Mass Shooting In Austin, Texas Brings Plans To Address Violent Crimes

CREDIT: Nuri Vallbona/Reuters

After a mass shooting on East Sixth Street in Austin, Texas saw one dead and over a dozen injured, the state of downtown is receiving special attention in public sessions where different views of causes and possible solutions are being discussed.

The city's Downtown Commission has recently heard statistics and context based around the state of crime in the area. There have been 27 violent gun crimes up until the end of June, not counting the 34 incidents in 2020, and 35 incidents in 2019.

There were 22 people shot this year, as well as four deaths and eight shootings.

It has been made clear by Austin Police Department Commander Jeff Greenwalt that it will take roughly several years of analysis to figure out why downtown crime is rising as high as those in bigger cities such as Houston and Baltimore. 

"What we're hearing now from the criminals themselves and a lot of the confidential informants is they know they're not being held accountable and know their competitors in the drug trades are carrying guns, so they have to carry as well. It's kind of a domino effect that has started with no fear of any sort of punishment from the criminal justice system. We have a dual-pronged problem of releasing violent offenders, and the bail reform push for PR bonds."

Information has been shared on the early success of the APD's Violence Intervention Program. This started as a citywide initiative in April, focusing on repeat offenders known to carry guns.

The program has been successful in 55 arrests of violent criminals and the seizure of over 100 firearms.

APD is just one of many entities planning to produce a diversion program that offers mental health and other services to misdemeanour offenders who constantly return to jail for nonviolent offences. "Our profession has been advocating for some time for something like this," said Interim Police Chief Joseph Chacon.

Travis County Attorney Delia Garza has said investment into social service programs would eventually lessen a lot of the city's crime statistics.

"When people are making a 911 call we are responding to when something bad has already happened, and I urge us to think about what the community can do more upstream. When cases come into our office, our institutions have failed people so many times and brought things to the point where police are being called."

"This revolving door of people who are in poverty, suffering from mental illness and in the revolving door of our criminal justice system is not new. This has been here for decades...we need to think about investing in people before that 911 call gets made and before they're a case on a judge's docket."

District Attorney José Garza has stated that his office is focusing on violent crimes, having more resources and case building available if the police didn't have a revolving door of low-level offenders.

"What leads to increases in crime is instability in our communities, and if we want to be serious about addressing violent crime and crime generally we must root out instability in our community in every way we can."