HPD struggles to determine who is suspect or victim in zoo parking lot dispute that led to shooting

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — A woman who was shot by a security guard outside the Houston Zoo on Friday has been discharged from the hospital and is now sharing her perspective on the incident with.

The Harris County District Attorney’s Office is currently investigating the matter, but as of now, no charges have been filed against anyone involved.

Diamond Hunter, who had her four young children in the car with her when she was shot multiple times, recounted the traumatic experience.

“I got one in the head, and then one in the cheek, and I have fragments all over my chest,” Hunter revealed, displaying her bullet wounds.

According to Hunter, the altercation began on Friday afternoon after she engaged in a dispute with another driver over a parking spot outside the Houston Zoo.

She claimed that the man hit her 2-year-old child, while the man alleged that she assaulted him.

Both parties subsequently called for security.

“I told him, ‘Hey, I’m going to go around the parking lot and I’m going to park on the side.’ He said, ‘alright,’ and he called for backup, that’s what I’m thinking,” she recalled. “As I’m pulling out, (5 mph), a car stops and I’m like, ‘What the hell is that?’ So, I go around and somebody jumped in front of the car like this, so I swerved. When I swerved, the one that was on the scene, [was] the one that shot me dead in the head.”

The Houston Police Department reported that a security guard began firing into the car after Hunter struck him with her vehicle.

Both Hunter and the security guard were subsequently hospitalized.

“When I picked my kids up, they had their mom’s blood all over them. All over them,” expressed Oscar Chappel, the father of Hunter’s children.

Authorities stated that the investigation is ongoing, and currently, they are unable to determine who is the victim and who is the suspect.

Hunter mentioned that she has not been contacted by any investigators.

“He didn’t care about no kids in the car. I don’t understand how somebody like that could just sit on their couch and be OK with that,” Hunter lamented. “I feel like I’m dead. I keep picturing me getting shot over and over again.”

“You guys don’t give the right proper training to the people you guys put guns in hands and badges on,” Chappel added. “A gun and a badge does not make you a man. It does not make you above the law.”

According to a spokesperson for the Houston Zoo, the parking lot is managed, maintained, and owned by the City of Houston.