A terrifying episode took place outside of a Houston gas station store on Tuesday evening, when a nine-month pregnant woman and her husband were threatened by an armed criminal.
The woman, who requested anonymity due to safety concerns, told KTRK-TV that she had pulled up to the All Season Food Store just before 5:30 pm to deliver a meal for her husband, who works there.
Upon arriving, the couple noticed that there were two men in a silver SUV parked nearby. The woman remarked that “as soon as [she] got out of [her] car, the guy in the passenger seat of the silver car got out with an AR and told [her] that [she] startled him.” The woman’s husband soon emerged from the store, and the man with the rifle got into the driver’s seat of a green Dodge Challenger parked beside the SUV.
The driver of the SUV, who was later identified as 39-year-old Mario Duque, began to behave aggressively, asking the husband “Do you want to die tonight?” Surveillance footage showed Duque pointing his gun at the couple multiple times, and even approaching the husband and striking him with the pistol.
In response, the woman pulled a gun from her bag and shot Duque, and her husband did the same. “Thank God we had our guns,” the woman told KTRK. “I’ve never been happier to be a gun carrier.” The footage also showed the woman holding Duque at gunpoint until assistance arrived.
A bystander noted that Duque should “pray to God for forgiveness” if he thought he was going to die. The woman was adamant that nothing would happen to her husband before her due date: “No, they were not taking out my baby daddy before July 11.”