A brave mom who was wounded in the California shooting rampage as she shielded her children said four people refused her pleas for help — one even claiming she was late for work, according to local reports.
Tiffany Phommathep, a 31-year-old mother or four, was dropping three of her children off at school Tuesday morning when gunman Kevin Janson Neal, 44, selected her as his next target,
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Her husband, Johnny Phommathep, told FOX 40 that Neal pulled up next to his wife’s car and fired at the driver’s side door.
“The kids started ducking,” he told the station. “My wife threw her body on top of my son JJ.”
Tiffany was shot four times — with wounds to her back, left shoulder, hip and stomach.
“I just kept on praying that he’d go away because I can’t take another bullet,” she told KCRA 3. “I knew I wouldn’t make it.”
Even though she was bleeding and losing consciousness, she frantically drove for miles, pleading with four passersby for help, according to the report.
“Found some more strength to open my window, my door and I hopped out to [a woman] and asked her, ‘Can you help? I’m shot, I’m dying, and my kids are in the car,'” she told the station. “She said she couldn’t help me because she only had a two-seater and she was late for work. That hurt my heart a lot to hear her say that.”
Finally, Phil Johnston, the Assistant Sheriff of Tehama County, pulled over to help Phommathep.
“Other community members didn’t stop,” Johnny Phommathep told FOX 40. “Me being a combat veteran and military police, I’m so grateful for Johnston within the community. To be honest, if not for that officer I wouldn’t have my wife.”
The brave mom is recovering at a local hospital. Her children have since been released. JJ, 10, was shot twice, and Phommathep’s 6- and 2-year-olds were hurt by shrapnel. They have since been released from the hospital. Her eldest son, who is 14, was not in the car at the time.
“My wife is a tough cookie to be shot and drive six, seven miles and bleeding to death,” her husband told the station.
He added that gunman was his family’s neighbor and had threatened to kill in the past.
“We’re not mad, we’re not angry,” Phommathep told KCRA 3. “We just feel like things could have been prevented — but that’s out of our control.”
