SAN ANTONIO – It’s a moment Jason Gates would like to forget yet will probably remember the rest of his life.
What was supposed to be a regular school drop-off for his 10-year-old daughter ended with her in surgery at a local hospital.
Gates was in the family’s van with his wife and daughter Friday morning when someone in another vehicle fired at them. San Antonio police described the shooting as a fit of “road rage.”
A single bullet pierced the back door of the van, right next to the seat where his daughter, who he identified as Alisa Gates, was sitting.
“My wife looks at my daughter and says, ‘Hey, did you get shot?’ My daughter says, ‘No’ Then, I opened the door a little bit,” Gates said.
Just prior to that, Gates said they had started to notice the odor of gunpowder.
Her parents soon found out that Alisa had, in fact, been shot and wounded in her upper body.
“I kept telling my wife, ‘Babe, you need to pull over.’ So, she pulled in right here, and this is where we stopped,” Gates said.
The couple, who were attempting to drive to a hospital on their own, instead pulled into a parking lot at Bandera and Callaghan roads and called for help.
San Antonio police later found evidence of the shooting at another location, which is near Wurzbach Road and Timberhill Drive.
Gates said that other location is where they first encountered the gunman before 7:30 a.m. Friday.
Gates told KSAT that he and his wife were taking their daughter to school when the other vehicle had suddenly pulled out in front of them.
“My wife was on her horn, but she was on her horn no more than three seconds,” Gates said.
Apparently, that was enough time to enrage the person in the other car and prompted him to open fire on the family’s vehicle.
Gates said as they attempted to drive his daughter to a hospital, they briefly met up with that car on the road again.
He said that’s when they were able to record the license plate number and get a description of the driver.
Police at the scene told KSAT 12 News they had a good idea of who that suspect might be. In a late Friday afternoon update, SAPD announced an arrest in connection with the shooting.
According to court records, Bryan Arceo, 41, is facing the following four charges:
- 3 counts of aggravated assault for recklessly discharging a firearm, which is considered a first-degree felony
- 1 count of child endangerment, which is considered a state jail felony
At this time, it is unclear whether Arceo is the shooter in the incident. As of Friday evening, a bond has yet to be set for Arceo.
Early on, Gates said his daughter was undergoing surgery.
“She’s doing great,” Gates said. “She’s doing (really) great.”
As for the family’s van, Gates said its days are numbered.
“I told my wife, I said, ‘What are we going to do with a bullet hole in the side of the car?’” Gates said. “She goes, ‘I don’t want the car anymore.’”
Gates said he’d like to see the vehicle and the bad memories of the day to quickly disappear.
More coverage of this story on KSAT: