OAKLAND — For the past two years, 23-year-old Tyja Braswell's life has been stuffed with turbulent ups and downs, each another drastic than the last.
Since March 2022 – when she was paralyzed in a shooting that left an innocent bystander dead – Braswell has been charged with murder, released from prison, witnessed her friend die after the automobile they were in was shot at, sent back to prison, negotiated a plea deal to avoid conviction for murder or manslaughter, and released on two years' probation.
Then, just six months after being released on parole, Braswell was arrested and again charged with attempted murder, this time on suspicion of shooting the identical woman Braswell confronted shortly before the fatal shooting in 2022.
In total, Braswell spent about three months behind bars, based on court records, much of it in an Alameda County Sheriff's Office medical facility with an armed guard because she was disabled. She is currently out of prison on parole under similar conditions that authorities say she has violated several times before.
Braswell's tumultuous story begins on March 19, 2022, when she and a girl named Tamia Foster got into an argument at a gas station on International Boulevard in Oakland, prompting Braswell to achieve into her fanny pack to get a gun. Foster's boyfriend, Stavon Moore, already had a gun ready and commenced shooting, hitting Braswell but in addition fatally wounding 64-year-old Rodney Davis, a veteran who was there to purchase drugs from Braswell, based on police and witness statements.
Braswell was shot within the spine and was paralyzed from that day on. Police investigated Davis' killing and prosecutors eventually charged each Braswell and Moore with Davis' murder and attempted murder of one another. Foster was accused of giving Moore the gun shortly before the shooting.
Moore took his case to trial last yr, where his lawyer argued that the blame for the whole lot was Braswell's, not Moore's. The jury apparently agreed, acquitting Moore of the whole lot except possession of the gun he used to kill Davis and paralyze Braswell. He was sentenced to 6 years in prison.
While that case was being tried, Braswell was not sent to jail despite the pending murder charge. The county's probation department charged her with dozens of violations of the conditions of her pretrial release, including escaping from a GPS ankle monitor and ignoring a court-ordered curfew.
However, one violation couldn’t be denied: On April 29, 2023, at around 2:30 a.m., Braswell was out with a friend when a person named Bernard Jimmerson allegedly riddled their automobile with bullets because he was upset concerning the loud vehicle.
Braswell survived the shooting, but cops who responded to her found that she was obviously not home, as she was purported to be there after hours. Braswell's girlfriend, Marie Villa Bedford, was struck by gunfire and died. Jimmerson was later arrested and charged with murder.
Five months later, a judge followed the probation officers' advice and ordered Braswell to be remanded in custody – but she didn’t go to jail. She was placed in a medical facility with armed guards, “at significant expense to the county,” her attorney wrote in a legal filing. Just a month later, a deal was negotiated – she pleaded guilty to possession of a firearm and received two years' probation.
“As far as I understand, you will not end up in state prison, but on probation. However, if you violate any probation at any point, you could go to prison for a maximum of six years,” Judge Delia Trevino Braswell warned at her plea change hearing in October 2023. “Do you understand that?”
“Yes,” Braswell replied.
But police say Braswell violated her probation six months later by attempting to kill Foster. The shooting occurred on May 30 of last yr at around 9:50 p.m. It bore striking similarities to the April 2023 shooting that Braswell survived. Police say she opened fire as Foster drove by in a vehicle, hitting the automobile several times, but Foster was unharmed.
Court documents say police recovered a gun from Braswell that day and located Facebook messages to Foster “that spoke of revenge and listed the date of the (murder) in which (Foster) and Braswell were co-defendants.” Braswell was charged in June with attempted murder, shooting into an occupied automobile and one other firearm possession charge.
On June 24, Judge Elena Condes released Braswell without bail, writing in a court order that Braswell should be under “house arrest” with a GPS monitoring device during her release. Her next court hearing is scheduled for October, records show.
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