HPD officer kills 1, wounds 1 after chase
3rd person who fled robbery is being sought by police
A Houston police officer shot and killed a man Tuesday in a residential neighborhood in Missouri City following a police chase that stemmed from a robbery at a Houston gas station, with another robbery suspect still at large, authorities said.
Police stopped the suspects’ car on Tiny Tree Drive, a residential neighborhood south of Independence Boulevard near Progressive High School and Hunter Glen Elementary, when a man got out and turned toward police with a pistol, Houston police said.
Two other men also got out of the car and one woman remained inside, police said.
Houston police spokesman Victor Senties said an officer, fearing for his partner’s safety, shot and killed one of the male suspects and wounded another, who was taken into custody. The officer was identified as M. Rivera.
Woman injured Senties said a third man fled. The female suspect was ordered to step out of the car, Senties said, but she did not immediately do so and the officer who had opened fire saw her appear to reach for something inside the vehicle.
In response, he fired at least one shot in her direction. She was injured but it is unclear if she was hit by the gunshot or shattered glass.
The wounded man and the injured woman were taken to Memorial Hermann Hospital. Senties said their injuries were not life threatening.
The incident began about 1:50 a.m. at the Busy Bee gasoline station in the 15500 block of South Post Oak, north of Beltway 8 South and just within Harris County, Senties said.
He said officers had been dispatched to an unrelated disturbance call when they saw several people robbing or trying to rob a woman pumping gasoline at the station.
Police said officers also heard a gunshot, and then saw the attackers jump into a silver Volvo driven by a woman and speed away, starting the police chase that ended in Missouri City, which includes parts of Fort Bend and Harris counties.
Dogs, copter used in search
No officers were hurt in the incident. Rivera is a six-year veteran of the HPD force.
The Houston police investigation remains ongoing, Senties said, with crime scene techs processing the scene and the homicide division conducting interviews while the search continues for the missing male suspect.
Missouri City police reached Tuesday evening referred all questions to Houston police, including whether they were still searching for the missing suspect.
No description was available of that man.
Senties said HPD searched the area with K9 units and a helicopter.
The Fort Bend County Sheriff ’s Office was alerted and deputies in the general vicinity were instructed Tuesday to keep on the lookout for the man, said agency spokesman Bob Haenel.
Because of the messy web of jurisdictional boundaries — both city and county — Haenel noted that police agencies in the area often collaborate on cases and searches that criss-cross the invisible borders.