HOUSTON – When the clock struck midnight on New Year’s Day, joy and excitement filled the Bellfort Village apartments complex.
But one family who was there is now speaking out about the danger they say was also lurking in the crowd and almost cost them their loved one’s precious life.
The past few nights have been sleepless for 12-year-old Emily Aguilar, her mother Sandra, and father Nestor Matute since they attended the festivities.
After getting there around 11:45 p.m., Matute says the plan was to bring in 2023 celebrating with the other approximately 50 adults and 30 children who filled the plaza area in the center of the complex.
But just moments after the clock struck 12, amid the firework and cheers for a happy and prosperous New Year, their plans were shattered with an unwelcome bang.
Emily says at first, she thought something might have fallen on her but then touched her neck and felt blood.
Soon, her family realized she had been shot in the neck.
Another bullet shattered the phone that was in her hand and another whizzed past her nose.
Matute says after rushing to his daughter’s aid, he heard at least four more shots and saw a gunman shooting about 40-50 feet away.
He says he ran to the gunman to try to warn him about what happened to his daughter and stop him from potentially killing someone else, but says the gunman cussed at him and told him to shut up.
He says he ended up leaving and rushing Emily to the hospital where doctors removed the bullet and told her she was lucky to be alive.
While the family is thanking God and calling her survival a miracle, Emily says she’s no longer the happy girl she once was, living in constant fear, suffering nightmares, and excruciating neck pain which only reminds her about what happened.
The family says they’re going to have to switch out the gauze on Emily’s neck every day for about a month or so, but the good news is she will be physically OK.
However, for them to find peace, they want to hear that the shooter has been taken off the streets.
Anyone with information is asked to give HPD a call.