Drivers’ spat ends in death of woman
A fight between two drivers turned deadly early Saturday when one pulled out a gun and opened fire on the other, killing her on a residential street in northwest Houston, police said. The death follows a spike last year in road rage shootings, a rampant issue authorities are trying stamp out.
Officers were dispatched to the reported shooting around 4:45 a.m. in the 8500 block of Rannie Road in the Spring Branch area, where they found a female driver dead from gunshot wounds, said Sgt. Michael Arrington of the Houston Police Department homicide division.
Investigators said the victim was in a physical altercation with the assailant in the 8600 block of Rayson Road shortly before the shooting, Arrington said. They did not know each other, and it was unclear what sparked the argument.
After the fight, both drivers got into their cars and drove off, but they encountered each other less than two blocks away. That’s when the assailant fired three or four rounds into the woman’s car, fatally striking her, Arrington said.
A female passenger in the victim’s car was not injured. The suspect vehicle was described as a silver Ford pickup. Authorities are seeking tips from the public to help solve the case.
“This is a common occurrence,” Arrington said of road rage. “We want to try to put a stop to this.”
The shooting follows a Friday night incident in Katy in which a child was shot in a suspected road rage incident. The 9-year-old girl is expected to make a full recovery, according to the Harris County Sheriff’s Office. The investigation continues, and no arrests have been made.
In a December news conference, HPD Chief Art Acevedo said his department would take steps to tamp down on road rage after noting a 33 percent increase in shootings tied to road rage in 2020, compared with the previous year.
At least six people were killed last year within city limits in shoot
ings that investigators attributed to road rage, police said. HPD also tracked roughly 200 nonfatal road rage shootings from January through October. Meanwhile, two people died in Harris County in shootings sparked by road rage.
The incidents often start with an aggressive driver, authorities said. Police, local constable’s offices and the Department of Public Safety will contribute officers to a task force patrolling the streets with the aim of arresting reckless and aggressive drivers, officials said.
“We’re saturating the roads with unmarked cars,” Sean Teare, head of the vehicular crimes division at the district attorney’s office, said in December. “The goal is to get the aggressive drivers that move directly to road rage off the street before it comes to aggravated assault or murder.”