Grand Jury Declines To Indict Officer Over Shooting

A grand jury Tuesday declined to indict an Austin Police Department officer for fatally shooting a woman during a standoff earlier this year outside a North Austin apartment.

The case stems from a May 25 SWAT standoff outside an apartment near the intersection of North Lamar Boulevard and Brentwood Street. Police responded to the scene after the woman’s boyfriend reported she had sent him a series of troubling text messages and asked officers to check in on her.

Police attempted to speak to the distraught woman over the course of three hours, but she refused to come out of her apartment, reports KEYE-TV. The woman reportedly demanded police leave the scene and threatened to shoot the officers, according to the district attorney’s office.

APD officers spent about three hours negotiating with the woman, who would occasionally walk just outside her door—at times armed with a handgun.

According to the DA’s office, police at one point fired a beanbag projectile at the women with no effect. When she emerged next, she pointed a gun to herself and then to police.

That’s when SWAT team member Robert Pfaff fired three times from his rifle, killing her. The woman was identified as Cassandra Bolin. She was 31.

After a thorough review of the evidence, a Travis County grand jury opted to no-bill the officer, meaning they won’t seek criminal charges against him for Bolin’s death.