Paul Shaffer

UPDATE: Why did DA José Garza's office just let Frank Bonner walk on the murder of homeless woman Kelly Meazell? Here's what prosecutors got from police: - Kelly was shot in the neck at close range, with signs of being robbed after. - A nearby security camera caught a man running after Kelly, then jumping into a car and speeding off. - A tipster told police what happened: Bonner killed Kelly because she owed him drug money, then came home that night in bloody clothes, bagged them up, and took off. - Two days later, police got a 911 call from Bonner's apartment because a woman was being held at gunpoint. He ran before officers arrived. - Police searched the apartment and found a Nest camera in his living room recording the night Kelly was killed. Six minutes after the shooting, Bonner walks in, strips off his bloody clothes, and stuffs them into a kitchen trash bag. He tells the woman with him to power off her phone then washes his hands. He tells her to mop the floor, and then says, on his own camera, out loud: "Homicide will be in this hoe, right." Then he tells her to misdirect police about his timing and whereabouts. Garza's office reviewed all of this and rejected the murder charge two weeks ago -- after years of dropping Bonner's prior cases for aggravated robbery, drug felonies, evading arrest, tampering with evidence, contraband in jail, and felon-with-firearm. Bonner's pending aggravated assault case was also dismissed in the meantime. This was a separate shooting where he put three bullets in a man's leg over a crack baggie. The reason given was that the victim wouldn't testify. But prosecutors don't need a cooperative victim to pursue a man who shot someone in broad daylight -- not with shell casings, surveillance, 911 audio, medical records, and a record a mile long. They chose not to fight that one either. So after a trail of victims, including a dead homeless woman, Frank Bonner is back on Austin's streets.