Jonathan & Wilma Hochstetler Bloomfield, Indianapolis couple shot in roadside robbery. Mom killed, dad critically injured as 6 year old son calls 911. No arrests.
Police in Indianapolis are looking for two armed men who shot and killed a mother of four during an armed robbery, critically injuring her husband on Thursday. The incident led to the couple’s six-year-old son who lay hidden calling 911 for help.
Wilma Hochstetler, 40, died on Thursday night after she and her husband Jonathan were attacked by the side of a road in the west of the city.
The ‘deeply religious’ couple owned a roofing business in Bloomfield, 80 miles south west of Indianapolis.
Jonathan was away with work and driving home, when his tire blew, damaging a trailer light.
Wilma then drove from their home, with their six-year-old son Bradon, to Indianapolis to help him WLOX reports.
6 year old son manages to call 911
While the couple were working to repair the tire, at 1:50am, two men approached and held Wilma and Jonathan up at gunpoint, stealing Wilma’s phone and both of their wallets.
The gunmen turned to walk away, but then swiveled back and shot at them, killing Wilma and shooting Jonathan in the neck.
After the suspects fled, Jonathan Hochstetler, who had been struck in the neck and critically injured, told the boy to get his phone. 6-year-old boy, Bradon grabbed it and gave it to his father, so he could call 911.
Samuel Hochstetler, Jonathan’s father, said his son has had two surgeries, required fusion of three vertebrae, and is on a feeding tube.
He felt lucky not to be paralyzed.
‘He said I have total peace, I’m comfortable, I’m encouraged,’ Samuel said.
‘He said I have no anger towards those men.’
‘I extend forgiveness towards the two murderers,’
Samuel said that he too forgave the two men who attacked them.
‘I extend forgiveness towards the two murderers,’ he told Fox 59.
‘Revenge only begets more violence.
‘My heart’s desire for them is that they would repent and fall on their faces before the Lord Jesus and cry out for mercy for their own soul’s sake.
‘Jesus would desire to give them a new heart and a new spirit.’
Friends say faith and family guided everything Wilma did, from mission trips to the roofing business she shared with her husband. She met Jonathan as a teenager, and the two had four children.
Childhood sweat-hearts
Andrew Yutzy, a family friend, told WIS News that the pair were childhood sweethearts living a happy family life.
‘They were in the same church and the same youth group, and I guess, they were both kind of shy people,’ he said.
‘Two shy people met each other and fell in love.
‘They were just always the people that were there with a smile, and literally, they would give the shirt off their back, if it would help you.’
Wilma leaves behind four children – Melissa, 16, Abigail, 14, Kendra, 10, and six-year-old Bradon.
No known description of the two men was immediately made known as they continued to remain at large.
