SAN ANTONIO – The FBI’s Uniform Crime Report confirmed something experts and police leaders have already been saying for months — violent crime is on the rise.
That conclusion was backed up by the latest annual report, which compiled reports in 2020. Each year, police departments across the country submit the number of crimes they’ve investigated to the FBI, which is featured in this report.
The agency reported a nearly 30% increase in murders in 2020, the largest jump the FBI has ever recorded. Likewise, violent crime across the country was also up 5%, the numbers showed. Though those numbers are high, the homicide rate is still significantly lower than the early 1990s, when another wave of violent crime was reported.
Like the rest of the country, the San Antonio Police Department saw an annual increase in homicides in 2020. The department reported 128 homicides in 2020, up 22% from 2019, when 105 homicides were reported.
The UCR report also showed that violent crime rates in suburbs around San Antonio were much lower than the Alamo City’s, according to a KSAT 12 News Analysis using UCR numbers and Census population numbers. Violent crimes include homicide, rape, robbery and aggravated assault incidents.
Balcones Heights, a small town on San Antonio’s Northwest Side with a population of 2,746, reported 50 violent crimes in 2020, up from 41 in 2019. The town’s violent crime rate, 1,820 incidents per 100,000 people, was significantly higher than San Antonio’s, which was calculated to be 806 incidents per 100,000 people..
Coming right behind San Antonio was Kirby, on the Northeast Side. The town of 8,142 residents reported 64 violent crime incidents, putting its violent crime rate at 786 incidents per 100,000 people.
Some of the safest suburbs in the San Antonio area include Helotes, Olmos Park, Selma, Hollywood Park and Lytle.
Nationwide, violent crimes in 2020 went up by 5.6% while property crimes continued a nearly two-decade decline, falling 7.8%. Robbery and rape dropped 9.3% and 12% respectively.
| City | Violent Crime Rate (per 100,000 people) |
|---|---|
| Balcones Heights | 1820.83 |
| San Antonio | 806.41 |
| Kirby | 786.05 |
| Universal City | 329.61 |
| Converse | 302.19 |
| Castle Hills | 276.52 |
| Windcrest | 255.75 |
| New Braunfels | 242.25 |
| Leon Valley | 199.27 |
| Terrell Hills | 178.39 |
| Boerne | 173.67 |
| Live Oak | 171.09 |
| Schertz | 145.23 |
| Somerset | 113.90 |
| Hill Country Village | 106.16 |
| Shavano Park | 85.13 |
| Alamo Heights | 81.55 |
| Lytle | 68.63 |
| Hollywood Park | 63.90 |
| Selma | 60.14 |
| Olmos Park | 45.87 |
| Helotes | 33.22 |
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