HARRIS COUNTY, Texas – A Houston man accused of fatally shooting his neighbor is now held on a $5 million bond after more than 500 local residents signed a petition requesting he be denied bail.
Christopher Braziel, who reportedly did not know Heather Smith personally but lived in her northwest Harris County neighborhood, is charged with capital murder following the October break-in and shooting.
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The $5 million bond was set due to Braziel’s history of troubling behavior in the neighborhood, including alleged incidents where he reportedly pointed firearms at other residents’ homes.
In response to these past actions and Smith’s death, neighbors gathered over 500 signatures, urging authorities to keep Braziel from returning to the community.
“There are certain instances where we can hold somebody at no bond. One of them is obviously if they violate a bond condition, we can have what’s called an 11B hearing. And if the judge believes that we’ve proved that violation, they can be held at no bond,” said Assistant District Attorney Lara Hogue.
Hogue said they can also hold people without bond in capital murder cases. She explains the issue with Braziel’s case that has made it difficult to do that right now.
“This case is very early on and in order for me to prove what I have to prove in a proof evidence hearing, I would have to show by clear and convincing evidence that it is probable that we are going to seek the death penalty in this capital murder case because the case is so new. We’re still waiting on all the evidence to come in,” she said. “Then once I have all the evidence and evaluate it, then (the) defense can present mitigation, which can take some time if they have experts. And then it eventually gets presented to the capital committee in our office. And so that’s not a process that happens in a short period of time on these very serious cases. And so what we did was basically ask the judge to set a sufficient bond.”
Hogue also explained the law as it applies to bond.
“Under the law, everybody is entitled to a bond unless we prove that they violated their bond, we prove that they have two prior felony convictions where they went to TDC. If. We proved them under Texas Article 11A or 11B and then death penalty cases can be can be handled differently with that proof evidence hearing that I talked about previously,” she said.