The mother of an Olympic athlete for Puerto Rico was killed after she was hit by a stray bullet while in her home in Connecticut over the weekend, according to police.
Mabel Martinez, 56, and mother of Olympian Yarimar Mercado Martinez, is believed to be an innocent bystander in the shooting that took her life on Saturday, police said.
It is believed that a man walking outside her home in Waterbury, Connecticut, was the intended target as he was also shot but only wounded from being hit in the leg.
Martinez was shot in the head on Saturday afternoon and pronounced dead on Sunday, according to police.
Mercado Martinez, 27, competed as a rifle shooter on the Puerto Rico Olympic team during the Summer Olympics 2021 and 2016. She took to social media sharing her loss after her mother's death.
"Why you? Why this way? You were just sitting in your little house sewing, as you always did," Mercado Martinez wrote in Spanish.
She continued, saying that the two had spoken over the phone just two days prior as Martinez was preparing to renew her wedding vows with her husband in Puerto Rico.
"There are so many things I still needed to learn from you ... I was so far away without being able to do anything, I couldn't even say goodbye to you," Mercado Martinez wrote.
Waterbury Police Chief Fernando Spagnolo shared that investigators believe the shooting had nothing to do with Martinez but was drug-related. No arrests have been announced by the department as of now.
"This was definitely a random, tragic act of violence," Spagnolo told the AP. "She was in her house. She's not the intended target."
The investigation is "very, very active," according to Spagnolo.
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