OPA-LOCKA, Fla. – A security guard at an apartment complex in Opa-locka was hit by a stray bullet when two men opened fire on three others leaving in a car early Thursday.
The shooting happened at Port Said Road and Northwest 132nd Terrace about 2 a.m. Police say the three men inside a car were pulling out of the complex when two others shot at them.
One of the bullets pierced the security booth and hit 26-year-old Marquise McElmore in the leg.
"I thank God that I'm alive," he told Local 10, speaking from a telephone at Jackson Memorial Hospital. "All of a sudden, I walked outside and I see myself bleeding like dramatically and then I screamed out for somebody."
"He was just doing his job. I guess the stray bullet entered the guard booth and struck him in the thigh," said Opa-locka Assistant City Manager David Chiverton.
The driver crashed through the gate. Two of the men were grazed by bullets, but none of the three were hospitalized. The gunmen then ran off.
A few hours after the shooting, Pamela Grate would have been in the guard booth. She questioned her career choice but realistic about changing it.
"You have to work. You have to work," she said. "It's dangerous wherever you go. There's no safe place in the world. You just have to hope nothing happens to you."
A description of either gunmen wasn't immediately available. Anyone with information on the shooting is asked to call Miami-Dade Crimestoppers at 305-471-TIPS.