The mother of a seven-year-old boy who was shot in the head by a stray bullet while eating a McDonald’s Happy Meal has revealed his heartbreaking plea before being rushed to hospital.
The woman, named by local outlets as Divina, said she had been returning to her north Houston home from work Tuesday night with her three children when the horrifying incident happened. She told KHOU 11 that the youngster and his brother had run upstairs to eat their food – chicken McNuggets – when gunshots rang out.
Divina said found her son screaming and bleeding from a gunshot wound to the head.
"’Why’ he said to me,” she told the outlet, in Spanish. “God heal me please. Save me please, I don’t want to die.”
The boy was hit while sitting on the couch in the apartment. The bullet shattered a glass door and struck him in the head.
The boy was later taken to nearby Memorial Hermann Hospital where he underwent surgery for a fractured skull. As of Wednesday, he remained in the hospital while doctors checked for further potential brain damage – though he is expected to survive.
A neighbor said she heard the gunshots and ran to help, telling KHOU 11 that she had tried to keep the child awake while emergency services were called.
Police said the bullet had come from a shootout between two groups of people near the apartment complex. Bullet casings and holes were found in several other buildings and in a nearby fence, KHOU 11 reported.
“We had apartments hit both upstairs and downstairs. The victim was in a downstairs apartment,” a HPD representative told the outlet.
“We have no witnesses. Just the evidence of the directions of the shots that were fired and the different casings leads us to believe that it was two separate parties firing at each other.”
Investigators said multiple shots were fired from several different caliber weapons, though as of Wednesday, police were still trying to identify suspects in the case.
