Woman shot inside her own car while playing 'Pokemon Go'

ATLANTA — A woman says she was shot in a northwest Atlanta parking lot when she stopped there to play the augmented reality game "Pokemon Go."

It happened around 12:15 a.m. on Dec. 14, 2018, in the 2000 block of Bolton Road Northwest.

The woman was sitting in her car when a man approached her with a gun. Luckily, a camera on the side of a nearby church recorded the whole thing.

Channel 2's Justin Wilfon obtained the newly released surveillance video from Atlanta police on Friday.

It shows the frightening moments when the man jumped out of a van with a gun and approached Ryan Lawler’s car.

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“She looked at the guy and saw he had a gun, and in her mind she thought, ‘I’ve got to get out of here,’” her husband, Jay Lawler, said.

As Ryan Lawler tried to drive away, Jay Lawler said the suspect shot her.

“The bullet went through the headrest, and fortunately, that probably slowed it down enough,” Jay Lawler said.

He said Ryan Lawler went out for a night of Christmas shopping.

On the way home, she later told police she stopped in the church parking lot to play the game "Pokemon Go" on her phone.

“She was in a red car. It may have stood out as an easy target,” Jay Lawler said.

Jay Lawler told Wilfon he believes it’s possible the suspect wanted to rob his wife, but after she started driving away, the video shows the suspect taking off.

Wounded in the shoulder by the bullet, Ryan Lawler crashed her car just feet away.

She called her husband for help.

“When I got there, I just told her to stay calm, just sit right here, don’t move or anything,” Jay Lawler said.

He told Wilfon that Ryan Lawler is healing from the physical wounds but said the emotional wounds will take longer.

“She gets to go on with life, and that’s part of the healing. Part of it is, she’s just going to just keep going,” Jay Lawler said.

Atlanta police now need your help to identify the van seen in the surveillance video.

Anyone with information about this case is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 404-577-8477.

Cox Media Group