Southern Dallas has been seeing a rise in Council Member Carolyn King Arnold’s District 4, with crimes like motor vehicle theft and burglary jumping up year over year in October.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, Arnold’s district clocked the third-highest Crime Score increase last month, logging a 27.2% bump. Year to date, criminal activity has been ticking up in the council district despite the best efforts of Dallas police.
District 4 is situated south of Downtown, comprising most everything north of Loop 12 but south of the Trinity River between I-35E and I-45, including the Cedar Crest and Five Mile Creek neighborhoods.
As of November 21, there have been 1,183 auto thefts logged by the City this year, marking a 42.7% hike from the 829 offenses recorded in 2022 during the same period, per the City of Dallas crime overview dashboard.
Drug offenses are up by about 48.7%. Some 843 incidents are on the books this year compared to the 567 reported in 2022 year to date. Furthermore, burglaries — of both homes and businesses — saw an uptick of 5.3%, with such crimes jumping from 285 to 300.
The Dallas Police Department’s ability to fight crime has been hampered by its long-standing staff shortage. There are fewer than 3,200 officers in the field despite a City analysis recommending that some 4,000 are needed to properly maintain public safety.
The shortage has been especially felt in Downtown Dallas, where significantly higher crime rates are logged compared to Fort Worth’s city center, which is reportedly patrolled by a special neighborhood police unit that works alongside private security guards.
Council Member Arnold’s office could not immediately be reached for comment.
The Dallas Express, The People’s Paper, believes that important information about the city, such as crime rates and trends, should be easily accessible to you. Dallas has more crime per capita than hotspots like Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and New York, according to data from the FBI’s UCR database.
How did your area stack up on crime? Check out our interactive Crime Map to compare all Dallas City Council Districts. Curious how we got our numbers? Check out our methodology page here.