Fort Worth crime drops as homicides plunge nearly 40%
Fort Worth is now the fastest-growing large city in the country, but what's not growing is crime, a trend reflected in crime stats for the first three quarters of 2026.
CBS Texas' Briseida Holguin sat down with Police Chief Eddie Garcia to go over the third-quarter crime report. It shows a 7.1% decrease in offenses such as aggravated assault, murder and burglary compared to last year.
"I mean, when you look at the third quarter results, murder was down about 30%, but when you look at it overall, year to date it's down almost 40%. I know we have two months to go, and one life is too many, but we really want to continue to go on that trajectory to make Fort Worth one of the safest, if not the safest large city in the country," said Garcia.
Yearly comparisons show drastic changes in crimes against persons and property from 2024 to 2026. Garcia says data and technology are powerful tools in the effort.
"We're really looking at where we're deploying our officers and things of that nature from a data lens, and that's something that we're going to do. Leveraging technology is something that's incredibly important to us as well. We have to leverage technology. We can't have an officer on every street," said Garcia.
With a population of more than a million people, Fort Worth is reporting lower homicide, robbery, and aggravated assault numbers than Dallas and San Antonio. Police and city leaders credit this success to the partnership they've created.
"We've set a foundation to support our police officers, to support our community, recruit, retain the best officers, make sure they have everything they need to do their jobs, and as a result, you're seeing our crime stats go down," said Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker.
City Manager Jay Chapa also credits community engagement, something he says Garcia has prioritized since joining the department a little over a year ago.
"I think one of the big things is, I think he's continued what Neil Noakes did as far as reaching out to the community and making sure the community overall is involved," said Chapa.
