A heroic Texas teen was shot in the heart during a road rage nightmare but still managed to safely veer her car off the road to save her passengers before she died.
Louise Jean Wilson, 17, was driving to watch the sunrise in Galveston with her boyfriend and another friend when the heated confrontation ignited on Dec. 10, according to Houston Police.
Police said Wilson unintentionally swerved in front of the suspect’s four-door sedan to avoid getting into an accident when the gunman opened fire in response at around 1 a.m. on Interstate 45 in Houston.
“The vehicle that they had cut off accelerated and overtook her on her driver’s side,” Det. Caleb Bowling said during the press conference.
Despite being mortally wounded, Wilson safely guided her car off the road to save her friends from the gunfire and prevent other drivers from crashing into her vehicle on the busy interstate.
Wilson died at the scene.
“Louise’s last act was to safely pull over, most likely saving the lives of two males,” Detective Caleb Bowling said during the press conference. “It was a heroic act to get that car to the side and stop with the injuries that she sustained.”
A 17-year-old male passenger was taken to the hospital with a gunshot wound and was treated and released. A third male was not injured.
The suspect, described as a black male in his mid-20s, has yet to be located by police.
Wilson had graduated high school in May and was only “a few classes” shy of earning her associate’s degree, according to her obituary.
She was killed on her grandmother’s birthday, her father, Daniel Wilson, revealed during the press conference.
“Our daughter was just trying to go to the beach to watch the sunrise with her boyfriend on her day off before she had to go back to work again,” her father said.
“She ended up dying a hero. She was shot through her heart, and she was still able to safely pull over the car and save people in her car and other people who were driving. She wanted to help people, and she helped them.”
Her father had a stern message to pass to the suspect still on the run.
“Just think about … what you took from this world and what she could have done,” Daniel Wilson added. “Lay that on your conscience, whoever did this. Just know, you gave an angel, but you took our baby girl.”
Wilson’s uncle, Leo Amoling, described his niece as a loving individual with a “wonderful soul.”
“Louise was a great girl, a wonderful soul, a great daughter, granddaughter and sister, and to have her life senselessly taken by a dirtbag. This should not have happened,” Amoling told KTRK Monday.
Texas ranks as one of the most dangerous states for road rage incidents involving firearms.
In 2021, an average of 44 people per month were killed or wounded in road rage shootings — double the pre-pandemic average, according to statistics shared by the Texas Supreme Court.
There were 610 incidents of road rage in 2021 where a gun was involved — with 34% of those incidents resulting in injuries or death.
“This is not the country we fought to protect, and it breaks my heart because it’s not just happening to us. There is a real crime issue in this country. We just want justice,” Amoling said.
Law enforcement is looking for any additional witnesses who may have seen the shooting unfold to come forward with more information.
“We’ve been here before, and it’s sad. We’re in a large city with some homicides, and we’ve got a lot of work to do,” Houston police Chief Troy Finner said during the press conference. “Every family is important to us. Every block in this city is important to us.”