Woman shot in face with airsoft assault rifle outside Riverside restaurant

RIVERSIDE, Calif. (KABC) -- A 21-year-old woman was shot in the face with what she believes was a pellet from an airsoft assault rifle in the parking lot of Baker's Drive-Thru in Riverside Friday afternoon.

SarahJane LaForge was fired on by a suspect outside the restaurant in the 5100 block of Jurupa Avenue shortly after noon. The pellet left a gaping hole in LaForge's nose.

"I felt like I got punched in the nose like three times. I didn't really know what to think. I honestly just covered my nose, and when I pulled my hand back, my whole hand was just covered in blood," she said.

Her father, Jeffrey LaForge, says he saw two men shooting airsoft guns from a home across the street about a split second earlier.

"It ripped through the trees and smacked her in the face before I could even tell her what was going on," he said.

LaForge was holding her 2-month-old son at the time.

"If I moved even one little inch, it could have hit him in the head and that's what terrified me," she said.

The alleged shooter walked over and apologized, but he didn't stick around for long.

"As soon as he found out we were calling the cops, he just took off on his bike down the street," she said.

The Riverside Police Department is investigating the incident, but LaForge and her father are frustrated. They claim police didn't recover the weapon because the homeowner denied them access to the entire home.

"Shots were fired from this address. How can you not search that entire address? How can you not enter every room to find a weapon?" LaForge's father said.

Riverside police told Eyewitness News one of the rooms of the home was being rented and officers did not have the right to go in and search it.