TRAVIS COUNTY, Texas — The Travis County District Attorney's Office is looking back on 2022 as a year of hard work. The office wrote an end-of-year letter, outlining its accomplishments from last year.
Here are the three things to know.
First, Travis County got back into the courtroom. Criminal jury trials resumed in March of 2022. Since then, the district attorney's office has tried 27 cases involving crimes of violence.
Second, gun violence is still a big problem. It's the No. 1 cause of non-accidental death in the county. Last year, the district attorney’s office said it secured more than 5,700 indictments and more than 4,300 convictions for all criminal offenses, and it has an over 90% prosecution rate for all gun crimes brought to the office.
Third, the office is working on criminal justice reformation. The district attorney's office expanded pre-trial diversion programs for non-violent cases to increase opportunities for services for substance use and mental health disorders.
“In 2022, we continued to implement evidence-based strategies to support a safer Travis County for all communities,” Garza said. “We focused our efforts on holding people accountable who commit acts of violence, meeting the needs of victims of crime and their families to find effective ways to help them heal, and working to prevent and reduce gun violence; that is how we make our community more safe.”
The district attorney’s office also diverted resources from prosecuting abortion or families of children who are transgender to prosecute acts of violence in the community.