Houston crime data: Taking a closer look at assault numbers across the city

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Shots fired at a busy Home Depot parking lot Wednesday afternoon got us wondering how safe the city of Houston is these days.

ABC13's Neighborhood Safety Tracker uses data from the Houston Police Department and helps shed light on crime trends across the city.

It shows most criminal activity is down over the past 12 months - including homicides, robberies, burglaries, thefts, and assaults. So Eyewitness News took a closer look at assault trends for the purposes of this story.

There was an instance Wednesday evening in southwest Houston, where three men were shot in a parking lot outside of a Wingstop. That's considered aggravated assault since none of them are expected to die as a result of their injuries.

Overall, assaults are down 2% in the city from Oct. 10, 2022, to Oct. 10, 2023. But that doesn't mean individual neighborhoods were immune from increased instances of that crime.

For example, the number of assaults in downtown Houston is up nearly 17% in the last year based on this data. There were also big swings in the other direction, as the area around Almeda Mall saw a 17% decrease in assaults over that time.

When ABC13 asked HPD how it was possible that such swings could exist, they said that information couldn't be quantified.

You can use the Neighborhood Safety Tracker to look at crime data in your part of the city on our website.

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