HOUSTON – A disabled Humble couple was robbed at gunpoint one week before their wedding.
Greg Gunnels and his fiancé, Marie Bratton, were watching airplanes take off and land about 2 a.m. Friday from the observation lot on Lee Road at George Bush Intercontinental Airport.
They said a black Ford pickup truck with at least two men inside pulled up alongside them. One of the men got out of the truck and started asking Gunnels for directions. As Gunnels was trying to help, the man pulled out a pistol and demanded he get out of the truck and onto the ground.
"He said, 'Where's your money?'" recounted Gunnels. "That's all he kept repeating. 'Where's your money? Where's your money? Where's your money?'"
The two men, who appeared to be in their early 20s, made Bratton get out and lay on the ground, too. She could only watch as one of the suspects kicked her fiancé in the ribs for no apparent reason.
"I thought right then that he was going to be gone," said Bratton. "And I was going to be laying there by myself, nowhere to go, nobody to help us."
The men did eventually leave, taking the couple's white 1998 Chevrolet 1500 pickup truck with them. Gunnels said it's not worth much, but it's his only means of transportation to get to and from work.
When the thieves drove away, they also made off with everything the couple had in the truck, including their wedding bands, keys to their home, driver's licenses and Social Security cards.
"They were supposed to get a marriage license today, and, in order to get a marriage license, you have to have all this," explained Gunnels' sister, Shelly Vick. Gunnels called her when he walked with Bratton to a nearby gas station.
"Both of them are handicapped," said Vick. "They don't have a lot except love between the two of them and their family. They're trying to get married. They're just out watching airplanes and the jerks come along and robbed them of everything they had."
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 713-222-TIPS.