Man pushes for gun control after being shot during road rage incident he wasn't part of

HOUSTON – A shooting that happened Tuesday while two drivers were fighting wounded a man who was waiting at a red light in his car.

What happened

The shooting was reported about 9:20 p.m. at the corner of Waugh Drive and D’Amico Street.

Houston police said 36-year-old Mani Nezami was waiting in his vehicle at the light when two other drivers got out of their vehicles and began fighting.

During the altercation, shots were fired from one vehicle toward the other, and Nezami was hit in his left shoulder.

Nezami was taken to an area hospital and treated for his injuries.

What the victim is saying

Nezami wasn't a committed gun control advocate before this incident, but he said he is now.

“This is gun violence, and this is something that can be solved, but I don't understand why our Legislature, why our governor isn’t trying to do enough,” Nezami said.

Nezami said he and his wife had just left Whole Foods and were waiting at a traffic light when the shooting happened.

"We saw two cars chasing each other, and it sounded like exhaust backfiring, and after the second car drove in this direction, I felt glass shatter and felt a pain in my shoulder,” he said.

Nezami said he wasn't sure if he was going to survive as he waited for help to arrive.

“Really, the scariest part of all this wasn't the pain or anything. Realizing while I'm laying there, this could be it. This is how it ends," he said.

Doctors were able to remove the bullet safely and send him home.

"Yeah, I lucked out, man. An inch to the right, it would have hit an artery, and I would be dead," he said.

While Nezami was at the emergency room, he said others were brought in with gunshot wounds.

"In the ER, I saw two other people who had been shot. One lady was shot in the head and another guy who had been shot nearly a dozen times all over his body,” he said.

While police are saying it's a case of road rage, Nezami says he thinks that misses the point.

"This is an incident which resulted from road rage, which is true, but implicit in a conversation of road rage is gun violence,” he said. "Road rage is not the issue. Like, road rage didn’t cause a wound to go through my shoulder. A gun did and an idiot who had access to that gun."

Nezami said he'd like to see commonsense gun control.

What's next

The vehicles involved in the shooting were described as a white, four-door sedan and a dark-colored, late-model Infiniti SUV.

Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 713-222-8477.