ELGIN, Texas — Police arrested a man suspected of shooting two teenage cheerleaders in an H-E-B parking lot about 30 minutes from Austin, Texas, after one of them mistakenly thought his car was theirs.
The Elgin Police Department identified 25-year-old Pedro Tello Rodriguez Jr. as the alleged shooter. Just after midnight, officers arrived on scene to find a car with multiple bullet holes and two people wounded inside. According to a police report, one girl was treated and released on-site, while the other was taken up in a helicopter to be transported to the hospital for her critical injuries.
In a CNN report, citing affiliate KTRK, the victim that sustained lesser injuries got out of a friend’s car and tried the handle of a vehicle she mistook as her own to then see a man seated on the passenger side. During a livestreamed vigil on Tuesday at the Woodlands Elite Cheer Company gym she recounted the suspected gunman’s reaction, saying she tried to apologize when back in her friend’s vehicle, but when she rolled the window down to do so, he let off gunshots into the car.
According to CNN, a probable cause affidavit reports the H-E-B manager witnessed the shooting, and the surveillance footage from the parking lot is in the hands of police. Officers said they could see the suspect’s license plate on video and later watched him at his residence.
This case is yet another incident where young people were met with violence after an oversight in surroundings. A 16-year-old was shot in the arm and head for ringing the wrong doorbell in Kansas City. And a 20-year-old is dead after she mistakenly pulled into the wrong driveway of a homeowner.
Officers said Rodriguez has been charged with deadly conduct, a third-degree felony. The investigation is still in progress.