Texas Father Fatally Shot While Carrying Daughter's Birthday Cake Into Chuck E. Cheese

A Texas man was shot and killed last week in the parking lot of a Chuck E. Cheese while his family was inside celebrating their daughter’s sixth birthday, KTRK reports.

Calogero Duenes, 24, was in charge of bringing his daughter’s birthday cake inside the restaurant. He was trailing behind his wife Amber Uresti and their 6- and 3-year-old daughters with the cake in tow when he encountered the person who would take his life. Surveillance footage shows Duenes getting into a verbal altercation with the suspect who nearly hit him after driving the wrong way down a row of parking spaces.

Duenes and the suspect exchanged words before gunfire erupted. “I saw him,” Uresti said. “I saw him walking towards us. I told the lady my husband was on his way. I pointed at him, and the instant I turned around, he came running in through the door and he kept saying, ‘I got shot! I got shot!’”

An eyewitness said they heard three gunshots. “He picked up his shirt and ran outside,” Uresti said. “I ran out after him. My 6-year-old saw him fall on the ground.” Duenes was taken to a nearby hospital where he was pronounced dead. “He had no weapons,” she recalled. “He was holding my daughter’s birthday cake. He had nothing on him. I don’t understand why.”

Duenes and Uresti were only teenagers when they first met, and would’ve celebrated a decade together in September. She said their daughter had been crying at night while clutching her father’s shirt. “There’s nothing I can tell her. There’s no words to tell her other than, ‘Daddy is with you in your heart. He loves you,’” Uresti said.

An investigation into the incident is still in progress.

A GoFundMe page has been set up to help cover the family’s funeral expenses.