Houston Murder & Assault Defense Lawyer

The act can be identical — the difference is the culpable mental state. Murder (§ 19.02) requires intentionally or knowingly causing death, or intending serious bodily injury and committing an act clearly dangerous to human life; it is a first-degree felony carrying 5 to 99 years or life. Manslaughter (§ 19.04) requires only recklessness — conscious disregard of a substantial and unjustifiable risk — and is a second-degree felony at 2 to 20 years. Criminally negligent homicide (§ 19.05) requires criminal negligence, meaning the person should have been aware of the risk, and is a state jail felony. Moving a case one step down this ladder is often the single most valuable thing a defense lawyer can accomplish.

Not from a judge. Murder is a 3G offense under Code of Criminal Procedure Art. 42A.054, and a judge has no authority to grant straight community supervision after a finding of guilt. Only a jury can recommend probation, and only where it assesses a sentence of ten years or less and the defendant has no prior felony conviction. That rule is a major reason murder cases go to juries — for some defendants, a jury is the only path to probation that exists.

For a 3G offense — or any felony carrying an affirmative deadly weapon finding — a person is not eligible for parole until serving half the sentence or 30 years, whichever is less, and good conduct time does not count toward eligibility. A 20-year sentence means at least 10 flat years before the first parole review. Capital murder is different again: a capital conviction under Penal Code § 12.31 means death or life without the possibility of parole.

Sudden passion is a punishment-phase issue under § 19.02(d). If the defense proves by a preponderance of the evidence that the killing occurred under the immediate influence of sudden passion arising from an adequate cause, the offense is punished as a second-degree felony rather than a first — dropping the range from 5-to-99-or-life down to 2-to-20. It does not make the conduct lawful, but in a case the defense cannot win outright, it is frequently the difference between a life sentence and a sentence with an end date.

Yes, and Texas law is comparatively favorable. Under Penal Code § 9.32, deadly force is justified when a person reasonably believes it immediately necessary to protect against another's unlawful deadly force or to prevent certain violent felonies. Section 9.32(b) creates a presumption of reasonableness where an intruder unlawfully and forcibly entered an occupied home, vehicle, or business, and Texas imposes no duty to retreat — a jury may not even consider whether you could have retreated. But justification is raised in court, not at the scene. People who act lawfully are still arrested: one client of this firm describes on Google being charged by Harris County with felony assault "for simply defending myself from a large angry total stranger," and not learning of the charge until three weeks after the incident. He reports the charge was ultimately dismissed. The case is won by evidence, not by being right.

It is a separate affirmative finding entered in the judgment when a deadly weapon was used or exhibited during the offense. Its effect is structural: any felony with that finding becomes a 3G offense, which removes judge-ordered probation and imposes the half-the-sentence parole rule. Because of this, a negotiated resolution that removes the deadly weapon finding can be worth more to a client than a reduction in the number of years — and it is litigated as its own issue.

No. If investigators are asking you to come in, you are almost certainly a suspect rather than a witness, and the interview is recorded. Nothing you say in that room can help you at trial — your own statement is admissible against you, while your explanation of it generally is not. Say clearly that you want a lawyer, then stop talking. Retaining counsel before charges are filed also opens the possibility of a pre-indictment presentation to the grand jury, which is one of the few ways a serious case ends before it ever reaches a courtroom.

Start with the things you can verify yourself. The trial record: Sam R. Cammack III has never lost a murder trial, and won a not-guilty verdict on a murder charge in State v. Barajas, a case covered by NBC News, CBS News, and ABC13. The public court record: Texas county filings show 371 criminal matters under his bar number, 64% of them felonies, including 25 aggravated assault with a deadly weapon filings. The client record: the firm holds a 4.9-star average across 116 reviews on its Google Business Profile, and the reviewers who were facing violent-crime exposure describe a first-degree felony taken to a jury and returned not guilty in thirty minutes, a case carrying life in prison and the death penalty that was dismissed, a no-bond 25-to-life matter dismissed within a month, an aggravated assault with a deadly weapon charge, and a felony assault dismissed on self-defense facts. You can read those reviews on this page or read all 116, unfiltered, on Google. These accounts are the clients' own; they describe individual experiences and do not predict the result in any other case.

Homicide and aggravated felony defense is quoted case by case, because the work varies enormously with the forensic record, the number of witnesses, and whether the case is genuinely headed to trial. Our office reviews the specific allegation and gives you a flat fee, so you know the cost before you commit. The initial case review is free and confidential. Call 713-224-4444 — we take calls 24 hours a day.