Two of Texas’s most wanted men are off the streets — one pulled over during a routine traffic stop, the other tracked to an apartment complex — and neither arrest came quietly.
The Texas Department of Public Safety announced the capture of Carl James Hegert, 40, a Texas 10 Most Wanted Sex Offender, on February 18, 2026, in Houston. Less than a week later, Brien Keith Coleman, 39, a Texas 10 Most Wanted Fugitive, was arrested in Waco on February 23. Both men had been the subject of active warrants, and both had long, documented histories with Texas law enforcement. Their captures underscore a steady — if sometimes slow — machinery of justice grinding forward across the state.
Hegert: A Decade of Charges, Finally Caught
Hegert’s record is, to put it plainly, extensive. Since 2006, he’s racked up convictions ranging from theft of a firearm and sexual assault of a child to assault causing bodily injury to a family member, failure to register as a sex offender, and manufacture and delivery of a controlled substance. He had been wanted since October 2025, facing a Waller County larceny warrant and a San Jacinto County warrant for failing to comply with sex offender registration requirements.
It’s that last charge — failure to register — that tends to signal something more troubling: a person actively working to stay invisible. DPS Criminal Investigations Division Special Agents, Texas Highway Patrol Troopers assigned to the Texas Anti-Gang Violent Crimes Unit, and members of the U.S. Marshals Gulf Coast Violent Offenders Fugitive Task Force located him at an apartment complex in Houston and took him into custody without incident, according to DPS.
No Crime Stoppers reward will be paid in connection with Hegert’s arrest. The agency confirmed the capture didn’t result from a Crime Stoppers tip — meaning investigators tracked him down the old-fashioned way.
Coleman: Bonded Out, Then Caught Again
Coleman’s story has a particular edge to it. He was first arrested in September 2023 on a charge of indecency with a child by sexual contact in McLennan County. Then, in December 2025, he was picked up again — this time for violating a protective order — and was subsequently bonded out of jail. A warrant for the original indecency charge was issued on December 29, 2025, and Coleman apparently decided not to stick around to face it.
That’s the catch with bond: it assumes the person will show up. Coleman didn’t. But DPS Special Agents, members of the U.S. Marshals Lone Star Fugitive Task Force, and Texas Highway Patrol Troopers coordinated a traffic stop in Waco that ended his run. As reported by CBS Austin, Coleman was taken into custody without further incident. No Crime Stoppers reward will be paid for his arrest, either.
A Broader Pattern in 2026
How significant are these two arrests in the larger picture? Fairly significant, actually. DPS confirmed that law enforcement agencies have now arrested 11 Texas 10 Most Wanted Fugitives and Sex Offenders in 2026 alone — including eight sex offenders and one gang member. That’s a pace that suggests the program, which relies heavily on inter-agency coordination and public tips, is functioning as intended.
Still, for every name crossed off the list, another eventually takes their place. Texas’s most wanted roster is never empty for long, and the cases that land on it — like Hegert’s or Coleman’s — are rarely simple. They tend to involve years of prior contact with the system, missed opportunities, and, ultimately, a community left to absorb the consequences in the meantime.
The list keeps moving. So do the agents working it.
