Texas Man's 90-Day Sentence for Killing Neighbor Sparks Outrage

Heartbroken parents whose son was killed as he slept when a neighbor accidentally fired through their shared wall have been left reeling after learning the shooter will serve just 90 days in jail.

Texas State University (TSU) student Austin Salyer was asleep in bed around midnight on September 16, 2021, when a bullet fired by his neighbor, Gabriel Brown, went through a shared wall and passed through both of Salyer's lungs before lodging in his right arm. The 20-year-old woke and managed to crawl across the room before dying from his injuries at his home in San Marcos, Texas, The University Star, a TSU student-run newspaper, reported.

Brown, who is now 24, said he had been trying to modify a gun when it discharged. He turned himself in to police and, although he was not arrested, he was later indicted and pleaded guilty to criminally negligent homicide. His initial sentence of 180 days in jail has now been halved to 90 days. His family are asking Hays County courts to review the decision, suggesting it represents a miscarriage of justice.

Brown's original 180-day jail term was made up of 18 days in custody twice a year for five years—to mark Salyer's birthday and the anniversary of the shooting. However, the period to be spent in jail each time was reduced to nine-day terms, cutting the full period behind bars to 90 days. It is unclear why the sentence was reduced.

Newsweek has reached out to the office of the Hays County courts' district clerk by email for further information and comment.

Salyer, a junior studying criminal justice and military science, was an only child and his parents, Rodney and Bonnie Salyer, say they have been left bereft.

"We've got our decades left to live without him," Rodney Salyer told The University Star in November last year. "He was our only child. So it's just us. We don't have other children to turn to. We'll never see grandchildren. We won't have anybody to help care for us when we're older. We won't be able to do all the plans that we had with him, so it's something we're going to have to live with for many, many years with a lot of pain."

Brown's maximum sentence could only be two years, due to the charge of criminally negligent homicide—rather than manslaughter which carries a sentence of up to 99 years.

Salyer's father said he felt that even two years couldn't compare to the loss of an entire lifetime for his son and the decades of pain ahead for his family. However, the eventual sentence was measured in days not years.

Austin Salyer had signed a contract with the U.S. Army shortly before his death and was excited about his future. He had gone to bed early that night because he had to be up at 4.30 a.m. for a marching exercise with his platoon.

Sharing her final text conversation with her son—their last contact with each other—Bonnie Salyer told local news channel Fox 7: "Austin texted me at 8:53 p.m. and said, 'I'm going to bed,' you know, 'good night, sweet dreams. I love you.' And I said, 'ok, I love you too.' And then I waited about three minutes and I said, 'keep making us proud' and that was the last text I got from him."

The next morning, at 6:00 a.m., Salyer's mother checked his location on her phone, wondering where he was with his platoon. But she was shocked when she saw his phone was still inside his apartment. "I thought, 'oh my gosh, he overslept,'" she said, explaining why she began calling him.

By 11.15 a.m. he still hadn't answered, and she began to worry. She asked one of his friends to check on him, who arrived at his building to find it swarming with fire crews and paramedics.

A police officer later called to break the news over the phone that her son had been found dead.

The couple say their suffering has been magnified by the justice system. "As a victim, you're so handcuffed and disadvantaged compared to what the criminal has available to them for loopholes," Rodney Salyer said, adding: "It is so lopsided against the victim to be able to get any kind of justice."

The Salyers said they have asked for a hearing to review the sentencing change, but their request has been denied, Fox 7 reported.

The case is not the first time an innocent victim has been shot through the walls of their home.

A similar tragedy occurred in October 2021, when Maxwell Williamson was cleaning his gun and accidentally fired through a wall, killing his neighbor, 36-year-old TV actress Carlether Foley, who was asleep. Williamson is reported to have knocked on the door of her apartment in Georgia and left a note offering to pay for the damage, unaware she had been hit.

In April, 2022, a four-year-old boy was left fighting for his life after being shot as he slept in bed by drive-by shooters who fired at his family's house in a "random" attack in Detroit, Michigan.

Another incident left a 10-year-old and 19-year-old with gunshot wounds when a gunman opened fire outside their home. Investigators said it was unclear whether the attack, in Louisiana in January 2022, was targeted.