She’s a grandmother who loves God, her family and cooking. It’s only natural that she and her brother would operate a food truck in their native Houston, Texas. She serves soul food — pork chops, chicken wings, fried fish and Doritos pie — and very few leave her food truck hungry. Located on the south side of Houston and in business for the past four years, the family makes people happy. But not everyone who comes to a food truck is looking for soul food, because some people do not have a soul.
A Man With No Soul
Illustration by: Jason Brauncowski
A food truck is generally a cash business, selling its wares to folks who pass its location and then move on. There are no fancy tables or linen napkins, just excellent food and friendly faces.
One day in March at around 1 p.m., a 23-year-old man stopped by the soul food truck. The young man asked from his car about the menu and whether they had sold much.
The brother, working the window alone, told the individual what they served and that they had only had a few customers. Although the young man had been inquiring about the menu, he did not choose to sample the wings or get a burger and fries. What he wanted wasn’t on the menu. He wanted cash. Unbeknownst to him, there was only $40 in the cash drawer.
After conversing briefly, the assailant got out of his car, walked up, produced a handgun and demanded money. The brother at the window slammed the sliding glass door on the man and alerted his sister in the back. She retrieved her handgun.
Looking For a Fight
We often say that robbers don’t want a fight; they want a victim. This wasn’t one of those times. Instead of running away, the assailant forced the window open with his hands. He then thrust his gun inside and located the two family members.
Now aware of the commotion, the sister saw the man stick his handgun through the window and pull the trigger. She credits God with the fact that the gun did not go off. But she didn’t wait to see if the attacker could fix it.
Fearing for her life and the life of her brother, and with the attacker furiously working his gun, she used her handgun to shoot the assailant several times. The assailant ran away but only made it about 50 feet before he collapsed. The 911 operator sent police and EMS, and paramedics attended to the man. In spite of these medical efforts, he did not survive.1
Sound Firearms Tactics
Tactically, the woman had very little choice other than to present her firearm and shoot the attacker. A food truck is a confined space. It is a “fatal funnel” on wheels. There is nowhere to hide, and a ricochet can be just as deadly as an aimed shot. The narrow confines of the truck demanded immediate action. With the gun being pointed inside the truck and her brother being the focus of the robber’s rage, the sister shot the attacker in order to preserve innocent life as the attacker continued trying to shoot.
Although Texas has permitless carry, our defender was licensed, which meant she underwent the required course of study and passed the firearms course before getting her handgun license. While we don’t know if she took additional training, we do know that her shooting skills were sufficient to carry the day.
A Win That Feels Like a Loss
Even the “winner” of a gunfight — one who had no other choice than to defend his or her life — still carries an emotional burden.
Although in many respects this shooting was a win for the good guys, it doesn’t feel that way to the woman who had to use her firearm in defense of herself and her brother. She took a human life, and that makes it feel much less like a win. She told the Houston media she never thought she would ever have to use her concealed firearm. The fact that she took a life still troubles her.
However, her successful defense did not trouble the Houston Police Department. It completed an investigation and concluded that the woman faced an imminent deadly threat in her attacker. The attacker displayed a firearm and pulled the trigger, indicating that he had the clear intent to commit at least one murder over that $40 in cash. She was in a place where she had a right to be, was not the initial aggressor and used justifiable lethal force to defend herself. She stopped shooting when the threat ran away, did not chase after him, called 911 and gave a statement to police. She did everything properly.
While she was clearly in the right and did not have to engage counsel to defend her, she may still face a lawsuit from the heirs of the attacker.
Commercial Retaliation
In addition, it would appear that a zealous band of anti-gun fanatics has seen fit to litter Yelp with reviews of her food truck, calling the woman “a killer” and vowing never to eat there. It’s almost as if they would have preferred the assailant to have murdered two hard-working, innocent people and stolen their money.
On the upside, I imagine there will be a lot of Houston concealed carriers patronizing her food truck in the future.
Endnotes
(1) Cory McCord, “Woman shoots, kills man who tried to rob her SW Houston food truck, HPD says,” KHOU 11, March 28, 2023, KHOU.com/article/news/crime/south-main-street-food-truck-shooting-houston-crime/285-7e5041fc-19ac-42a5-bf46-121c7e9270d3; Mycah Hatfield, “Suspect killed while trying to rob food truck on South Main Street in SW Houston, police say,” ABC 13, March 28, 2023, ABC13.com/houston-crime-robbery-suspect-killed-man-shot-while-trying-to-rob-food-truck-main-street/13035778/; Mycah Hatfield and Briana Conner, “Houston food truck operator who shot robber says she didn’t think she’d use gun she owned for years,” ABC 13, March 31, 2023, ABC13.com/south-main-street-houston-ricky-jimenez-food-truck-robberkilled-elite-eats-fondren/13059822/.
