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Residents upset by security officer’s past
Residents are upset that Chauna Thompson, a woman whose murder charges were dropped in the 2017 death of John Hernandez, was hired to patrol their neighborhood.
HOUSTON - Residents in a Houston-area subdivision are up in arms after finding out the security guard patrolling their neighborhood is the former deputy who was once charged in the John Hernandez murder.
Emails to the Balmoral Sub-Division Homeowner’s Association started pouring in about two weeks ago when residents found out their security officer was former Harris County Sheriff’s Deputy Chauna Sheffield Thompson, who was fired after Hernandez was killed in a Denny’s parking lot.
MORE: Chauna Thompson, charged with murder, terminated from Harris Co. Sheriff's Dept
After the video was recorded in the Denny’s parking lot in 2017 of Hernandez’s last moments alive, Harris County Sheriff’s Deputy Chauna Sheffield Thompson was fired and she and her husband were charged with murder.
Terry Thompson was sentenced to 25 years.
The murder charge against Chauna was dropped last year. Now she's turned up as a security guard in Humble in the Balmoral Sub-Division.
"We don’t want anything like that to happen here,” says Balmoral resident Marilyn Gilliam Mattax.
MORE: Prosecutors move to dismiss charge against Chauna Thompson
"Why would we have someone like that patrolling our neighborhood?” asks Balmoral Dennis Simmons.
"As a police officer she failed to protect and serve a gentleman while her husband murdered him,” adds resident John Barras.
Investigators say Terry Thompson put Hernandez in a chokehold, with his wife helping hold Hernandez at one point, after Hernandez urinated in the restaurant parking lot.
Residents of Balmoral say they fear for their family's safety having Sheffield Thompson patrolling their community.
“With the systemic racism that’s going around in America, it doesn’t surprise me that you would hire someone like that. Black people know that conversation we have to have when our kids go out, even just going to the pool, in order to make sure my son comes home every day and that’s not good. We shouldn’t have to live like that," says Simmons.
“If you can’t feel safe in your own home in your own neighborhood then where are you going to feel safe?” asks Barras.
“That’s a different type of fear every time you go out are you going to come back home? That’s scary to me,” says resident Darrell Daniel.
Earlier this month the Somerville City Council voted against hiring Sheffield Thompson as a police officer.
“If you’ve already shown disregard as a sworn officer I don’t see how you can continue to serve the people in that realm ... Try to find a different type of employment,” says Daniel.
The Developer “Land Tejas” and the HOA told me this afternoon Chauna Sheffield Thompson is no longer patrolling the Balmoral Sub-Division.
I reached out to Sheffield Thompson for comment through the security company and through her attorney.