A professional mixed martial artist was able to take out a gunman at a sushi restaurant on Monday night – a year after he stopped a car thief.
Kevin Holland, 29, a UFC welterweight, was at Ra Sushi in Highland Village in Houston, Texas around 11:30 p.m. Monday night when witnesses say someone entered the restaurant and fired shots into the air.
As ABC 13 reports, many of the restaurant’s nearly 50 patrons ducked for cover at the time, but not Holland.
He and two of his friends, who were having lunch at the time, quickly moved into action to help apprehend the shooter.
“We were eating and the next thing you know is a shot,” Dallas native Patrick Robinson told ABC 13.
“So everything stopped and then everyone ran to get under the table.”
But he told Click2Houston: “We just quickly jumped on him, got to the shooter and brought him down.
Kevin Holland, 29, a UFC welterweight, helped stop a shooter at a sushi restaurant in Houston on Monday night.
His friend Patrick Robinson told ABC 13 how they went into action immediately after the shooter fired into the air.
The shooting took place at the Ra Sushi restaurant in Houston, Texas around 11:30 p.m. while Holland and his friends were having lunch.
The suspect, 24-year-old Jesús Edrai Cardiel Samaniego, is now facing possession of a stolen weapon and the dismissal of firearms charges.
“He had a backpack,” Robinson added. “We took his backpack from him because we didn’t know what was in it.
“And from that moment on, everything went well.”
By the time the police arrived on the scene, they said 24-year-old Jesús Edrai Cardiel Samaniego had already been captured and his weapons were taken from him.
Following this, Holland posted a video of police standing next to Robinson, claiming there was a “gunfight” and writing, “I’m drunk and fighting, fighting kung fu.”
In the second video, he added that the suspect was fine.
Samaniego is now being charged with possession of stolen weapons and charges of using firearms.
Police say he was also in possession of drugs at the time of his arrest.
Last year, Holland managed to apprehend the hijacker until the police arrived at the scene.
But this was not the first time that Holland showed his real heroism.
Last year, when he was returning home to Texas from a UFC fight in Las Vegas, he helped catch a car thief.
He told Bleacher Report that he was on his way home in October when he noticed a car pulling out of a parking lot.
Just moments later, he said, a man ran up to him and yelled, “Hey, he stole my car.”
Holland then decided to chase the runaway car, and when he stopped next to it, the driver sped away.
He then continued to follow the car around his home, according to Bleacher Report.
At one point during the chase, the driver hit a tree, but by the time Holland tried to get close to him, the driver reversed and tried to drive towards him instead.
He immediately jumped back into his car and said he noticed that the alleged victim had now got into the truck and was also chasing the thief.
Eventually, the driver crashed into the trailer and attempted to escape on foot as Holland pursued him.
When he finally caught up with the thief, he said, he used his Brazilian jiu-jitsu skills and held the suspect in place in Saginaw, Texas until the police arrived on the scene.