Parker Man Accused Of Shooting Austin Police Officer
DENVER (CBS4) - A man from Parker is in jail in Austin, Texas. Investigators say he shot and killed a police officer during a drunken rage inside a Walmart.
The shooting was early Friday morning after an officer responded to reports of a drunken man inside the store.
Brandon Daniel, 24, attended both high school and college in Colorado. He moved to Austin about a year ago.
"We lost a really good, solid human being today. And it's a loss for the city," Chief Art Acevedo with Austin police said.
Daniel allegedly shot officer Jaime Padron point-blank in the neck after the two began to struggle.
"He was a laid back guy. I never heard him raise his voice," Daniel's roommate told CBS4.
His roommate, who did not want to appear on camera, was shocked to hear about the shooting. He told an Austin newspaper that Daniel was a "quiet computer nerd" and a "good person." He went out Thursday night to buy Xanax.
"I heard him leave, but then I heard him come back. So I didn't think anything of it. I just went to bed."
Daniel's Facebook page says he was a student at Chaparral High School and a graduate of Colorado State University with a degree in computer science and math. In Austin he works as a software engineer for Hewlett-Packard.
It wasn't his first brush with the law. In 2007 he was charged with 10 misdemeanors in Colorado, including possession of marijuana and attempting to elude police. In February of this year he was arrested for DUI. Now he faces much more serious charges. If he's convicted it could send him to death row.
According to this arrest affidavit, Daniel fired a second shot in the direction of two Walmart employees who were trying to help. Those two men grabbed Daniel and subdued him until police arrived.
