AUSTIN, Texas – Travis County Sheriff Sr. Deputy Christopher Korzilius was killed in March 2020 in an early morning hours crash after St. Patrick’s Day in Austin. The 32-year-old deputy was on-duty when another vehicle smashed head-on into his patrol unit, sending the vehicle flying over a guardrail into a canyon. The county’s progressive district attorney Jose Garza refused to file charges against the offending driver. Now the deputy’s mother, Nancy Korzilius, is speaking out.
After Korzilius learned that Garza, a rogue activist prosecutor, would not file charges against the striking driver, she said she was “stunned” and called it “unconscionable,” Fox News Digital reported.
“I was stunned, I didn’t know what to say,” the distraught mother told the news outlet once she learned in January that Garza would not impanel a grand jury after the collision that killed her son.
The male driver of the other vehicle was traveling more than 80 mph in a 65 mph zone before failing to control his vehicle, crossing into oncoming traffic and smashing head-on into her son’s patrol unit, sending it over a guardrail and into a canyon, Korzilius said.
The deputy died in the crash from blunt force trauma. According to his mother, there were several troubling aspects about the moments following the traffic fatality, including the other driver not having a toxicology test until that afternoon and his claim that he swerved to avoid something in the road, which she said has not been corroborated.
Korzilius has previous experience serving on a grand jury. She believes there was sufficient evidence for the case to be heard and that she would have respected any decision the jurors made.
“I just couldn’t believe that they weren’t willing to present this case to a grand jury,” Korzilius noted. “I know you can agree or disagree with a jury, but it’s got to get to that point before the legal system even functions properly.”
“I’m very familiar with the process and realized it’s unconscionable and maybe even unconstitutional not to give this case a chance to be heard by a grand jury in Texas. The grand jury bills or no bills these cases, and they can move forward into the process of a jury trial, or they can be plea bargained, or many things can happen to them, but nothing will happen unless the grand jury reviews the case.”
During a February phone call, Korzilius urged the DA’s office to reconsider. She also scribed a statement to a prosecutor in the Vehicular Crimes Special Prosecutions Unit.
“Your decision has forever broken my trust in the county district attorney,” Korzilius wrote. “I am ashamed to say that for the rest of my life I will have to try and understand and explain to my family and friends how this decision happened and how [he] received no punishment for this crime, involuntary manslaughter.”
“Now the justice + law that my son gave his life to support has been denied. He did not deserve this either.”
The DA’s office denied her request to reconsider charges. She was told there was not enough evidence to proceed forward.
Jennifer Hackney-Szimanski is the Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas (CLEAT) public affairs director and a former Austin police officer. She told Fox News that video from a nearby business showed the other driver’s car traveling more than 100 mph and “hauling ass” around a turn. She agreed the case should have been presented to a grand jury.
“I used to work for the Austin Police Department in types of situations where there’s reckless, clear, reckless behavior, they would, at a minimum, present it to the grand jury because it’s a probable cause standard,” she said, adding that she “can’t imagine” that the totality of evidence would not have resulted in “at least negligent homicide.”
Moreover, Hackney-Szimanski, who is also a City Council member in Lakeway, expressed the belief that Garza’s office “didn’t even bother” to make sure Korzilius’ mother had the information before announcing no charges would be filed, which demonstrates a “disrespect for law enforcement.”
Garza’s campaign for district attorney was backed by progressive mega-donor George Soros, and he’s been widely criticized since taking office in January 2021. He campaigned on both “reimagining” policing in Austin (i.e. soft-on crime policies) and promising to prosecute police officers, which he’s done in unprecedented numbers.
