SAN ANTONIO — Members of an east San Antonio church continue to pray fervently for two congregation members who were shot as they were leaving the Greater Faith Institutional Church after an event Sunday afternoon.
Pastor Rosa Wilson says 24-year-old Rico Steward was in surgery all night after being shot seven times.
Wilson adds a six-year-old boy in the car with Steward was shot once. She says the bullet went through the boy’s shoulder and is now lodged just inches from his heart. The family is praying for healing, saying the boy had significant arterial damage that may have a lasting impact on his ability to use his arm.
The shooting happened around 3 pm Sunday at the church at 3514 Martin Luther King Drive.
San Antonio Police Chief William McManus called the incident a targeted attack, saying a gunman had been lying in wait in a nearby open field.
Congregation members say when the family came out of the church and started to drive away, the gunman came out from behind a tree, walked up to the car, and opened fire.
Church members say when Steward was shot, he drove away from the church seeking to get away from the gunman and call for help.
Police say Steward made it as far as a grocery store at the corner of South WW White and Martin Luther King Drive.
First responders found Steward in critical condition, the boy with the gunshot wound, and a 21-year-old woman with bleeding injuries caused by shrapnel from flying glass.
Two other children were in the car as well. Police say a five-year-old and a 10-year-old weren’t hit by gunfire, but family members say they, too, were injured by flying glass, and by the trauma of seeing family members shot at close range.
“All of the violence throughout the city is stepping over the line, but when you do it at a church event? That's pretty much unheard of,” McManus said, adding “This is just uncalled for insanity, that someone would be brazen enough to do this Sunday afternoon at a church event.”
McManus said eyewitnesses told investigators they saw the man with the gun run from the scene, barefooted, into the neighborhood nearby. A suspect, 20-year-old Ronald Robinson, was taken into custody late Monday afternoon. Police said Robinson faces several Aggravated Assault Deadly Weapon charges in connection to the incident.
Undeterred in their faith, church members took to praying on Monday, hosting a noon service for in-person and online participation.
Pastor Rosa Wilson prayed “God open the windows of heaven and pour down a blessing!"
As they joined hands and hearts, in-person and online, they asked for a double miracle, to heal both of the shooting victims and the community at large.
Meanwhile, a spokesman for the San Antonio Independent School district confirmed the young boy is a student at a district campus. They said they activated what they call the “Handle With Care” protocol, notifying school personnel that some students might need extra help dealing with the attack.
They said counseling would be provided to any child who needs help.
The church is hosting what they hope will be a city-wide prayer service in their parking lot Wednesday night at 6 pm.
They have titled the event "Stop in the Name of Love." Wilson says she hopes people will come to pray but also to commit to becoming involved in building a better community.