw a similar year-over-year decrease from 2021 -- but 2022 numbers did not below what the city saw in 2020 and 2019. Last year, there were 7,965 assault victims for 5,648 incidents.
Here's a look at the past four years of assault charges:
- 2019: 6,442 victims, 4,991 incidents
- 2020: 7,045 victims, 5,954 incidents
- 2021: 8,027 victims, 5,873 incidents
- 2022: 7,695 victims, 5,648 incidents
In a previous interview with WFAA, Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia said violent crime overall in 2022 was down close to 5.5%.
While the year saw crime drop overall, there was a period of the year between March and May where the city saw higher crime than any of the same period in past years.
With a total of 1,174 victims, May 2022 saw not just more violent crime victims reported than any other May from the past 4 years, but more violent crime victims reported than any any other month -- period -- in the past four years.
March and April 2022 saw similarly high violent crime counts, too, with 984 and 1,017 victims respectively.
The reason for this springtime jump, compared to relatively lower violent crime in other months, may have to due with a rash of shootings in that period -- including a concert shooting in early April which saw 16 people shot.
March through May also saw the highest number of assault victims reported, rising from 697 (in March) to 701 (in April) to 797 (in May) before dropping back down to 664 victims in June.
May 2022 saw the second-highest number of assault victims reported in the last four years behind only July 2021, which had 815 victims reported.