The Texas cheerleader who was shot after a friend mistakenly got into the wrong car in a supermarket parking lot is now recovering in the ICU, her father said in an interview Wednesday. The star athlete, born with just one lung, is described by her dad as “tough as they come.”
Payton Washington, 18, was shot in the leg and the back in the gunfire that erupted around 12:15 a.m. Tuesday in an H-E-B parking lot in Elgin, her father, Kelan Washington, said.
Payton, a cheerleader at Woodlands Elite Cheer Co., was heading back home from practice with three other friends when they were shot at by a 25-year-old suspect, who has since been arrested.
Washington said one girl was grazed by a bullet and treated and released at the scene, but Payton suffered more serious injuries. She was transported via helicopter to a hospital in critical condition, Elgin police said.
Payton’s father said doctors removed Payton’s spleen and she’s now stable in the ICU at Dell Seton Medical Center at The University of Texas in Austin.
“Payton’s accomplished everything she has with only one lung [from] when she was born. She’s as tough as they come,” he said.
The shooting
The shooting unfolded as four cheerleaders with Woodlands Elite Cheer Co had stopped at an H-E-B parking lot, where some of the members had parked their cars, on their commute home from practice, gym owner Lynn Shearer told NBC affiliate KXAN of Austin.
Washington said the H-E-B was a “designated carpool site.” He said his daughter Payton had been going to Woodlands Elite in Houston for almost 10 years and was very familiar with the commute from Houston to her home Round Rock, about 170 miles away.
At the H-E-B, one of the girls accidentally tried to get into the wrong car, Shearer said.
That’s when, she said, a “guy got out and they saw that he had a gun. And so they tried to speed off and he shot his gun, like five times or so into the car.”
Payton’s father verified Shearer’s account about the mistaken car.
“He raised his hands and then brandished his weapon and then just started shooting at the girls,” Washington said, noting the shooter didn’t exchange any words.
He expressed shock that the suspect resorted to opening fire.
“You watched her walk up to your door on accident, it’s a girl in a cheer outfit,” he said.
Elgin police said “information suggests that an altercation occurred in the parking lot of HEB, and multiple shots were fired into a vehicle.” Two of the girls in the car were struck by gunfire.
Suspect Pedro Tello Rodriguez Jr, 25, was taken into custody and charged with deadly conduct. The investigation is still ongoing, police said.
Washington said the other girls are doing “fine” in the wake of the shooting and are supporting Payton.
“They’re family. Those girls are Payton’s sisters basically in spirit and in team camaraderie,” he said. “Of course they’re very concerned about their sister, they’re very concerned about their leader. Payton was the leader of this cheer squad in Houston.”
A lead cheerleader who won a tumbling scholarship
Since news of the shooting, there’s been an outpouring of support on social media for the impacted cheerleaders.
A prayer organized by Woodlands Elite was held Tuesday. Meanwhile, a GoFundMe page organized by the Woodlands Elite Generals to help raise money to cover her hospital costs had raised more than $71,000 as of Wednesday.
Payton has been a star athlete since she was a toddler, always looking for the next challenge, her father said.
She started with gymnastics when she was just 18 months old, but then “she wanted more dynamic movement.”
“She gravitated towards watching cheer and tumbling and just felt like she had to do it. She had to get over there and learn how to execute that stuff. She really had to learn how to throw all those moves she can as a left hander. And she did it on her own,” Washington said.
Currently a senior in high school, she’s already secured a tumbling scholarship to attend Baylor University after graduation.
Payton has another surgery to undergo. Though she’s heavily sedated and “in and out”, she’s been able to talk with her many visitors when she’s awake, her father said.
He said the family is leaning on their faith at this time and “Payton’s undeniable will not to settle for anything.”
The family is also grateful for the support they’ve received from the community and beyond.
“Just everybody rallying around Payton, it’s pretty refreshing,” he said.
He called his daughter “beautiful inside and out. She makes everybody around her a better person, a better athlete, a better student, a better Christian. All of it.”
Speaking on the suspect, Washington said his family wants “accountability for sure.”
“This young man has to deal with the next call, his own recollection and reflection of what he’s done and whatever God has for him. That’s a sentence in itself that he has to work through,” he said.
