While the Dallas City Council was on summer recess, news of homicides more than doubling in the region in June ’22 was reported by The Dallas Express.
Violent crime — a primary focus of Dallas Eric Mayor Johnson’s initiatives — was up 13% over the previous year for June.
Violent crime includes the categories of Homicide, Assault, and Robbery offenses. There were 1,068 such crimes reported in June 2022, compared to 945 in June 2021.
Murders in Dallas jumped from six in June ’21 to 13 this year, an increase of 116.6%.
Six of the 13 homicides occurred in Districts 4 and 13, represented by Carolyn King Arnold and Gay Donnell Willis, respectively. In other words, the number of homicides in the city last June was equaled this June by homicides in only two districts.
Both Arnold and Willis have been contacted by The Dallas Express numerous times to see what, if anything, is being done in their districts to combat crime increases, especially murder. To date, neither council member has responded.
The other seven Dallas Districts with murders reported in June 2022 are District 1, led by July’s Crime Boss of the Month Chad West, District 2, District 3, District 5, District 7, District 9, and District 11. Each of those districts had one murder in July ’22.
Early in July, Johnson told The Dallas Express that Dallas Police Department (DPD) could not fight crime alone, and it must be a community effort with leaders and neighborhoods working with law enforcement,” pointing city residents to his Summer of Safety program to help curb violence.
Will murders continue to increase in the City of Dallas? No one can yet say, but the LexisNexis Community Crime Map shows three murders in July in Dallas.
District 4 was home to at least one homicide, per the LexisNexis data.
According to a police department news release, an 18-year-old male was fatally shot in District 4s’s east Oak Cliff on July 10, prompting Dallas police to search for a potential suspect, The Dallas Express reported.
Officers responded to the 4400 block of South Marsalis Avenue around 11:15 p.m. and discovered the victim with gunshot wounds in the parking lot of the Time Saver convenience store.
Curdarrius Chapple was identified as the victim by police. Officers stated that Chapple was still alive when officers arrived on the scene. Dallas Fire-Rescue took him to the hospital, where he died from his injuries, as reported by The Dallas Express.
The suspect, an unknown male in his early 20s, entered the store and fired multiple shots at Chapple. DPD is still investigating the motive of the shooter and the circumstances surrounding the murder.
In Willis’ District 13, there were no reported murders in July based on the LexisNexis Community Crime Map. However, The Dallas Express is awaiting July’s crime scores that are pulled from the official City of Dallas crime database.
The Dallas Express 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.