Houston Police Union blames county's push for crime reform for officer-involved shootings

"On September 2nd Brandon Bell and his gang of dirt bags went out and carjacked some poor defenseless citizens," said Houston Police Officer Union President Joe Gamaldi.

The carjacking victim was a campaign worker for District D city council candidate Travis McGee.

"This is kind of personal because my family was out there as well," McGee said. "It could have been anyone of us in that predicament."

The next day, September 3, 17-year-old Brandon Bell was arrested.

"Unfortunately, the only charge they could get was criminal trespass in a motor vehicle," Gamaldi said.

Because he was given a PR bond Bell was out of jail in no time.

"All he had to do was sign his name and he was free to go," the union president said.

On September 9, Bell was charged with aggravated robbery.

On September 10, he was supposed to appear in court on the misdemeanor charge.

Police planned to arrest him then, but he didn't show up for court.

"We had that opportunity to pick him up and we could have avoided this entire crime spree that went on just two days later," said Gamaldi.

On September 12, Bell was shot to death by police after he shot a 5-year veteran of the Houston Police Department.

No warrant was filed against Bell for failing to appear in court. Instead, his case was reset to another day.

"We're seeing an awful lot of cases reset in court now when people don't show up," Gamaldi said.

The police union president believes there's hundreds of people like Bell out on PR bonds committing more crimes.

"We probably have hundreds of suspects out there right now on a PR bond that shouldn't be," said Gamaldi.