Car break-ins at popular Austin trails caught on camera

AUSTIN, Texas - City of Austin Park Rangers say they’ve noticed recent car break-ins at some of the city’s most popular trails. 

Visitors say this has been an ongoing problem for years, and some have now taken security into their own hands.

Car break-ins at Austin trails

The backstory:

On Sunday, the City of Austin Park Rangers posted that they were aware of the recent break-ins that had been happening at Bull Creek, Mt. Bonnell, the St. Edward’s Greenbelt, and other trail hotspots. 

They advised the public not to leave any valuables in their car, have nothing visible inside the vehicle, and double check that they locked everything before leaving. 

But for those familiar with Austin’s trails, this sort of advice has unfortunately become common practice.

"You know not to come with things, not to come with valuables, but sometimes they don't know, they don't care. They just break it to see what's inside, so no one’s safe," said Shelby. Just minutes after arriving at Bull Creek, the pair decided it was safer to leave rather than risk losing their car’s window.

Local perspective:

"Your first thought is, okay, should we even be here? And like, is this even safe?," said Shelby, a woman visiting Bull Creek on Monday afternoon with her friend, Alyssya. 

The two were shocked at what they saw when they entered the trail’s parking lot.

"It's evident that like every single car here had their window broken at some point," said Alyssa. 

Littered among the gravel were several mounds of glass, where cars had their windows broken, items stolen, and the owners left behind to deal with the mess.

"We've lived here, what, 10 years now, and it's been something that's more and more recurring," said Alyssa.

Man records break-ins

Dig deeper:

That feeling of helplessness is what motivated one man to take action.

"The biggest thing probably was my frustration with just seeing it happen so often," says James Baumgardner, who’s lived in Austin for the past four years. 

He’s had his car broken into at least three times and has seen it happen to dozens of others along Bull Creek. Oftentimes, when he calls 311, he says there was little that could be done without any evidence.

"So, I was like, okay, then let's get the evidence," says James. "It'd be pretty easy just to set up a camera there, you know, for the day, for the weekend and see if I could get lucky and get some evidence there."

It wouldn’t take him long to get a hit. On July 12, the first weekend he had set up a hidden camera along Bull Creek, he captured a break in. A man could be seen removing the back left window of a truck before diving into the backseat. In just about one minute, he jumped back out of the truck into a getaway car which then took off.

"In a weird way, it is kind of impressive how quickly they get in and out," says James. "I know they got it down to a science. And in this case, too, I was luckily able to get in contact with the person whose car got broken into, and he said he had a wallet in there that I guess he had $1,500."

After recording the break-in, James says he called 311 and was recommended to get in contact with the Austin Police Department. 

He showed FOX 7 emails he had sent to those officers on July 12 and 13, offering the video of the break-in as evidence and asking if there was anyone else he should talk to in order to make sure the evidence was received. He then sent a follow-up email on July 23, but says he still has heard nothing back.

"Still haven't gotten a response, really. In a case like this, where we have license plates, we have multiple videos of the incident, we got the victim, to me, it seems kind of like a layup," says James. "Just getting to the point where you can get that evidence from somebody has been a lot more difficult than I feel it should be."

James also attempted to file reports online but says it can be difficult since he is not the victim. He showed FOX 7 a photo of one of the reports supposedly being denied by APD. Under the reason, it said, "We must have the victim’s information to proceed. Please have the victim make this report, as the victim has your videos and all the details necessary for an investigation."

FOX 7 has reached out to APD on why James has not yet received a response to the break-in. We will update the article if a response is given.

Although James has yet to hear back from APD, he says the support he’s received online has been overwhelming. He posted video of the break-in to Reddit, where it received thousands of upvotes and comments.

"Like 95% of the crowd was, ‘Hey, what can we do to stop these people?’" says James. "The number of people who are like, ‘Okay, I'll go sit out there for three hours, you know, I'll do this.’ People were asking me what type of camera it was, how they can get one. So, I think people are just kind of fed up with it."

But it hasn’t always been up to citizens to try and capture videos of these break-ins on their own. 

From 2022-2025, a pilot program for surveillance cameras was set up along 15 parks and trails in Austin, including Bull Creek and St. Edward’s Park. Many of those areas saw a decrease in burglaries during that time. 

At the beginning of this year, an agenda item was removed from the Austin City Council, which would have entered the city into a five-year deal with the company behind the cameras, LiveView Technologies. 

The contract was met with pushback from protesters who believed the cameras would lead to privacy issues. The vote would be postponed and was never picked back up again by the City Council.

Crime and Public SafetyAustin