Woman sees domestic abuse, calls 911; but did help arrive?

HOUSTON (FOX 26) - A good Samaritan says she was alarmed to see a man verbally, then physically attacking a woman who had a baby with her.  She says she was even more disturbed when she called 911 but she never saw any officers arrive.  

It happened in Third Ward.  The woman even recorded a portion of the incident.  She says sometimes when it may be unsafe to intervene, the next best thing is to call 911 and record what you can in case police need it later for evidence, and that’s what this resident did.

She says on Sunday through a closed window she could hear indescribable screaming coming from the sidewalk on Wheeler near Crawford.  So she called the police for the woman and baby who seemed to be in danger, but she says she’s still waiting for help to arrive.

“You can’t mind your own business when you see physical violence,” she says.  

So what did she see Sunday evening?  

“The man was in her face and pushing her. The woman was trying to get away from him, but he wouldn’t let her and the behavior continued to escalate with the gentleman.  He started using physical violence against her.  She was defending herself," she says. 

This resident doesn’t want her name revealed, because after about 20 minutes of recording the horrible domestic violence incident, she intervened. 

“He told me it was in my best interest to mind my own business.  He was not calming down.  He was continuing to use physical violence and his size to dominate.  She was still trying to get away.  The baby was upset,” she says.  On the recording you can hear the baby in the stroller crying.  

What you don’t see on camera is this man responding to this resident rather unkindly, to say the least.

The woman says she called 911 twice.  "I was told they were in route and other people had already called.  I called again because I was more concerned about the child and her well being, as well as everyone else nearby because he kept lifting up his shirt and I didn’t know why."

She says the man yelling in the woman’s face, the profanity, the pushing soon graduated to choking.

"The screams the woman was yelling was really upsetting,” she says.  There's audio of the woman screaming at that point, but not video as the resident says the man had his hands around the woman’s throat.

“She was trying to twist away.  It wasn’t good. She was screaming and yelling and twisting and he wasn’t letting go," she says.

The resident says when she told the man to stop, he eventually allowed the woman to pass by him, but he followed her and she says the verbal attack continued.  "I could hear him yelling about a block and half away."

She has no idea what ultimately happened to the woman and baby.  The resident says she was so disturbed at never seeing help arrive she followed up the next day with an email to the Houston Police department and Houston City Council.

The Houston police department says preliminary findings show an officer responded, talked with someone who called 911 and was told it was just an argument so the "call for help" was closed out. However HPD says an investigation into the matter is underway.