HOUSTON – A Houston man was outside admiring the fireworks display on New Year’s Eve when he was hit in the wrist by celebratory gunfire.
“I was right here standing outside my car,” Roberto Carlos said in Spanish. “And it just fell from the sky.”
Carlos’s roommate, Paul Moreno, was standing next to him at the time.
“(We were) just talking about 2020, hoping everything (was) going to be ok,” Moreno said. “He goes, ‘Ow!’ I said, 'are you kidding?”
“He asked me where the bullet came from,” Carlos said in Spanish. “I said, ‘I didn’t see anything.’”
Capt. John Shannon said the Harris County Sheriff’s Office received many calls about celebratory gunfire on New Year’s Eve.
“Despite repeated warnings against celebratory gunfire, this is something that goes on and is unacceptable,” Shannon said. “It’s a dangerous thing and that’s why we tell you don’t do it and that’s why it’s against the law.”
Crimestoppers is offering rewards of up to $5,000 for information leading to the arrest or conviction of anyone who fired weapons illegally on New Year’s Eve.
The crime is a misdemeanor punishable by up to a $4,000 fine and up to a year in jail.
Doctors removed the bullet from Carlos’s arm and he is recovering at home in north Houston.