Texas Car Thefts Up 10% in 2022

Car thefts in America have reached their highest level in over a decade. More than one million car thefts nationwide for the first time since 2008.

Texas accounted for 105,000, second only to California, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau .

"A lot of these guys will go steal a car or carjack someone for their car, so they can use it in the commission of other crimes. Other robberies. Other assaults. Drive-by shootings. Whatever it is. The element they want to use at that time," says Douglas Griffith, president of the Houston Police Officers' Union .

Griffith says many stolen cars are driven straight to Mexico.

"If they can get it across the border, then there's no record of it down there. So we have a lot of our vehicles from Texas and California that end up in Mexico."

The most common vehicle stolen in Houston is pickup trucks.

"We see a lot of F-250s, F-350s, Dodge Rams, because they can use them to haul things. They can use them to steal these ATMs. They can bust through walls with them. Then they just drop them off somewhere and leave them," says Griffith.