Texas man is charged in killing of Afghan refugee who fought alongside Green Berets

A Texas man has been charged with murder in the killing of an Afghan father who spent years fighting alongside U.S. Green Berets in Afghanistan.

The suspect, Katia Trevon Bougere, 31, was charged with shooting Abdul Rahman Waziri, also 31, in a dispute over parking in Houston. But Bougere hasn’t been arrested. Instead, he received a summons to appear in court next week, as if it were a traffic violation.

It’s the latest bizarre turn in a case that has sparked protests in Houston and prompted Green Berets to write letters to public officials demanding justice for their fallen former comrade.

“This indictment is just the beginning of the justice the Waziri family deserves,” said their attorney, Omar Khawaja.

“A husband and father was senselessly killed, and while we are grateful the grand jury returned a murder charge, it is outrageous that the man accused of taking his life is being allowed to appear by summons — not arrested, not handcuffed, not treated like the violent offender he is alleged to be.”

Asked why prosecutors didn’t issue an arrest warrant, a spokeswoman for the Harris County district attorney’s office responded with a brief statement.

“After a grand jury indicted the defendant, the clerk’s office issued a summons and he’s required to appear in court,” the statement read.

Efforts to reach Bougere were not successful, and it was not immediately clear if he had hired an attorney.

For five years, Waziri served in an elite unit tasked with helping to protect Green Berets in Afghanistan. He made it to the U.S. in 2021 and settled in Houston with his wife and two young daughters, only to be gunned down outside his apartment complex, Houston police said.

The gunman spoke to police officers at the scene but was let go without being charged, police said. Three months passed with no updates from law enforcement officials. But on Monday, a Houston grand jury returned an indictment charging Bougere with felony murder, according to a copy obtained by NBC News.

The charging documents include a “request for summons” that calls on Bougere to appear in court at 9 a.m. next Tuesday, Aug. 5.

“Failure to appear will result in a warrant being issued for your arrest,” it states.

David Kwok, an associate professor of law at the University of Houston Law Center, said state law allows for prosecutors to request a summons rather than an arrest warrant even for people accused of murder and other violent crimes. But it was unclear to him why the Harris County district attorney’s office would make such a decision in this case.

“It certainly provokes a lot of questions,” he said.

Eddie Cortes, a veteran defense attorney in Houston who has no connection to this case, said it is an unusual course of action but it typically comes down to whether the defendant has hired a lawyer who is known to prosecutors.

“They’re not going to do this with somebody who is just Joe Blow off the street,” said Cortes. “But they will if the guy has counsel, and he’s a well-respected longtime defense attorney here in town.”

Bougere hails from the Los Angeles area, according to online records, and he competed in the high jump at Lynwood High School.

In 2020, he filed paperwork in Texas to launch a company called Black Kartier Militia LLC, according to state records. No other information was immediately available.

The fatal shooting took place on the evening of April 27. Just before 9:10 p.m., Waziri drove into the parking lot of his apartment complex and hopped out of his Toyota Camry, according to surveillance footage provided to NBC News by the family’s attorney.

A man pulled up in a car behind his vehicle, leading to a confrontation that ended with Waziri lying on the ground, with multiple gunshot wounds.

The surveillance footage did not capture the shooting or the moments beforehand, but the other man was seen calmly walking away afterward.

Waziri was unarmed at the time, according to Khawaja, his family’s lawyer.

Houston police said in a statement that responding officers were approached at the scene by a man who identified himself as the shooter and said he and Waziri were “arguing over parking.” Officers interviewed the man and took possession of his gun but then let him go.

The spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office told NBC News in May that prosecutors were waiting for additional information from investigators before deciding whether to bring charges.

Abdullah Khan, Waziri’s brother, said that he was “very happy” with the grand jury’s decision, but that he doesn’t understand why it took so long for the suspect to be charged.

“It’s really strange to me,” Khan said. “Why did they not do this already with the evidence they had?”