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Pastor shot after leaving Houston rodeo speaks
A pastor was robbed and shot after leaving the Houston rodeo and says he's grateful for being alive. FOX 26's Damali Keith reports more after speaking to him.
HOUSTON - A pastor who was robbed and shot after leaving the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo says he's grateful to be alive and able to share his story.
Pastor Thomas Wilson was robbed and shot twice while walking to his car last week after the rodeo.
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"I looked at him, and he pulled the gun, and put it in my face," Pastor Wilson explains.
It was around 10:30 p.m. last Wednesday when Pastor Wilson arrived at his car, finding the window in his vehicle and several others broken, and a man approached asking to borrow his phone.
Then, "He said something odd to me. He said the Lord's not going to bless you tonight," the pastor explains.
That's when the man pulled a gun on the pastor.
"I got hold of him and slung him down and tried to wrestle the gun away from him," says Pastor Wilson, who ended up shot a short time later, with the bullet narrowly missing his heart, but he kept fighting, literally for his life.
"It was definitely terrifying," the pastor explains.
Wilson was then shot a second time in his chest.
"We fought for about 15 minutes. It was truly a fight. It finally ended with me hitting his hand, him losing control of the gun, but he scrambled up and got away from under me, and he grabbed his gun and was running," says Pastor Wilson.
In the struggle, the shooter left behind his phone, a vape, a shoe and a near lifeless Pastor Wilson, who says that night he was saved by God himself.
"He said get up from here. You shall live and not die. I have work for you. (You're lying on the ground, face down, bleeding, shot twice and you could clearly hear a voice?) I clearly heard that voice. Every time I think about it, I start to well up and say thank you, God, thank you, God," Pastor Wilson explains.
The pastor, who paid $25 for the parking spot on Interchange Drive near Bellfort, one block from Kirby, has since learned it was not an official Rodeo parking lot.
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The shooter hasn't been caught. Pastor Wilson believes he was between 18 and 25-years-old.
"Satan comes in all types of ways. I forgive him, but there are some consequences he has to face. I just want to say to the parents of this young man that I just want you to know I'm sorry that all of this happened. I know he has parents somewhere, and I feel sad for them," says Pastor Wilson, who in his full-time job works with youngsters trying to steer them into positivity. So, the pastor says he's heartbroken at the path this young man has chosen to take.
Pastor Wilson is expected to make a full physical recovery, but he realizes he has some emotional challenges ahead. He's now having trouble sleeping, but finding comfort in spending nights reading his Bible.
There is a $5,000 reward if you have information leading to the arrest of the gunman.