Good Samaritan saves man shot on 5 freeway in suspected road rage incident

NORWALK, Calif. - On December 31st, Arely Gonzales didn’t know that the last day of 2023 would put her face-to-face with having to try to save somebody’s life.

Around 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Noel and Elsa Pena, along with their niece Bella, were driving on the northbound 5 Freeway at Carmenita Road, when they got involved in a violent road rage incident. 

Pamela Pena says her parents were driving home, after visiting a swap meet in Santa Fe Springs, when a man in another car got angry at them. 

"The guy cut them off on the freeway, almost causing an accident with my parents and my cousin," Pena said. 

Pena says her dad honked his horn, adding… "I guess the guy got really upset over it.  So he pulled up right next to my dad... started exchanging words... my dad drove off. The guy followed him and decided to shoot him."

Pena says her dad was hit under the armpit and lost a lot of blood. 

That's when Arely Gonzales, an off-duty surgical nurse, showed up. She wasn't going to stop... but she did. 

"I started screaming for people to help pull him out of the car and we put him on the street. There was so much adrenaline going through my body that all I could think was I needed to stop that bleeding," Gonzales told FOX 11. 

"I was scared. I was shaking... I was crying." But, through all of that, Gonzales did save a life.

She says she did what she was trained to do. 

"What I did was I just applied pressure, stay with that pressure... you try to contain that bleeding."

To Noel’s daughter, "she saved his life."

Noel remains in the ICU and underwent several surgeries. The driver who fired the shot is still outstanding. 

A GoFundMe has been created to help the family.